Latest & Interesting News

Political Play: Obama dances for Ellen DeGeneres

2008-10-22T07:26:00.001-07:00

MIAMI: They really will do anything to get elected. At the end of a long campaign day Tuesday in Florida, Democrat Barack Obama had one more stop: "The Ellen DeGeneres Show."

DeGeneres got right down to business.

"Let's talk about dancing," she said. "Your wife, Michelle, was on the show and she was talking some smack about your moves."

DeGeneres played music and gave Obama 20 seconds to prove his spouse wrong. He complied, albeit in a decidedly awkward set of circumstances — standing alone on a patch of concrete and looking into cameras that were to beam him into the studio, as supporters and reporters watched.

He gamely grooved a little, though mostly with his arms, before calling off the operation with a smile.

"Michelle may be a better dancer, but I am convinced I am a better dancer than John McCain," Obama said of his Republican rival.

During the brief appearance, Obama revealed the Halloween costumes his two daughters have planned. Ten-year-old Malia will be a fairy and 7-year-old Sasha has chosen to go trick-or-treating as a "corpse bride," he said.

Obama also offered to help DeGeneres with her campaign to lure George Clooney onto her show, agreeing it would be one of the new president's most important priorities. If elected, he said he would appoint Clooney "ambassador to the Ellen show."

"We would have you and him sit down without preconditions and solve any differences that you may have," Obama said. "Just don't talk about my dancing anymore."

The interview is scheduled to air Wednesday

Princess Victoria invites Aamir Khan for dinner

2008-10-22T07:22:00.000-07:00

MUMBAI: So much is happening around Aamir Khan these days. The stupendous success of his critically-acclaimed film Taare Zameen Par has made him popular all the more. Now, Princess Victoria of Sweden has invited him for a dinner with her.

It is said that the 31-year-old princess is aware of Aamir's works and very appreciative of his latest film Taare Zameen Par, India’s official entry to the Oscars this year.

She along with the Swedish ambassador will meet Aamir on Tuesday. It is said that she would call on him during her visit to Mumbai and congratulate him on his second entry to the Oscars. Aamir is all set to meet the princess. He said that it's a privilege to receive such special invitation.

Princess Victoria, the eldest daughter of Swedish King Carl XVI Gustaf, is on a 10-day state visit to India for The Sweden India Nobel Memorial Week 2008 celebrations.

US suicide rate increases due to spike in Whites

2008-10-22T07:19:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON: The suicide rate in the United States has risen for the first in a decade largely due to an increase in the number of middle-aged white people taking their lives, according to a study published Tuesday.

The annual suicide rate rose by 0.7 percent between 1999 and 2005, but among white Americans between the ages of 40 to 64 it rose 2.7 percent, according to the study.

For middle-aged white women the suicide rate rose 3.9 percent, the study reported.

By contrast, the suicide rate among African-Americans decreased during the same period, and remained unchanged among Asian Americans and Native Americans, said the study, published in the online edition of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

"The results underscore a change in the epidemiology of suicide, with middle-aged whites emerging as a new high-risk group," said co-author of the study Susan Baker, a professor with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School's Center for Injury Research and Policy.

"Historically, suicide prevention programs have focused on groups considered to be at highest risk -- teens and young adults of both genders as well as elderly white men," sh said.

The research, said Baker, "tells us we need to refocus our resources to develop prevention programs for men and women in their middle years."

Researchers found that firearms remain the predominant method for suicides, but that the rate of firearm suicides decreased during the study period. Suicide by hanging or suffocation soared among men, the study found, with a 6.3 percent annual increase.

Hanging or suffocation accounted for 22 percent of all suicides by 2005, coming in second place behind firearms. Poisoning took third with 18 percent.

Reasons behind the spike in the suicide rate remain unclear, the study said.

"While it would be straightforward to attribute the results to a rise in so-called mid-life crises, recent studies find that middle age is mostly a time of relative security and emotional well being," said Baker.

"Further research is warranted to explore societal changes that may be disproportionately affecting the middle-aged in this country," she said.

Obama and McCain cats in championship

2008-10-19T06:34:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK: Barack Obama and John McCain will attend a New York cat show this weekend — Obama the Bombay cat and McCain the American Shorthair, that is.

The two felines are vying for the title of "Purr-fect President" at the Cat Fanciers' Association-IAMS 2008 championship that opens Saturday at Madison Square Garden.

More than 40 breeds are represented among the several hundred competing animals. The top title goes for "Best in Show."

In addition, hundreds of other kittens and cats will be available for adoption.

This year's show also features a rescued New Jersey shelter cat and member of the Iams Trained Cats that perform Olympic-style tricks.

NASA satellite to scan solar system outer limits

2008-10-19T06:28:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON: NASA is preparing to launch a satellite that will study in unprecedented detail the distant regions where the outermost reaches of our solar system collide with the cold expanse of interstellar space.

The U.S. space agency said that the Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, satellite is scheduled to be launched into high-Earth orbit on Sunday for its two-year mission from a site at Kwajalein Atoll in the south Pacific.

While interstellar space often is thought of as a vacuum, it actually contains traces of gas and dust.

The solar wind, a stream of electrically conducting gas continuously moving outward from the sun at 1 million mph (1.6 million kph), blows against this interstellar material and forms a humongous protective bubble around the solar system. This bubble is called the heliosphere.

As the solar wind reaches far beyond the planets to the solar system's outer limits, it encounters the edge of the heliosphere and collides with interstellar space. A shock wave is present at this boundary.

"These boundaries really protect us from the fairly harsh galactic environment," Boston University astronomer Nathan Schwadron, who heads science operations for the IBEX mission, said during a conference call with reporters.

NASA said IBEX will map the boundary region, which is important because it shields the solar system from dangerous galactic cosmic rays. IBEX is designed to detect atoms that are heated and thrown off from the boundary.

"Every six months, we will make global sky maps of where these atoms come from and how fast they are traveling. From this information, we will be able to discover what the edge of our bubble looks like and learn about the properties of the interstellar cloud that lies beyond the bubble," physicist Herb Funsten of the U.S. Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory, who is part of the mission, said in a statement.

Speak two languages and save your brain

2008-10-16T09:39:00.000-07:00

ISLAMABAD: People who can speak two or more languages are said to be more imaginative, flexible and get distracted less.

"Speaking two languages save one's brain" is the formula of human life and the brain of bilingual and multilingual work fast as compared to the people who know single language.

Competency in more than one or two languages also saves the brain from getting weaker with age.

According to a recent research of Canadian University, the brain of a person who is frequent in speaking two languages work quickly and soundly for long period as compared to those who know single language.

The researchers of Canadian university have performed an experiment on 104 people between the age of 30 to 88 which proved that those people who are proficient in speaking two languages, their brains work more fast comparatively.

The research of Psychology and Over-aging tells that the mental condition of people who are proficient in speaking two languages is not affected with growing age factors as of others.

The research also revealed that the people who spend their time in playing musical instruments, study and dancing, their mental health decline passively as compared to others.

Solving queries and playing board games like chess also help sustaining mental health for a long time.

This modern research verifies the previous concept that language proficiency has the ability to protect the brain from decaying.

Last Titanic survivor sells mementos

2008-10-16T09:34:00.000-07:00

LONDON: Millvina Dean was just two months old when she was wrapped in a sack and lowered into a lifeboat from the deck of the sinking RMS Titanic.

Now, more than 95 years later, Dean, the last living survivor of the disaster, is hoping to help pay her nursing home fees by selling artifacts of her rescue — a suitcase and other mementos expected to auction for about $5,200.

Rescued from the bitterly cold Atlantic night by the steamship Carpathia, Dean, her brother and her mother were taken to New York with nothing but the clothes on their backs. Before returning home to England, they were given a small wicker suitcase of clothing, a gift from New Yorkers, to help them rebuild their lives.

The suitcase and other mementos are to be sold Saturday at an auction organized by Henry Aldridge and Son, which specializes in Titanic memorabilia.

Auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said the key item was the suitcase that was filled with clothes and donated to Dean's surviving family members after the disaster.

"They would have carried their little world in this suitcase," Aldridge said Thursday.

Dean also is selling letters from the Titanic Relief Fund offering her mother one pound, seven shillings and sixpence a week in compensation.

Dean, 96, has lived in a nursing home in the southern English city of Southampton — Titanic's home port — since she broke her hip two years ago.

"I am not able to live in my home anymore," Dean was quoted as telling the Southern Daily Echo newspaper. "I am selling it all now because I have to pay these nursing home fees and am selling anything that I think might fetch some money."

In 1912, baby Elizabeth Gladys "Millvina" Dean and her family were steerage passengers emigrating to Kansas City, Missouri, aboard the giant cruise liner.

Four days out of port, on the night of April 14, it hit an iceberg and sank. Billed as "practically unsinkable" by the publicity magazines of the period, the Titanic did not have enough lifeboats for all of 2,200 passengers and crew.

Dean, her mother and 2-year-old brother were among 706 people — mostly women and children — who survived. Her father was among more than 1,500 who died.

Aldridge said the "massive interest" in Titanic memorabilia shows no signs of abating. Last year, a collection of items belonging to Lillian Asplund, the last American survivor of the disaster, sold for more than $175,000. Asplund died in 2006 at the age of 99.

"It's the people, the human angle," Aldridge said. "You had over 2,200 men, women and children on that ship, from John Jacob Astor, the richest person in the world at the time, to a poor Scandinavian family emigrating to the States to start a new life. There were 2,200 stories."

Iran could make 60 nukes in two years: US expert

2008-10-15T04:17:00.000-07:00

MILAN: Iran may have the capacity to produce up to 60 nuclear bombs within two years, a leading US non-proliferation expert said.

Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Washington-based Nonproliferation Policy Education Center (NPEC), was taking part in a summit , "Preventing nuclear proliferation in the Middle East", organised by Italy's Institute for the Study of Foreign Policy (ISPI) and the Italian Foreign Ministry in Milan.

In an interview, Sokolski raised the alarm about Iran's intentions, claiming that it would have sufficient plutonium after the opening of the Bushehr plant to construct from 30 to 60 bombs.

The nuclear facility at Bushehr is being built under an agreement between the Russian and Iranian governments for 800 million dollars and is expected to begin production in early 2009.

Sokolski said Iran was putting in place the necessary technology and knowledge to recover the new plant's waste using a chemical process that does not need complex installation or specific structures.

"Plutonium that could be used to make atomic bombs," he said. "The fuel for Bushehr will be supplied by the Russians who also said they would dispose of the waste products from it."

But he said few people know that this waste will remain in Iran for two years before being taken away.

"In this time frame the Iranians, with an excuse to analyse the waste, can transfer it to a chemical factory and extract the plutonium," he said.

He said in the first 18 months the plant would use between 22 to 25 tonnes of fuel, from which 300 kilogrammes of plutonium could be recovered from the waste to make from 30 to 60 bombs.

Henry Sokolski heads the nonprofit organisation founded in 1994 to promote a better understanding of strategic weapons proliferation issues among policy-makers, scholars and the media.

He also serves as an adjunct professor at the Institute of World Politics in Washington and is a member of the Congressional Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism, to which he was appointed in May 2008.

Elephants send text messages to rangers

2008-10-13T03:32:00.000-07:00

OL PEJETA, Kenya: The text message from the elephant flashed across Richard Lesowapir's screen: Kimani was heading for neighboring farms.

The huge bull elephant had a long history of raiding villagers' crops during the harvest, sometimes wiping out six months of income at a time. But this time a mobile phone card inserted in his collar sent rangers a text message.

Lesowapir, an armed guard and a driver arrived in a jeep bristling with spotlights to frighten Kimani back into the Ol Pejeta conservancy.

Kenya is the first country to try elephant texting as a way to protect both a growing human population and the wild animals that now have less room to roam. Elephants are ranked as "near threatened" in the Red List, an index of vulnerable species published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

The race to save Kimani began two years ago. The Kenya Wildlife Service had already reluctantly shot five elephants from the conservancy who refused to stop crop-raiding, and Kimani was the last of the regular raiders. The Save the Elephants group wanted to see if he could break the habit.

So they placed a mobile phone SIM card in Kimani's collar, then set up a virtual "geofence" using a global positioning system that mirrored the conservatory's boundaries. Whenever Kimani approaches the virtual fence, his collar texts rangers.

They have intercepted Kimani 15 times since the project began. Once almost a nightly raider, he last went near a farmer's field four months ago.

It's a huge relief to the small farmers who rely on their crops for food and cash for school fees. Basila Mwasu, a 31-year-old mother of two, lives a stone's throw from the conservancy fence. She and her neighbors used to drum through the night on pots and pans in front of flaming bonfires to try to frighten the elephants away.

Once an elephant stuck its trunk through a window into a room where her baby daughter was sleeping and the family had stored some corn. She beat it back with a burning stick. Another time, an elephant killed a neighbor who was defending his crop.

"We had to go into town to tell the game (wardens) to chase the elephants away or we're going to kill them all," Mwasu remembered.

Fishing can heal Icelands financial wounds

2008-10-13T03:27:00.000-07:00

REYKJAVIK: The debt hurricane that tore across the Atlantic has devastated Iceland's banks, but down in Reykjavik port the fishermen say it is time for the country to turn back to the industry that kept the country alive for centuries.

Some even see fishing providing a lifesaving boost in exports as the country battles bankruptcy and licks the self-inflicted wounds caused by its once marauding banks.

Bjorn Gunnarsson, an agent for the Thorvaldur Jonsson Shipbroker company in Reykjavik, said he had seen no "negative impact" on the fishing industry from the financial crisis which has forced the government to nationalise the country's three biggest banks.

"Actually it will be probably quite the opposite because the exports are paid in euros and then when we convert into kronas, the fishermen will get a lot of money," Gunnarsson said.

Gunnarsson's company is just a stone's throw from the massive Reykjavik market where trawlers leave their fish to be sent out across the globe.

Gunnar Haraldsson, director of the Institute of Economic Studies at the University of Iceland, shares the optimistic outlook for an industry that is 90 percent geared towards exports and needs no state subsidies.

While's Iceland's population of about 320,000 consumes about 44 kilogrammes (98 pounds) of fish a year each, it is difficult to find cod in Reykjavik restaurants because so much is sent abroad.

Fishing and tourism are Iceland's best bet for the future, said Haraldsson.

With the collapse of the financial sector, that once weighed in at nine times the size of the country's gross domestic product, Icelandic media are already making calls for an increase in the country's fishing quota.

Holmjeirs Jonsson, a spokesman for the main association of small fishermen, said activity had not increased because there are strict rules on what fish and how much can be caught.

The catch has generally gone down in recent years. According to the most recent government statistics, in 2006, some 1.32 million tonnes of fish were caught by Icelandic fishermen, down from 1.98 tonnes in 2001 and 2.05 millions tonnes in 1996.

The psychological boost from the return to Iceland's traditional industry may be the most important effect for the workers in Reykjavik port who have seen their prestige overshadowed by the country's bankers and financiers in recent years.

In the 1930s, about a quarter of the working population was in the fishing industry. Now about three percent work as fishermen and another three percent are in the fish processing industry, according to government figures.

The finance industry overtook fishing as an employer in the early 2000s.

"Of course the financial crisis has affected everyone as individuals, but I think it will have a good influence because now Icelandic people realise it's not finance but industry which creates real value," said Gunnarsson, the shipping agent.

He said the fishing industry could provide jobs for people thrown up in the financial storm.

"Icelanders will probably see fishermen with less arrogance because they will offer jobs to thousands of people who lose their jobs," said Gunnarsson.

Hackers using fake YouTube pages to attack computers

2008-10-11T09:18:00.000-07:00

SAN FRANCISCO ( 2008-10-10 10:34:14 ) :Computer security specialists warn that hackers are using fake YouTube pages to trick people into opening their machines to diabolical software.

A deceptive YouTube attack evolving as it spreads on the Internet is part of a growing trend of hackers to prowl popular online social networking communities in which people trustingly share web links and mini-programs.

"We are seeing tools like this not just for YouTube, but for MySpace, Facebook, America Online instant messaging ...," Trend Micro software threat research manager Jamz Yaneza told AFP on Thursday.

"All the various social networking sites have been hit with some page or another."

Hackers using the YouTube attack send people links to what are said to be must-see snippets at the Google-owned video-sharing website.

The links, instead, connect to convincingly realistic replicas of YouTube pages and tell people that a software update is needed to view a requested video.

Agreeing to the update lets the hacker install malicious software that could log keystrokes, steal data, or even take over people's computers, according to David Perry of Trend Micro.

Victims are not likely to catch onto the invasion since the hackers' software is able to stealthily link to the real YouTube website and play a promised video.

"This works as your typical drive-by download," Yaneza said of hackers planting malicious software in machines while rerouting online traffic.

"Essentially this can be used as a tool to serve up everything -- botnets, key loggers. Visually, you can't differentiate this from your regular YouTube page, it is done so well."

While some computer users might be able to spy something unusual about the online address, or "URL," of a bogus page, the safest thing to do is not trust links and instead go directly to YouTube for recommended videos.

"The reason they are using YouTube now is that during the elections we are looking at YouTube a lot," Perry said of hackers. "It is using social networking software in an anti-social way -- anti-social networking."

Hackers at a recent gathering of software savants in Las Vegas told AFP that social networks are prime places to take advantage of people's trust.

While people may be wary of links or programs emailed to them by strangers, they eagerly open such offerings from "friends" in social networking communities.

Online evil doers can easily create false social networking profiles and even impersonate people who may be well known or respected. The imposter can then build a network of trusting contacts in online communities.

Estimates are that as much as 40 percent of social networking profiles are fakes, according to figures cited by Cloudmark Inc., a company specializing in protecting Internet messaging systems from spam and hackers.

A poll conducted in the United States in June for Cloudmark concluded that 83 percent of the people using social networking accounts received unwanted "friend" invitations or messages steering them to dubious websites.

"Friends" are granted access to pictures, message boards, contact lists and other personal data stored in social networking profiles.

"Unfortunately, the very qualities that make social networks successful -- the wide variety of communication channels, the openness of the networks and the size of the audience -- are also powerful lures for spammers and hackers," Cloudmark says.

Be wary of taking strangers in as friends at social networking websites and only install trusted applications when customizing profile pages with mini-programs, sometimes called "widgets," according to Cloudmark.

Security specialists say to also limit the amount of personal information revealed to the Internet through profile pages.

"Understanding the risks and knowing how to protect yourself is critical to avoiding scams and other threats" said Cloudmark chief technical officer Jaime de Guerre.

"As spammers, hackers and other online criminals broaden their scope to social networks (people) must be especially vigilant and employ safe practices while engaging in online communities."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Global warming sending tropical species uphill: study

2008-10-11T09:17:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON ( 2008-10-10 02:56:35 ) :Global warming is driving tropical plant and animal species to higher altitudes, potentially leaving lowland rainforest with nothing to take their place, ecologists argue in this week's issue of Science.

In a rare study on the impact of global warming in the tropics, University of Connecticut ecologist Robert Colwell and colleagues worked their way up the forested slope of a Costa Rican volcano to collect data on 2,000 types of plants and insects.

"Half of these species have such narrow altitudinal ranges that a 600-meter (2,000 feet) uphill shift would move these species into territory completely new to them," said a summary of their article released Thursday.

Many species would be unable to relocate at all, as most tropical mountainside forests have become "severely fragmented" by human activities.

Tropical lowland forests -- the warmest on Earth -- would meanwhile be challenged by the absence of replacement species. Flora and fauna unable to move uphill could also perish, unless it turns out they they can bear higher temperatures.

"Only further research can estimate the risk," the summary said, "but Colwell's report indicates that the impact of global climate change on some tropical rainforest and mountain species could be significant."

In another article, Science reports this week on a similar uphill trek by squirrels, mice and other small mammals in Yosemite National Park in California, one of the oldest wilderness parks in the United States.

Comparing a landmark 1918 study against fresh data about Yosemite's wildlife numbers, it found that small mammals have moved to higher altitudes, or reduced their ranges, in response to warmer temperatures.

"We didn't set out to study the effects of climate change," said Craig Moritz, a zoologist and integrative biology professor at the University of California at Berkeley who led the study.

"But the most dramatic finding in the Yosemite transect was the upward elevation shift of species," he said. "When we asked ourselves what changed, it hit us between the eyes -- the climate."

While such population movements have not altered Yosemite's biodiversity, Moritz's research team felt that rapid changes to the climate in less than a century could be a problem, a summary of the article said.

While half of the small mammal species at Yosemite have shifted their ranges, the other half has not. That means wildlife communities -- and the way in which species interact -- have changed, the summary explained.

If such change happens too fast, said James Patton, a member of the study, "elements of the (ecosystem) may start to collapse because a keystone element gets pulled out too quickly".

The study used as its starting point a detailed 1918 survey of Sierra Nevada wildlife by a Berkeley professor, when the snow-capped mountain range was under threat from gold mining and overgrazing.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Sea levels could rise one metre by 2100: German institute

2008-10-11T09:16:00.000-07:00

BERLIN ( 2008-10-10 22:38:56 ) :Sea levels could rise one metre (3.3 feet) by 2100, a leading German research institute said Thursday, much more than even the most pessimistic projection by the UN climate panel.

"We should prepare for a rise of sea levels of one metre this century," said Joachim Schellnhuber, head of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), which advises the German government on environmental policy.

The rates that glaciers in the Himalayas and the Greenland ice-sheet have doubled or even tripled in recent years, due partly to the increased greenhouse gas emissions by Chinese power stations, Schellnhuber said.

In February 2007, in the first volume of a landmark report, the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted the oceans would rise by between 18 and 59 centimetres (seven and 23 inches) by 2100.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Bollywood legend Amitabh hospitalised

2008-10-11T09:13:00.000-07:00

MUMBAI: Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan, who turned 66 Saturday, was taken to hospital after reportedly suffering abdominal pain, an international news agency photographer at the scene said.

The actor, who has superstar status in India, was seen leaving his home in the northern Mumbai suburb of Juhu with his actor son, Abhishek, and daughter-in-law Aishwarya Rai, in an ambulance.

Huge crowds that had gathered outside his house to wish him happy birthday anxiously watched him leave, television pictures showed.

Bachchan, wearing a brown-coloured woollen cap and blue ensemble, was spotted lying down inside the vehicle before being supported by Abhishek and another man as he walked into hospital, the photographer said.

A news channel said Bachchan had complained of stomach pain since Friday evening.

Unnamed sources quoted by the Press Trust of India described his admission to hospital as a "routine medical check-up". Hospital officials said x-rays were taken of his stomach and chest, they added.

Bachchan was later transferred to a private hospital where he spent three weeks, including one in intensive care, after undergoing bowel surgery in November 2005.

There was no immediate comment from the hospital when contacted by a French news agency.

With a career spanning four decades in India's movie industry, doctors have warned Bachchan to slow down.

He also suffered a severe stomach injury in 1982 while shooting the film "Coolie".

Bachchan, known as "The Big B" with a distinctive white beard, flowing grey hair and baritone voice, was last seen in his first English-language movie, "The Last Lear" and has been on a world tour with his family.

Indian newspapers marked Bachchan's birthday Saturday with a series of interviews. A MUMBAI-based newspaper commented that he had "never looked better. Or fitter" when they spoke to him two days ago on a film shoot.

"I enjoy being alive, I look for a new struggle, a new experience every day. An artiste has no right to say he is satisifed, that's being defeatist," he was quoted as saying.

Species under threat by climate change

2008-10-11T09:08:00.000-07:00

ISLAMABAD: Around 35 percent of the world's birds, 52 percent of amphibians and 71 percent of warm-water reef-building corals are likely to be particularly susceptible to climate change, the first results of an IUCN study has revealed.

The report identified more than 90 biological traits which are believed to make species most susceptible to climate change. It found that 3,438 of the world's 9,856 bird species have at least one out of 11 traits that could make them susceptible to climate change.

Albatross, penguin, petrel and shearwater families are all likely to be susceptible to climate change, while heron and egret families, and osprey, kite, hawk and eagle families are among those least likely to be susceptible to climate change.

"This is the first time that a systematic assessments of species' susceptibility to climate change has been attempted," says Wendy Foden of IUCN's Species Programme.

"Climate change is already happening, but conservation decision makers currently have very little guidance on which species are going to be the worst affected."

The study found 3,217 of the 6,222 amphibians in the world are likely to be susceptible to climate change. Three salamander families could be particularly susceptible, while 80-100 percent of Seychelles frogs and Indian Burrowing Frogs, Australian ground frogs, horned toads and glass frog families were assessed as susceptible.

Specialized habitat requirements, such as species with water-dependant larvae, and those unable to disperse due to barriers such as large water bodies or human-transformed habitats are most at risk.

The report found that 566 of 799 warm-water reef-building coral species are likely to be susceptible to the impacts of climate change. The Acroporidae family, including staghorn corals, had particularly high numbers of susceptible species, while the Fungiidae family, including mushroom corals, and the Mussidae family, including some brain corals, possess relatively few.

Coral species qualified due to their sensitivity to increases in temperature, sedimentation and physical damage from storms and cyclones. Poor dispersal ability and colonization potential were used as further important indicators.

According to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, 32 percent of amphibians are threatened with extinction. Of these, 75 percent are susceptible to climate change. For birds, the overall percentage of those threatened with extinction is lower – 12 percent.

However, 80 percent of those are susceptible to climate change.

"There is a large overlap between threatened and climate change susceptible amphibian and bird species," says Jean-Christophe Vi Deputy Head of IUCN Species Programme.

"Climate change may cause a sharp rise in the risk and rate of extinction of currently threatened species."

"But we also want to highlight species which are currently not threatened but are likely to become so as climate change impacts intensify. By doing this we hope to promote preemptive and more effective conservation action," Christophe said.

More than 60 artists band together to fight for rights

2008-10-04T06:01:00.001-07:00

LONDON ( 2008-10-04 16:25:45 ) :More than 60 artists, including Radiohead, Robbie Williams and the Kaiser Chiefs announced on Saturday they had banded together to seek more rights over their music and break free of record labels.

The Featured Artists' Coalition (FAC) aims to "give artists the voice they need to argue for greater control over their music," amid new opportunities provided by Internet, the group said in a statement.

"It is time for artists to have a strong collective voice to stand up for their interests," said Brian Message, co-manager of Radiohead and Kate Nash.

"The digital landscape is changing fast and new deals are being struck all the time, but all too often without reference to the people who actually make the music."

Message said the FAC would "help all artists, young and old, well-known or not, drive overdue change through the industry in their interests and those of fans."

Thus far, 61 artists have signed up to the coalition, which will be officially launched on Sunday in the northwest English city of Manchester.

It is fighting for changes to laws that govern business in the music industry so that artists always ultimately own the rights to their music, rather than record labels.

The FAC is also calling for, among other things, artists to receive "fair compensation whenever their business partners receive an economic return from the exploitation of the artists' work."

Several groups have recently used the Internet to promote their music directly to fans, often bypassing record labels entirely, including Radiohead, which launched their latest album "In Rainbows" in October 2007 on the web.

This week, Oasis posted their new album "Dig Out Your Soul" on Internet social networking site MySpace in advance of its commercial release, allowing fans to listen to the whole compilation, but they could not buy it.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Top 12 prettiest wallpapers of Katrina Kaif

2008-10-04T00:11:00.000-07:00

Katrina-The Man of the Family

2008-10-03T23:51:00.000-07:00

MUMBAI: Nobody in Bollywood was betting on the outsider Katrina Kaif, but a surging need to forge stability for herself and her siblings has driven her to the top finds Shoma Chaudhry.

The clipped, self-possessed 24-year-old in the untidy hotel room is almost a disconcerting surprise. Curled into the corner of a sofa, hair pulled back in a tight pony tail, Katrina exudes an aloof, slightly irascible air that is difficult to penetrate at first. She has just returned from a set on a windy mountain top — a shot that required her to wear a tiny cotton dress in a chill wind — and is nursing a bad headache.

Katrina came to India at 17 as part of director Kaizad Gustad’s film Boom: he had spotted her as a model in an ad in London. It should have been a grand debut, boasting as it did a cast that included Amitabh Bachchan, Jackie Shroff, Madhu Sapre and Padma Lakshmi. But, for all its apparent star and skin power, the film flopped badly. That could have been the end of Katrina’s Bollywood career — she was young, an outsider, and incapable of a word of Hindi. Instead, in barely six years, she has grown to be a commercial female superstar, moving from the anonymity of bit roles in Telugu, Malayalam and Hindi films to mainstream directors and producers like Vipul Shah, Rajkumar Santoshi and Yash Raj Films. She has learnt Hindi, taken Kathak lessons, and is spoken of in the same breath as Aishwarya Rai and Kareena Kapoor. Far from the minor-league deals of her early years, she now charges between Rs 2 to 3 crores for product campaigns and, at last count, signed a two-film deal with Studio 18 for Rs 6 crore. What explains this singular story? Who is Katrina Kaif off-screen?

One of seven siblings — six sisters, one brother, she exactly in the middle — Katrina was born to a British mother, Suzanne, and a Kashmiri Muslim father, Mohammad Kaif. “My father is not an influence, he was not part of our family; my parents separated when I was very young and I have never met him since.”

Her mother, Suzanne, had deeper impacts. A polyglot lawyer who knew five languages, she gave up a successful legal practice to devote herself full time to international charity work (she now works in Madurai with orphaned children).

She had married again, but that did not last either, and as her work took her to far-flung places, the children followed — homeschooled for the most part by a series of tutors. Hong Kong, Japan, China, Ukraine, Romania, France, Hawaii, America, Poland, Belgium, Austria, South Africa, England: more than 13 countries in almost as many years.

“The biggest thing I learnt from her is to be completely non-judgemental.” There is very little that squares the Katrina off-screen with the one on-screen.

Online, she is unabashed eye-candy, Kiss Me, Kiss Me: a bit role in Sarkar, a pretty prop in Welcome, some cool moves in Race, some razzmatazz in Singh is Kinng, more of the same in Partner and Apne. It’s only in Namastey London, that you get a hint there could be something more to the girl.

A single dynamo then seems to drive Katrina and her choices: the need to make money and forge stability. “She wants to be the man in her family,” Reshma Shetty — owner of Matrix, the agency that has handled her since she first came to India. Katrina is by nature low profile, gentle and intensely private, says Shetty. “She wants to secure things for her siblings.

“I love comedy films. I love playing these light characters. It gives me a chance to be a teenager and have all the fun I missed out on. I feel old because of all I’ve been through, but I am just 24.”

Stardom has brought many panaceas. Three years ago, Katrina bought herself a house in Bandra; a year later, she bought one in London. Most recently, she has bought herself a Porsche. But stardom has also brought fresh set of pressures: the irascible edge, the panic of 360 degree demands, the sense that everything will be sucked out of you. “Everyone reacts differently to this pressure. I don’t react very well, I get frantic, I snap, I feel the stress very easily. People might think, what a difficult woman she is, and I feel like saying, no, no, no, this is not me, I’m just under too much pressure.”

“I believe very strongly in God, I am in a really good place today and I feel he has watched over my journey and given me so much.” Probe her for more essential DNAs and she says, “I have seen so much, I feel old. The other day, a friend was going through a problem and asked me, ‘how long does it take to get over being heartbroken?’ And I really wanted her to understand my words — I wanted the words to have meaning. I said, ‘I have been in a position where I felt I could not live without something, I would not be able to breathe without something — and everything has changed.’ I said, ‘Just understand one thing — you will be surprised how quickly everything can change in this world.’ There’re no laws, no logic. I have seen unbelievable things happen: when I came here, I had nothing. But everything has changed — that is pretty incredulous in itself.”

In all of this, conversation about Salman Khan, Katrina’s tumultuous superstar boyfriend, sits like an unopened box between us. But no embroidered question is going to yank that open. It’s the mix of thaw and reserve that seems quintessentially Katrina. What you are left with then, is stories of her focus.

(Courtesy: Tehelka magazine, India)

Smoking, coal set to claim tens of millions of lives in China

2008-10-03T23:46:00.000-07:00

PARIS ( 2008-10-04 09:40:49 ) :Tobacco use and smoke from coal and wood are likely to claim tens of millions of lives in China over the next quarter-century, according to a study published online on Saturday by the British journal The Lancet.

Smoke from tobacco, biomass and coal will kill 53.3 million Chinese from chronic respiratory illnesses and 13.5 million from lung cancer during the period from 2003 to 2033, its authors calculate, using the current rate of exposure as a benchmark.

Half of Chinese men smoke and more than 70 percent of Chinese households use solid fuels, such as wood, crop residues and coal for heating and cooking, providing a potent source of indoor air pollution, the study says.

Smoke from these sources will account for 82 percent of the likely 65 million deaths in China from respiratory disease from 2003 to 2033, and 75 percent of the probable 18 million deaths from lung cancer, it projects.

The paper is lead-authored by Hsien-Ho Lin and Majid Ezzati of the Harvard School of Public Health in Massachusetts.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

US House approves sweetened finance deal

2008-10-03T11:29:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON ( 2008-10-04 00:01:52 ) :The US House of Representatives on Friday approved a revised 700-billion-dollar Wall Street bailout, bowing to intense pressure to help avert a global economic meltdown.

The House, which sparked market and political turmoil by rejecting an earlier version of the bailout on Monday by 228 votes to 205, voted 263 in favor to 171 against in favor of the largest US government economic intervention since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Congressional leaders had worked together to win over more Republican and Democratic votes amid signs that businesses are already being hurt by a failure to procure credit, triggered by the US subprime mortgage crisis.

Three Democratic lawmakers said earlier they would switch their votes. Several revealed that calls from White House nominee Barack Obama played a key role in their decision. A House source said four other Democrats were also switching.

House Minority whip Roy Blunt said the pain of the deepening credit squeeze was now being felt by the public.

"Calls to members officers are beginning to even out, people are beginning to realize this has impacts on their pension plans."

Rahm Emanuel, a senior member of the House Democratic leadership spoke out in support the bill from the House floor.

"This is only the first step. While we address the balance sheets of banks, the next step must now address the checkbooks for middle class families and the struggles that they face," he said.

The Senate passed a revised version of the bailout package 74-25 on Wednesday, including sweeteners on extending bank deposit insurance and expired tax breaks in order to get more Republicans behind the legislation.

Maryland Democratic representatives Donna Edwards and Elijah Cummings said they had received calls from Obama after voting against the original package.

"It meant a lot to me that somebody who at least has a 50-50 shot at being the next president of the United States would take time," Cummings said.

Obama said during the call that he would push attempts to reform bankruptcy laws to help ill-fated homeowners escape foreclosure, Cummings said, but stressed urgent action to save the US financial system was vital.

Edwards said Obama reached out to her on Thursday morning, as she was considering how she would come down in Friday's looming vote.

"I had a very good conversation with Senator Obama yesterday morning, and I had to weigh on that the entire day in coming to this decision," Edwards said.

There were still many holdout lawmakers though, who voiced deep skepticism whether the new measure would work, while bleakly concluding that the bill was a necessary evil.

The debate resumed amid more shocking news for the world's largest economy which shed some 159,000 jobs in September as the weight of the housing collapse and credit crunch hit a broad swath of industries.

The unemployment rate held at 6.1 percent, a five-year high, with payrolls having fallen by 760,000 this year, the Labor Department said.

Global stocks had sank heavily early Friday with losses in Asia as some lawmakers continued to make known their opposition to using vast amounts of taxpayer money to bail out Wall Street firms.

The amended version of the plan is laced with 150 billion dollars in tax breaks to coax reluctant lawmakers from both the Democratic and the Republican parties to get on board.

The bailout gives the US Treasury power to buy up toxic mortgage debt which has been choking the financial industry and would create a 700-billion dollar federal program to buy bad assets from banks and other financial firms.

The Senate raised the ceiling on federal insurance for bank deposits from 100,000 dollars to 250,000 dollars, and added up to 150 billion dollars in tax break extensions for middle class families and business.

They also retained limits on "golden parachute" severance payments to disgraced Wall Street executives.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Dead Man Good to go for Obama benefit

2008-10-03T11:20:00.001-07:00

LOS ANGELES: First Barack Obama raised the Dead. Now he's healing the sick.

Despite a TMZ report that Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir was suffering from recently broken ribs, as well as a killer cold, the musician has no intention of missing a fundraising concert for the Democratic presidential contender.

As for the TMZ item, which said Weir backed out of a weekend concert due to broken ribs suffered during a mishap on his tour bus, the rocker's publicist tells newsmen that the injury has been greatly exaggerated.

"It's about as bad a case of reporting in terms of taking minor facts and, by the method of communicating them, completely misrepresenting the situation," says Dead spokesman Dennis McNally. "He had a cold, which is why he really couldn't do the event on Sunday."

The gossip site reported Wednesday that the 60-year-old axeman had fallen on his tour bus when the driver slammed on the brakes and then quoted McNally—out of context, he says—claiming it hurt for Weir "to breathe, hold the guitar, and laugh."

McNally says that Weir's "getting better" and he should be well enough to reunite with the three surviving members of the Dead — bassist Phil Lesh, drummer Bill Kreutzmann and percussionist Mickey Hart — for their first gig in four years on Oct. 13 at Penn State University in State College, Penn., to support the Obama-Biden ticket.

Weir, Lesh and Hart previously played together at a February show dubbed Deadheads for Obama in San Francisco in advance of California's Democratic primary.

But this will be the first time the quartet will take the stage since the summer of 2004, when they toured as the Dead (they retired the "Grateful" moniker following the death of lead guitarist Jerry Garcia). Allman Brothers Band member Warren Haynes, who also plays with Gov't Mule, will fill in for Garcia.

As for the possibility of a future Dead trek, McNally didn't rule it out completely.

"They want to see how it feels," he said, "but as of now, no."

China to set up APSCO by end of 2008

2008-10-03T11:14:00.000-07:00

BEIJING: China said it will set up the Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization (APSCO) at the end of this year.

Pakistan was one of the three first countries along with China and Thailand that had proposed the setting up of APSCO early 1992.

The establishment of APSCO is part of a major effort to promote joint space exploration, the chief of the China National Space Administration, Sun Laiyan said, adding that the organization would focus on satellite applications and training.

Sun, delighted from the success of the country's first space walk on Sept 27, made the remarks at the 59th International Astronautical Congress held in Glasgow, Scotland, the state media here reported.

The organization, already joined by nine countries - Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, Iran, Mongolia, Pakistan, Peru, Thailand and Turkey - welcomes the participation of more nations, Sun said.

According to the Convention of the APSCO, signed by these nine countries, the organization aims to promote multilateral cooperation in space science and technology and regional economic and social development among Asia-Pacific nations.

Since space projects require huge financial input and research work, Sun appealed to countries to work together on the development of space resources.

“China is willing to conduct international space cooperation on the basis of equality, mutual benefit and common development," Sun said.

Sun said China plans to develop a new generation of carrier rocket by 2013 and to research and develop spacecraft docking technologies.

Elements of a space station will be in orbit by 2011 before a robotic landing is attempted on the Moon two years later.

Microsoft to open research centre in South Korea: institute

2008-09-29T23:51:00.000-07:00

SEOUL ( 2008-09-29 14:05:16 ) :Microsoft will set up a research and development centre in South Korea in cooperation with the country's leading scientific research institute, officials said Monday.

The Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) said it would sign an initial deal with the US company next month.

"Microsoft's chief research and strategy officer Craig Mundie will visit our institute to sign a memorandum of understanding on October 30," KAIST professor Choi Key-Sun told AFP.

Microsoft is expected to fund the establishment and management of the centre while KAIST will provide staffing, he said, adding that details such as the amount of Microsoft's investment are still being discussed.

During a trip to Seoul in May, Microsoft founder Bill Gates promised to invest 147 million dollars in South Korea over five years to strengthen his company's presence in the country.

Microsoft also agreed with top automaker Hyundai Motor to set up a strategic alliance and to jointly establish an auto IT innovation centre.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Nicole makes public appearance with daughter

2008-09-29T23:45:00.001-07:00

LONDON ( 2008-09-29 13:15:58 ) :Aussie actress Nicole Kidman made her public appearance with daughter Sunday Rose in London.

Kidman was photographed cradling her daughter close to her chest, as she left the famous Abbey Road Studios, letting the world catch a glimpse of the little baby’s strawberry-blonde hair.

In the picture taken, Sunday Rose could be seen dressed in a pink dress with white socks, oblivious to the photographers clicking away as she slept peacefully in her loving mum's arms.

Ever since she was born, on July 7 in Nashville, the public has only seen pictures of her wrapped in a papoose.

“She's like a doll - a little, little thing,” News.com.au quoted 41-year-old Kidman as saying of her first biological child. Even her dad Keith Urban, 40, could not stop showing his adoration for her. “We're still experiencing the pure bliss of welcoming her into our lives,” he said.

But where a proper public photograph is concerned, Kidman and Urban have refused million-dollar offers for shots of Sunday Rose, who has been named after painter Sidney Nolan's muse Sunday Reed.

Copyright www Aaj TV, 2008

Taliban grows stronger and better organised

2008-09-29T00:06:00.001-07:00

KABUL:Just one year ago, the Taliban insurgency was a furtive, loosely organized guerrilla force that carried out hit-and-run ambushes, burned empty schools, left warning letters at night and concentrated attacks in the southern rural regions of its ethnic and religious heartland.

Today it is a larger, better armed and more confident militia, capable of mounting sustained military assaults. Its forces operate in virtually every province and control many districts in areas ringing the capital. Its fighters have bombed embassies and prisons, nearly assassinated the president, executed foreign aid workers and hanged or beheaded dozens of Afghans.

Parallel structure

The new Taliban movement has created a parallel government structure that includes defense and finance councils and appoints judges and officials in some areas. It offers cash to recruits and presents letters of introduction to local leaders. It operates Web sites and a 24-hour propaganda apparatus that spins every military incident faster than Afghan and Western officials can manage. "This is not the Taliban of Emirate times. It is a new, updated generation," said Waheed Mojda, a former foreign ministry aide under the Taliban Islamic Emirate, which ruled most of the country from 1996 to 2001.

"They are more educated, and they don't punish people for having CDs or cassettes," he said. "The old Taliban wanted to bring sharia, security and unity to Afghanistan. The new Taliban has much broader goals -- to drive foreign forces out of the country and the Muslim world."

In late 2001, U.S. forces made common cause with ethnic groups in Afghanistan's north to overthrow the Taliban, in response to Osama bin Laden's use of the country as a base. Hamid Karzai was tapped as president by the United States and other powers, then elected to the job. In the early years, much of the deeply conservative Muslim country was largely peaceful and secure. Over the past two years, the Taliban's revival has been fueled by fast-growing popular dissatisfaction with Karzai's government. (Courtesy: Gulf News)

No going back for Golan brides

2008-09-29T00:01:00.000-07:00

QUNEITRA, Golan Heights: Arina Safadi, wearing a sumptuous white wedding dress, walked past barbed wire in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights so she could join her future
husband on the Syrian side.

She was beaming with happiness at the prospect of embarking on a new life, but the young bride could also not hold back the tears as she waved farewell to her native home, knowing she could never return.

Just before she reached the Quneitra border post, Safadi had one last heart-wrenching task to perform -- signing a document in which she pledged to relinquish her right to residency in the Israeli-annexed area.

"I give up my right of residence and I know that I may not return because of the absence of diplomatic ties between Israel and Syria," says the text.

The Golan Heights, a rocky mountainous plateau rich in water and also a strategic military outpost, has been at the core of the Syrian-Israeli conflict since it was seized by the Jewish state in the 1967 Six-Day War.

Israel annexed the mostly Druze-inhabited territory in 1981, a move never recognised by the world community.

Israel and Syria have been holding indirect peace talks with Turkey as a mediator since May, after an eight-year freeze, with Damascus expecting the process to lead to the eventual return of the Golan Heights.

But until that happens brides such as Safadi, 24, who wish to marry on the Syrian side of the Golan, must make a one-way trip past barbed wire covered in camouflage netting and
past "checkpoint Charlie" in a demilitarised zone.

Safadi will tie the knot with her cousin, Rabih Safadi, and the couple will live in Jaramana, a town near Damascus but miles away from her little village of Ein Qiniya on the windswept borders of Israel, Syria and Lebanon.

She got a facial -- a bittersweet escape from the family home for a short while, away from the constant stream of friends and relatives who have been calling in every day for the past two weeks to bid her farewell.

"I love him," she said of her husband-to-be. "It is my choice to start a new life, but I will have to start from scratch."

Safadi has never been to Syria and only knows what she has seen about it on television. "Of course they have a different lifestyle from ours," she said.

She met her future husband in Jordan during a reunion of the extended Safadi clan which, like many Golan families, was broken up after Israel occupied the strategic plateau in the 1967 war.

More than 18,000 Syrians, mostly Druze, an offshoot branch are left from the Golan's original population of 150,000. The vast majority of these Druze have refused to take Israeli citizenship.

The plateau which overlooks much of northern Israel is also home to nearly 20,000 Jewish settlers.

The father of the bride, Yahiya Safadi, is sad to see his daughter leave. "I raised her, took care of her," he said, his voice choked with emotion. "I didn't sleep at all last night. I will never see my grandchildren."

Safadi, clutching a bouquet of flowers, turned for a last look, a final wave. Then the yellow gate of the crossing gently shut behind her. There is no going back.

Paul Newman remembered for cool style, heart

2008-09-28T23:48:00.000-07:00

LOS ANGELES: The death of film legend Paul Newman sparked an outpouring of reaction on Saturday with friends remembering the Oscar winner for his cool acting style and his warm, charitable heart.

Newman, known for roles in films including "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," "The Hustler," "The Sting," and "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," died at his Westport, Connecticut, home on Friday night at age 83 after a long battle with cancer.

His wife of 50 years, Joanne Woodward, and family were at his side.

Friends and associates remembered his talent that earned Newman nine Oscar nominations, his passion for auto racing and his philanthropy through such causes as his Newman's Own Foundation and Hole-In-the-Wall camps for sick children.

"There is a point where feelings go beyond words," said Robert Redford, his longtime friend and co-star in "Butch Cassidy" and "The Sting." "I have lost a real friend. My life -- and this country -- is better for his being in it."

"He comes from that era of actors along with the Deans, Brandos and Clifts that I, that we all looked at, as actors who changed the art form," said Leonardo DiCaprio.

Eva Marie Saint, who starred with Newman in "Exodus," said: "Yes, his eyes were that blue and beautiful. ... His legacy as a humanitarian for children around the world is unmatchable."

Indeed, in 1982 Newman co-founded Newman's Own food products and decided to funnel much of his profits to charity. Over the years, his Newman's Own Foundation has given some $250 million to charitable and other organizations.

Newman sponsored 11 Hole-In-The-Wall camps worldwide that helped 135,000 kids experience the fun and healing powers of outdoor activities.

"His heart and soul were dedicated to helping make the world a better place for all," said Newman's Own Foundation Vice Chairman Robert Forrester.

Along with philanthropy, Newman was active in liberal political causes, and former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Clinton on Saturday offered their condolences.

"Paul was an American icon, philanthropist and champion for children," the Clintons said. "Our prayers and thoughts are with Joanne and the Newman family and the many people who Paul impacted through his endless kindness and generosity."

From the world of auto racing, where Newman proved to be as adept a driver as he was an actor, McLaren Formula One team boss Ron Dennis said Newman "was one of those very few people for whom the term 'megastar' was no exaggeration."

But perhaps the most poignant words came from Newman himself, via a statement from his five daughters.

"Always and to the end, Dad was incredibly grateful for his good fortune," they said. "In his own words: "It's been a privilege to be here."

China’s astronauts safely complete first space walk

2008-09-28T23:42:00.000-07:00

BEIJING ( 2008-09-27 14:45:52 ) :A Chinese astronaut completed a space walk Saturday, state television said, as China became only the third nation to perform the feat after the United States and the former Soviet Union.

Zhai Zhigang, 41, left the Shenzhou VII spacecraft at about 4:45 pm Beijing time (0845 GMT) for a walk in orbit that lasted just under 15 minutes, according to the live TV transmission.

"I feel well," Zhai said, waving to a camera outside the spacecraft. "I am greeting the Chinese people and the people of the world."

In a highly symbolic move, Zhai produced a small Chinese flag shortly after leaving the spacecraft, and waved it to the camera.

Zhai slowly moved towards a test sample of solid lubricant placed outside the orbital module, Xinhua news agency said.

He took the sample and handed it over to fellow astronaut Liu Boming who stayed in the orbital module and closely monitored Zhai's moves.

Zhai returned to the Shenzhou VII's orbital module, closing its hatch shortly before 5 pm Beijing time (0900 GMT), state TV said.

The walk was supposed to last 20 minutes, with no immediate explanation given for the shortened length of time.

President Hu Jintao had appeared at the Beijing Aerospace Control Center to watch the live transmission of Zhai's spacewalk, according to Xinhua.

The walk was the highlight of the 68-hour mission -- China's third manned foray into space -- and is considered an important step towards building a space station, China's next major ambition in space.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

US nuclear carrier docks in Japan to protests

2008-09-24T21:14:00.000-07:00

YOKOSUKA, Japan: A giant US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier arrived Thursday in Japan, greeted by thousands of people waving US flags but shunned by many residents concerned about their safety.

The 97,000-ton USS George Washington sailed into Yokosuka, a naval hub 50 kilometres (30 miles) south of Tokyo, becoming the first US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to be based outside of the United States.

Despite sensitivities in the only nation to have suffered nuclear attack, Japan agreed to accept the George Washington to replace the diesel USS Kitty Hawk, which is being retired from service.

The mood on the dock was festive with people, mostly Americans, holding balloons and ribbons of red, white and blue. Some 2,000 US military personnel and their families welcomed the ship, according to a military spokesman.

But the ship was not welcome for all. Residents of this port city planned protests against the arrival of the carrier, saying that they feared radiation and crimes by US military personnel.

It is unprecedented for a nuclear-powered ship to be stationed in a densely populated area, according to a civil group which is calling for people to prepare for a possible nuclear accident with iodine syrup.

The United States argued it must deploy its best carrier to Yokosuka due to East Asia's tense security situation. Japan has been officially pacifist since World War II and hosts more than 40,000 US troops under a security alliance.

Bush calls McCain, Obama, leaders to White House

2008-09-24T21:06:00.001-07:00

WASHINGTON: US President George W. Bush will host White House rivals John McCain and Barack Obama, as well as top lawmakers, for unprecedented economic crisis talks on Thursday, a spokesman said Wednesday.

The news came 40 minutes before the US president, at pains to convince wary lawmakers to adopt his administration's 700-billion-dollar Wall Street rescue plan, was to take his case to the US public in a prime-time televised speech.

Bush, who telephoned Obama around 7:30 pm (1130 GMT), hopes "to work on driving toward a bipartisan and timely solution on the financial rescue package," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto.

Obama spokesman Bill Burton confirmed in a statement that the Illinois senator would attend.

Bush warns 'entire economy is in danger'

2008-09-24T20:59:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON: President George W. Bush said Wednesday that lawmakers risk a cascade of wiped-out retirement savings, rising home foreclosures, lost jobs and closed businesses if they fail to act on a massive financial rescue plan.

“Our entire economy is in danger,'' he said. “Without immediate action by Congress, American could slip into a financial panic and a distressing scenario would unfold,'' Bush said in a 12-minute prime-time address delivered from the White House East Room that he hoped would help rescue his tough-sell bailout package.

“Ultimately, our country could experience a long and painful recession.'' Said Bush: “We must not let this happen.'' The unprecedented $700 billion bailout, which the Bush administration asked Congress last weekend to approve before it adjourns, is meeting with deep skepticism, especially from conservatives in Bush's own Republican Party who are revolting at the high price tag and massive private-sector intervention by government.

Though there is general agreement that something must be done to address the spiraling economic problems, Bush has been forced to accept changes almost daily, based on demands from the right and left.

Seeking to explain himself to conservatives, Bush stressed he was reluctant to put taxpayer money on the line to help businesses that had made bad decisions and that the rescue is not aimed at saving individual companies but to save entire US nation.

Face value: Why we love, hate, fear cars

2008-09-24T09:39:00.000-07:00

PARIS ( 2008-09-24 00:02:16 ) :Do you find that the Renault Twingo has a smiling face? That the VW Beetle looks startled? The Trabant is sad? And a BMW looks angry?

In a new study, scientists say that if we see a mellow, macho or other expression on the front end of a car, it is because we are hardwired to scan human faces for vital information.

Humans, like other animals, have evolved the ability to size someone up in the briefest of glances, they say. Seeing a face for just a tenth of a second in enough to figure out if that person is hostile or helpful, a stranger or kin -- a prehistoric survival mechanism that can make the difference between life and death.

To see if this reflex extends to automobiles, a team of researchers led by Karl Grammer of the University of Vienna asked 40 young adults -- half women, half men -- to rate the front ends of 38 recent-model cars, all of the same colour.

The researchers first classified the "expressions" on the cars using a computerised system of standardized measures for human faces that indicate degrees of masculinity or femininity, and different emotions, based on the size and position of facial features.

Then they asked participants to rate each car's "face" for 19 criteria: Is the "face" more like a child or an adult? More friendly or hostile? More male or female? Is it arrogant? Happy? Afraid? Aggressive?

Respondents were also simply asked if the car's front end looked like a face and, if so, whether it was more human or animal. Finally, they picked the vehicles they liked.

More than a third said that 90 percent of the cars reminded them of a face, and all of the participants indicated headlights for the "eyes" and a radiator grill for the "mouth." Their ranking of emotions matched the ones generated by computers in most cases, according to the experiment, reported this week in the journal Human Nature, published by Germany's Springer group.

As for preferences, both men and women showed a clear liking for cars they described as mature, dominating, masculine, arrogant and angry -- characteristics the researchers bundled together under the heading "power".

These cars had a low-slung bonnet and wide front, associated with with the square jaw and prominent chin of stereotyped masculinity. Topping the list of "power" cars were top-of-the-line BMWs and the Chrysler 300C, 340-horsepower alpha-male of an auto with a V-8 under the bonnet.

At the submissive, friendly and childlike end of the spectrum were Nissan's New Micra, Volkswagen's New Beetle and the Kia Picanto.

"The tendency to interpret car fronts as faces could be the result of an error management strategy which has evolved in order to not miss any information about faces," the authors argue.

Error management theory looks at the consequences of making a mistake in judgement. In evolutionary terms, faces are the quickest indicators of potential danger.

The next step could be to quantify how our perception of car "faces" affects our auto purchases and driving behaviour, offering potential benefits for marketeers but also for road safety, the researchers say.

"Do we feel that driving a car that looks arrogant and dominant might be of benefit in the daily 'battles' on the road?" they ask.

"Does one change lanes and give way sooner when an 'aggressive' car appears in the rear-view mirror?"

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Amazon's Google phone alliance ramps up attack on iTunes

2008-09-24T09:38:00.000-07:00

SAN FRANCISCO ( 2008-09-24 11:34:22 ) :Internet retail titan Amazon has ramped up its attack on Apple's iTunes by having links to its MP3 online music and movie store built into a 'Google phone' due out next month.

Contrary to the way things are done at iTunes, digital music sold at Amazon MP3 store isn't shackled with digital rights management (DRM) software that prevents people from copying tunes or moving them between devices.

"Amazon arguably has the best DRM-free music service out there and it is a coup that Google got them," said analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group in Silicon Valley.

"It is very aggressive. They are seriously targeting Apple. They want to break that monopoly Apple has with iTunes."

Apple's chief executive Steve Jobs has cited industry statistics saying that iTunes is the largest music seller in the world.

Amazon MP3 launched a year ago with an online music catalogue listing more than two million songs from more than 180,000 artists and 20,000 labels, including EMI Music and Universal Music Group.

Songs are priced from 89 cents to 99 cents and albums are priced from 1.99 dollars to 9.99 dollars.

Amazon's music download store is similar to offerings from Apple, Real Networks, and retail behemoth Wal-Mart.

Amazon boasts that MP3 store tunes can be played "on virtually any personal digital music-capable device," including Apple's iPods and iPhones and Microsoft's Zune line of players.

Amazon MP3 "turns up the heat on iTunes" while boosting an MP3 audio format compatible with most music players, Lazard Capital Markets analyst Colin Sebastian said when the online shop debuted in September of 2007.

Meanwhile, Internet search leader Google took a giant leap into the mobile phone market on Tuesday, unveiling a handset developed with telecom carrier T-Mobile to compete with Apple's hot-selling iPhone.

The T-Mobile G1, the first mobile device powered by Google's open-source Android software, will be available in stores in the United States on October 22 and will cost 179 dollars.

T-Mobile chief technology and innovation officer Cole Brodman called the G1, built by the Taiwanese firm HTC, a "game-changing" device which will "power a new mobile Internet of the future."

The G1 will go on sale in Britain in early November and in other European countries served by T-Mobile, a subsidiary of Germany's Deutsche Telekom AG, in early 2009.

Amazon's escalated attack on iTunes' mainstay, digital music, comes just weeks after the Seattle-based firm enhanced its UnBox service to offer on-demand streaming of ad-free films and television shows.

The improved service, which competes with iTunes digital video rentals and sales, lets people watch programs or movies instantly in Web browsers or download them to watch on home computers whenever they wish.

"We're continuing to create new, convenient ways for our customers to watch digital movies and TV shows," Amazon Video On Demand directory Roy Price said in a release.

"The ability to watch content instantly without downloading first was among the most requested features of our customers."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Bollywood goes hi-tech in hunt for new audiences

2008-09-24T09:37:00.000-07:00

MUMBAI ( 2008-09-24 11:34:10 ) :Indian cinema is getting hi-tech, as Hollywood increasingly influences its themes and plots away from traditional love stories and towards spectacular superheroes and fantasy.

Directors are turning to special effects to woo younger, more upwardly mobile and middle class fans, spawning home-grown computer-generated imagery (CGI) firms and tie-ups with established figures in the United States.

"Indian audiences are very much exposed to Hollywood films and they draw parallels with our cinema when it comes to visual effects," said Rakesh Rohan, who produced and directed the 2006 science fiction film "Krrish."

"So, here we want to prove that Bollywood is no longer less than Hollywood."

"Krrish," which cost nearly nine million dollars to make, draws much from the 1978 blockbuster "Superman." It raked in 33 million dollars worldwide and was one of the biggest grossing Bollywood films that year.

"To take a big risk is better than making a common film," said Rohan. "Indian audiences don't want to see the same wedding scenes all the time. They want something new and we have to give it to them."

The latest film to follow the trend for special effects is "Drona" (Saviour), which is released worldwide on October 2, station and distribution company Red Chillies Entertainment for that purpose.

The venture proved lucrative in his film 2007 "Om Shanti Om." The film is thought to have made 44 million dollars at the box office, making it one of Bollywood's biggest ever hits.

"The mode of entertainment is changing and we really don't know what the future will be," said Khan. "Tomorrow, mobile phone may be the biggest platform of entertainment.

"At this time I feel India's entertainment industry is booming and many Hollywood companies are looking for production services over here. So, I feel it is a good time to cater to them with VFX (special effects) facilities."

More than a dozen Indian companies are now catering for the trend.

In February 2008, "The Golden Compass," starring Nicole Kidman, won an Oscar for Best Visual Effects, using a team of Indian digital artists from California-based Rhythm and Hues.

Darby has also linked up with another Indian production and distribution firm, Eros Entertainment, to found the Mumbai-based EyeQube with the aim of creating a world-class special effects facility in India.

"A visual treat is what makes a film in Hollywood a good grosser," he said in a recent lecture on the subject here. "The real star of the film is the film itself.

"And of course if there is a good script then it is surely going to be success."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Obama and McCain spend US$ 3 mln daily

2008-09-24T09:30:00.001-07:00

WASHINGTON: US presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and John McCain have spent a record amount on their advertising campaigns. The two runoffs have spent about $94 million in dozens of states, financial reports say. According to experts’ calculations, each of the two candidates spends about $3 million a day.

It is worthy of note that the advertising campaigns of the two candidates have been getting more and more aggressive recently. Barack Obama portrayed his rival, John McCain, as a retarded old man, who does not even know how to use a computer. The pre-election website of the senator also offers Believers for Barack and Catholics for Obama buttons and bumper stickers.

In the nearest future, Obama’s headquarters plan to release a new portion of advertising material addressing representatives of other religions.

Obama’s online advertising campaign has proved to be a lot more successful than that of his Republican rival. Obama has left McCain behind on his website traffic, banner impressions and even search entries. However, the difference in the ratings of the two senators is very small – only two or three percent.

Two US-based mathematicians said that they had developed a technique which allowed to envisage the results of the election. Calculations showed that Barack Obama would outstrip John McCain.

Wes Colley of the University of Alabama said that McCain would need to win several hesitating states over to his side, whereas Obama can afford losing in a couple of states, although Obama will win the election anyway.

Scientists from the Institute for Operational Research and Management stick to a different opinion. Their calculations show that Republican John McCain will become the next President of the United States. They based their research on the technique of the mathematical model of voting in separate states that uses a dynamic and progressive algorithm to predict the election results.

The early voting in the USA has already begun. The population of Virginia and several other states will be able to cast their ballots 45 days before the election. Thirty-six states in total will participate in the early voting. Not less than 30 percent of US citizens are expected to take part in the voting by absentee ballots.

US respects Pakistan sovereignty, says Bush

2008-09-23T09:52:00.001-07:00

NEW YORK: US President Bush Tuesday said that his country respects the sovereignty of Pakistan. He said this during his meeting with Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari.

President Bush said Pakistan is an important ally of USA. Bush also offered condolences to Zardari over the demise of Benazir Bhutto. He also expressed grief over the casualties in suicide attack in Islamabad.

Zardari said a democratic government has been established in Pakistan. On this occasion, he thanked President Bush for continuing support to Pakistan.

Zardari said Pakistan would continue efforts against terrorism and extremism, adding the bilateral relations between the two allied countries will further be boosted in future.

Zardari will also call on Indian Premier Manmohan Singh to discuss various affairs including Indo-Pak peace process.

McAfee to buy Secure Computing in $465 million deal

2008-09-23T09:49:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON ( 2008-09-22 23:59:32 ) :McAfee the second-largest US maker of security software, announced on Monday that it was buying California-based Secure Computing Corp. for 465 million dollars.

McAfee, whose headquarters are in Santa Clara, California, said the purchase of the San Jose-based Secure Computing would make it one of the largest network security vendors in the world.

McAfee offered 5.75 dollars a share for Secure Computing, whose stock soared more than 20 percent on news of the deal and was trading at 5.58 dollars at midday. McAfee was trading at 36.74 dollars, down 1.53 percent.

Dave DeWalt, chief executive and president of McAfee, described the purchase of Secure Computing as a "natural extension of McAfee's security-only focus.

"We believe that this pending acquisition will allow us to immediately establish a leading and highly competitive position in the network security space," he said.

McAfee is the second-largest US maker of security software after Symantec Inc.

Secure Computing provides protection solutions for Web, email and network assets and has more than 22,000 customers in 106 countries.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Magician David Blaine hangs in Central Park

2008-09-23T09:37:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK: Magician David Blaine unveiled his latest stunt at Wollman's Rink in Central Park, this time, the daredevil, will hang upside-down at a height of 44 feet for 60 hours.

Blaine, who has made a name for himself by pushing the limits of what humans can endure, will abstain from eating and sleeping for the duration of the challenge but will drink fluids. He will also be able to zip around freely while upside-down to talk to those who want to visit him.

Two hours after being hoisted upside-down, Blaine looked uncomfortable.

He could be seen stretching his legs and pulling himself up to a horizontal
position about every five minutes.

"I thought it was going to be pretty bad but it's probably worse than I anticipated," said Blaine.

Blaine's past challenges include holding his breath under water for more than 17 minutes, fasting for 44-days while suspended in a glass box over the Thames in London and surviving in a block of ice for more than 60 hours.

With each challenge, he takes things minute by minute, he said, not contemplating the remaining time he must spend in discomfort.

This challenge where the blood rushes to his head for a prolonged period has been particularly difficult, he said.

"I think the hardest part of this is going to be sleep-deprivation plus keeping blood flow and I guess the good news is... I guess the other factor that we didn't consider is heat from the sun. That'll need to be considered," said Blaine, who grunted from the pain.

Joining him above ground was tv host Kelly Ripa who interviewed him upside-down for a segment on "Live with Regis and Kelly".

Blaine's doctor, Ronald Ruden, who has advised him on all of his challenges said he was particularly concerned about blood clots and blindness.

"We get into real trouble because if he throws a clot or he breaks a blood vessel in his brain, there is nothing stopping it. So we just have to hope it doesn't happen because if it happens it will literally be a tragedy for David," he said.

A crowd of fans on onlookers had gathered at the rink, many incredulous that he was undertaking his latest stunt.

"I don't know how he does it. He must have the biggest headache, I would think but it's pretty amazing. He's an amazing person," said Cameron Scansaroli, who lives nearby.

The challenge ends on Wednesday night with a two-hour special airing on ABC called "David Blaine: Dive of Death".

Cool discovery lifts global warming outlook: researcher

2008-09-21T18:13:00.000-07:00

OTTAWA ( 2008-09-20 10:31:15 ) :Ice unearthed in Canada that stayed frozen for 700,000 years, even in warmer times, should allay fears of melting permafrost venting its vast carbon stores to hasten global warming, a study said on Friday.

Permafrost, or subsoil that remains frozen year-round, underlies a quarter of the land in the Northern Hemisphere and is estimated to hold twice as much carbon as is in the atmosphere.

When it melts, some experts fear it will quicken the pace of global warming significantly.

But the discovery of a cone-shaped wedge of subterranean ice near Dawson City, Yukon, that did not melt during balmier times shows that permafrost is more "stubborn" than first believed, researcher Duane Froese of the University of Alberta's earth and atmospheric science department told AFP.

And so, current climate models that predict "extensive and severe degradation of permafrost in response to global warming, with a potential for release of large volumes of stored carbon" should be revised, the study says.

In theory, the permafrost in the interior of Yukon and Alaska, along with this wedge of ice exposed by Klondike gold mining, should have melted during more temperate periods, Froese explained.

Some 120,000 years ago, for example, the Earth is believed to have been a few degrees warmer than now, he said.

The fact that the wedge did not melt indicates "some inherent properties of permafrost" are keeping it cool, and so climate models that predict significant melting of permafrost in the coming decades are wrong, he said.

The findings also suggest that global warming will occur at a much slower pace than predicted, Froese said.

"We don't have to be as worried," he told AFP. "Permafrost seems to be very resilient."

"Relative to other parts of our cryosphere or frozen parts of the Earth, like sea ice that is responding so quickly (to warming) or glacier ice which is responding quickly as well, deep permafrost is remaining cool."

Froese surmised that the layer of soil atop the permafrost acts as insulation from the warming atmosphere.

Environmental groups immediately lambasted Froese's conclusions, saying all evidence so far points to a melting permafrost, causing sinkholes to open up, and homes and forests to tilt.

In an interview with AFP, Froese qualified his findings.

He pointed out that his study dealt with the "deep" or continuous layer of permafrost that can be up to 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) deep at spots and contains more carbon that the thin top layer that has mostly concerned others.

"This does not tell us that we don't need to worry about shallow permafrost which also contains tremendous stores of carbon," he said.

His ice chunk, determined to be the oldest in North America, was first discovered seven years ago, but was not dated until more recently based on a layer of volcanic ash later found on top of it.

The study appeared in Friday's issue of the journal Science.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Potter author donates 1m pounds to Labour Party

2008-09-21T03:37:00.000-07:00

LONDON: Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling has donated one million pounds (1.3 million euros, 1.8 million dollars) to Britain's governing Labour Party, it announced Saturday.

The donation is a much-needed shot in the arm for Prime Minister Gordon Brown's debt-ridden party, which has been trailing the main opposition Conservatives by as many as 28 percentage points in the polls, and comes as Labour is set to kick off its annual party conference.

Rowling -- who was a single mother in Edinburgh surviving on state benefits when she was writing the first in the series about the bespectacled boy wizard -- said she backed the government's efforts to reduce child poverty, and opposed Conservative plans to give tax breaks to married couples.

The 43-year-old author now has a fortune totalling around 560 million pounds, according to the latest Sunday Times Rich List.

"I believe that poor and vulnerable families will fare much better under the Labour Party than they would under a Cameron-led Conservative Party," Rowling said, referring to Conservative leader David Cameron.

"Gordon Brown has consistently prioritised and introduced measures that will save as many children as possible from a life lacking in opportunity or choice."

She said opposition plans for tax support for married couples sent a message that the Conservatives "still believe a childless, dual-income, but married couple is more deserving of a financial pat on the head than those struggling, as I once was, to keep their families afloat in difficult times."

Brown, meanwhile, said in a statement that he was "delighted that J.K. Rowling, who is one of the world's greatest ever authors, has made such a generous donation."

Labour -- which has debts totalling 17.8 million pounds -- is entering its conference in the northern city of Manchester amid internal party rows over Brown's leadership, with the party near its lowest-ever points in the opinion polls.

The Harry Potter series of books have sold over 400 million copies, have been translated into 67 languages, and have spawned a successful film franchise and theme park.

UN text message campaign on Peace Day

2008-09-21T03:31:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK: Seeking global efforts against conflict, poverty and violation of human rights, the United Nations has launched a peace campaign through text messages on mobile phones and websites to mark the International Peace Day.

"On September 21, the International Day of Peace, I call on world leaders and peoples around the world to join forces against conflict, poverty and hunger, and for all human rights for all," said UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon in the text message.

The effort is part of a UN campaign that urges cell phone users in the United States to compose peace messages to be published on a website and delivered to world leaders gathered for the General Assembly beginning later this week.

Renowned violinist Midori Goto was appointed UN's Messenger of Peace in yesterday's ceremony which was kicked off with the traditional ringing of the peace bell.

The Secretary-General noted that the International Day has special significance as the year 2008 also marks the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the universal declaration of human rights by the UN.

"We know that human rights are essential to peace," he said, "yet too many people around the world still have their rights violated, especially during and after armed conflict."

"That is why we must ensure that the rights in the Declaration are a living reality - that they are known, understood and enjoyed by everyone, everywhere," he added.

Later, Ban and the President of the 63rd session of the General Assembly Miguel D'Escoto Brockmann welcomed more than 700 participants in a students' conference on 'Peace and Human Rights' organised by the UN's public information department.

Asking the students to utilise the chance to speak out about their concerns and think about their future as well as the future of this world, the secretary general said that today's generation has powers of social networking that his generation can "hardly comprehend".

"I use electronic communications all the time, but honestly - this is a little embarrassing - I have zero friends online. But you, collectively, can reach tens of thousands of people in an instant," Ban said.

"You can mobilise way beyond your clique, beyond your community, even beyond the borders of your own country. That is the power you have and I count on it - your power to make this world different when you become leaders, and even before," he added.

The function was attended by several peaceniks including Oscar-winning actor Michael Douglas, wildlife researcher and conservationist Jane Goodall and Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace prize winner Elie Wiesel.

Marriot Massacre: Death toll raises to 57

2008-09-21T03:20:00.000-07:00

ISLAMABAD: The death toll in the suicide bombing at Marriot Hotel Islamabad raised up to 51 as the rescue workers retrieved eleven more corpses from the wreckage of the building on Sunday.

Near 236 people were also injured in the deadliest attack in the history of Islamabad that almost completely destroyed the hotel building and dozens of vehicles parked aside.

Czech Republic’s ambassador to Pakistan is also among dead whose body was recovered from the hotel today, reported ARY OneWorld.

Czech ambassador Ivo Zdarek was missing since the attack.

Zdarek, 47, who used to serve in Vietnam, was appointed ambassador to Pakistan last month and has been staying at the hotel, the embassy sources said.

Earlier, doctors at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences Islamabad said that bodies of a Czech national and a foreigner lady were brought to the hospital Sunday.

A security official said the body of the ambassador was delivered to the Czech mission.

Many foreigners were also included among injured of the blast.

British High Commission in Islamabad has confirmed that five of its nationals got hurt in the blast, out of two were still be medicated in hospitals.

Meanwhile, the rescue efforts are underway at the blast site and some 11 more dead bodies have been recovered from various rooms of the hotel.

“More dead bodies have been found from the premises this morning,” a relief worker told ARY One World correspondent. “However, many of the hotel’s portions and rooms are still inaccessible due to intense fire and its aftermaths,” he added.

According to the relief workers the temperature of the building reached to 400 centigrade and the structure has been declared dangerous.

A joint investigation team constituted by the federal government has started probe into Marriott blast Sunday morning at the location.

The police and other investigation teams were collecting evidences at the location and pieces of the truck used in the bombing have been gathered.

According to the sources, surveillance cameras installed in the premise can help the investigators but entry in the hotel premises has been banned.

Meanwhile, United States has offered help to Pakistan in the investigations of the bombing.

“A 15-member team of investigators will leave for Pakistan after receiving permission from Pakistan,” US officials said.

Obama mingles with Hollywood royalty at lucrative fundraiser

2008-09-18T17:00:00.002-07:00

BEVERLY HILLS ( 2008-09-17 12:52:45 ) :Hollywood's A-list was out in force on Tuesday at a fundraiser for Barack Obama with stars including Leonardo DiCaprio helping to amass an estimated nine million dollars for the Democrat's White House campaign.

A dinner in a Beverly Hills mansion costing about 300 attendees 28,500 dollars each also attracted director Steven Spielberg along with a bevy of actors such as Jodie Foster and Tobey Maguire, and comedian Chris Rock, reporters saw.

Obama told the high-rolling audience that many of them had expressed jitters to him about his chances of success in the November 4 election against Republican John McCain.

The Illinois senator urged his supporters to "keep steady" in the days ahead and never forget what his candidacy was about.

He offered a reminder that his campaign "was about those who will never see the inside of a building like this and don't resent the success that's represented in this room, but just want the simple chance to be able to find a job that pays a living wage."

Drawing laughter, Obama added that he was "confident about winning because, I've looked at John McCain, I've looked at (McCain's running mate) Sarah Palin, I've looked at their agenda, and they don't have one."

Singer-actress Barbra Streisand crooned at a 2,500-dollar-per-head reception at the swanky Beverly Wilshire hotel after the dinner, where the stars ate goat's cheese, roasted potatoes, filet mignon and asparagus.

Obama aides would not confirm how much the twin events were set to raise but did not dispute reports that predicted a bumper haul of nine million dollars, which would be a record for a single night's fundraising.

McCain had accused Obama of siding with the Hollywood glitterati at his lucrative events instead of with hard-hit voters trapped by the economic malaise sweeping the United States.

Addressing voters in Vienna in the battleground state of Ohio, the Arizona senator earlier said Obama "talked about siding with the people, just before he flew off to Hollywood for a fundraiser with Barbra Streisand and his celebrity friends."

"Let me tell you, my friends, there's no place I'd rather be than here with the working men and women of Ohio," McCain said.

"Senator Obama's not interested in the politics of hope, he's interested in his political future."

But Obama's staff said McCain was on shaky ground, as he was flush with more than five million dollars after his own big fundraising event in Miami late Monday.

"I don't know who showed up in Florida where he raised five million dollars, but my guess is that it wasn't a lot of nurses, firefighters and police officers," Obama's top strategist David Axelrod told reporters.

Senator McCain raised an impressive 5.1 million dollars at his own fundraising dinner late Monday in Florida, the Republican's campaign said.

Supporters paid 50,000 dollars a ticket to attend the buffet dinner in Miami's InterContinental hotel, taking McCain's total fundraising in Florida to date to 26.2 million dollars.

Tuesday's events in Beverly Hills come after Obama racked up a record-breaking 66 million dollars in fundraising last month, beating his previous high mark of 55 million in February.

McCain raised 47 million dollars in August -- his best month so far. But the Republican has accepted public financing for his effort, which limits his spending to 84 million dollars for the general election campaign.

Obama has opted out of public financing, but both candidates are maintaining a regular schedule of fundraisers to top up their coffers for the most expensive US election ever.

Under US law, the first 2,300 dollars of donations can go to Obama's campaign and anything over that was going to the Democratic Party's election war chest.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Scientists to use satellites to count kangaroo rats

2008-09-18T17:00:00.001-07:00

FRESNO ( 2008-09-18 22:08:02 ) :Scientists plan to use satellite photos to count Giant Kangaroo Rats, the first-ever monitoring of an endangered species from outer space.

Scientists will examine images taken from the same satellite used by Israeli defense forces to find the circular patches of earth denuded by the rats as they gather food around their burrows. From that they plan to get the first-ever accurate population count of the rodents, a bellwether for the health of a parched plains environment.

By comparing the photos to 30 years of satellite images being released this month by the U.S. Geological Survey, researchers hope to better understand how the population has fluctuated in response to climate change and as the arrival of state and federal canal water turned the arid San Joaquin Valley into a patchwork of intensely cultivated farms and forced Giant Kangaroo Rats to concentrate on higher ground.

The information will help scientists determine when cattle might be used to reduce nonnative grasses, allowing the rats to more easily find food.

This study using satellite technology is taking place on the vast Carrizo Plain, a 390-square-mile desert grassland 150 miles southwest of here that is home to the most concentrated remaining populations of kangaroo rats.

The technology replaces trapping and tedious airplane fly-overs as a means of taking census.

"It allows us to more quickly recognize whether populations are declining where we want them to exist," said Scott Butterfield, a biologist with of The Nature Conservancy. "If they go below a threshold that is when we would consider intervening."

Giant Kangaroo Rats, nocturnal rodents so named because they hop on back legs, adapted to their desert environment by extracting moisture from seeds and in their nasal passages from the humid air they exhale. For food, they pile seeds from native grasses in circles outside their burrows, which provide shelter for the endangered San Joaquin antelope squirrel and blunt-nosed lizards. Their fat five-inch bodies are a favoured source of food for the endangered kit fox.

High rainfall encourages the growth of taller nonnative grasses, which overrun the shorter grasses that kangaroo rats depend on for food. Less food means fewer offspring. When kangaroo rats decline, so do the endangered native plant and animal species that depend on them for survival, the researchers say.

Determining at what point rainfall affects foraging will help the U.S. Bureau of Land Management establish grazing policy to control nonnative grasses and encourage a healthy kangaroo rat population.

"Without them the entire ecosystem would go out of whack," said Tim Bean, a doctoral student with the department of environmental policy and management at the University of California, Berkeley. "It's fairly rare for something so small to be a keystone species. It's easier to track, say, bison."

Farming has taken 90 percent of the kangaroo rat habitat since the middle of the last century.

The Carrizo Plain National Monument is California's largest remaining undisturbed tract of grasslands similar in biology and geography to the San Joaquin Valley, and it supports many plant and animal species that once thrived on the valley floor.

"Carrizo is like a Yosemite for grasslands, and there are decisions people are learning to make to manage it in a way that preserves its natural state," Bean said. "Since the kangaroo rat is so important to its function, we've got to get a handle on it."

Copyright Aaj TV, 2008

Johnson space center to reopen next week: NASA

2008-09-18T17:00:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON ( 2008-09-18 23:57:35 ) :The Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, which was shut down as Hurricane Ike barreled toward the US Gulf Coast, will reopen next week, US space officials said Thursday.

Officials in a statement set a September 22 date for reopening the space center, which controls many systems aboard the orbiting International Space Station (ISS).

Space officials said the center emerged unscathed from the killer hurricane, which exacted billions of dollars of damage around the region.

The space center shut down on September 11, as the monster storm steamed toward the US mainland. Johnson Space Center officials temporarily handed over control of the ISS to backup facilities elsewhere in Texas and in Alabama.

The hurricane killed more than 100 people in the Caribbean, then killed more than 17 across nine US states after making landfall in southeastern Texas.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Yahoo opens its doors to hackers

2008-09-16T17:30:00.000-07:00

SUNNYVALE ( 2008-09-15 11:20:02 ) :Hackers armed with laptop computers, camping tents and dreams of software glory invaded Yahoo during the weekend as the Internet pioneer opened its strategy and its doors to outside developers.

The "hackathon" was as much a symbol of Yahoo rising from the ashes of a burned-out courtship with US technology colossus Microsoft as it was a chance for software wizards to work their magic on Yahoo's platform.

The approximately 300 hackers that swept onto the firm's campus in Sunnyvale, California, had the first chance to tinker with the inner workings of Yahoo online offerings such as its globally popular free email.

Yahoo earlier in the week outlined a shift to an "Open Strategy" that it believes will jazz-up the website and lead to meshing offerings from hot online properties such as Amazon and iTunes with its web pages.

"Open is a really important strategy for us," Yahoo Developer Network head Chris Yeh told AFP as hackers fueled up on pizza, keg beer and caffeine-based energy drinks for all-night software writing sessions.

"It is a new course for the ship. Our ability to turn Yahoo from a company that owns and operates its own sites to a company that lets other people in on the action is a critical growth moment. This is really exciting."

Breaking down walls between websites where people store digitized photos, videos, messages, and musings is a trend that's overdue, according to Internet users and developers.

"It's something that really needs to happen," Developer Ryan Moore said as he worked on a hack in a purple-and-yellow armchair overlooking sand volleyball courts. "It's the way everything ought to work."

Yahoo announced plans to revamp its homepage in coming months to allow people to customize home pages with mini-applications, including those crafted by third-party developers and vetted by Yahoo.

"Jerry (Yang) and I are dedicated to keeping that spirit of openness and innovation alive, but we know that we can't come up with all the great ideas ourselves," Yahoo co-founder David Filo wrote in a 'Hack Day' message.

"Hackers, bring it on."

Hackers working alone or in teams set up camps in booths or tables in URL's Cafe in the heart of Yahoo's campus while others retreated to classrooms or stuffed chairs on the second floor of the two-story building.

"This is the Yahoo that you know; that you've always dealt with," said Moore, who attended the company's first and only other US hack day in 2006.

"It's the old Yahoo: 'We have eyeballs; we have data -- have at it."

Some broke from coding intermittently through the night to nap in tents pitched in a grassy courtyard or play classic arcade videogames including Pac-Man and Galaga.

Musically inclined hackers tested their skills on faux instruments playing pretend rock stars in the Rock Band video game.

Nearly 50 "hacks" were completed by the time the event wrapped after dark on Saturday.

Software creations included a "Ganzbot" robot that reads people news, weather, Twitter messages or other information streamed to their home pages by automated delivery mechanisms known as "feeds."

An Icarus.tv hack served up music videos in online radio style, scouring the Internet and fetching performances that promise to fit people's tastes.

"The people here from Yahoo are psyched, excited," Yeh said. "It's a great event. It is one of the things we can rally about as a company."

Yahoo claims more than 500 million users worldwide but has been struggling to cash-in on its popularity.

Yahoo's sagging fortunes and Google's ascension as Internet advertising king prompted Microsoft on January 31 to offer to buy Yahoo for 44.6 billion dollars in a half-cash, half-stock deal.

Microsoft was eager to combine online resources with Yahoo in order to better battle Google.

Microsoft walked away from negotiations May 3 after Yahoo rejected an offer it raised from 31 dollars to 33 dollars per share, which amounted to 47.5 billion dollars.

Yahoo subsequently made a deal with Google to put its online advertising expertise to work on Yahoo websites. That deal is to take effect later this year if it passes muster with US anti-trust regulators.

"It's been a remarkable year so far and it is going to continue to be a remarkable year," Yeh said. "I like interesting times. I think when things are in flux good things happen."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Self-flying helicopter takes off

2008-09-16T17:29:00.001-07:00

STANFORD ( 2008-09-16 21:25:53 ) :A four-foot-long helicopter flew itself over the Stanford University campus on Monday in a test of artificial intelligence that researchers say could be used to scout wildfires or on military missions.

The autonomous helicopter performed flips, rolls, pirouettes, stall-turns, knife-edges, and an inverted hover over a field.

The helicopter is equipped with an artificial intelligence system developed by computer scientists at Stanford and taught itself to fly by watching the aerobatics of a radio-controlled helicopter flown by a human.

"These helicopters can fly maneuvers at the edge of what a helicopter is capable of," said Adam Coates, a PhD student who worked on the project.

The helicopters, which communicate with a ground-based computer that guides it, are still being developed.

PhD student Pieter Abbeel said the research group has been contacted by a number of companies interested in surveillance and mapping applications, while scientists saw the mini-helicopters investigating wildfires and looking for land mines.

Each helicopter costs approximately $4,000 and is outfitted with an accelerometer, gyroscope and a magnetometer to determine its orientation and acceleration, and a GPS or two ground-based cameras to determine its location.

Copyright Reuters, 2008

Ozone hole larger in 2008 than previous year: WMO

2008-09-16T17:27:00.000-07:00

GENEVA ( 2008-09-17 00:31:35 ) :The ozone hole is larger in 2008 than the previous year but is not expected to reach the size seen two years ago, the World Meteorological Organisation said on Tuesday.

"In 2008, the ozone hole appeared relatively late. However, during the last couple of weeks it has grown rapidly and has now passed the maximum size attained in 2007," the WMO said in a statement.

The hole in the layer over the Antarctic was discovered in the 1980s. It regularly tends to form in August, reaching its maximum size late September or early October before it fills again in mid-December.

The size it reaches is dependent on weather conditions.

Experts warned that such is the damage to the ozone layer, which shields the Earth from harmful ultra-violet rays, it will only attain full recovery in 2075.

"It would take decades for the hole to disappear and for it to return to the situation before 1980. We are looking at 2075," Geir Braathen, who is the World Meteorological Organisation's expert on the subject told AFP.

On September 13, the hole covered an area of 27 million square kilometres, while in 2007, the maximum reached was 25 million square kilometres, said the WMO.

"Since the ozone hole is still growing, it is too early to determine how large this year's ozone hole will be," it added.

Ozone provides a natural protective filter against harmful ultra-violet rays from the sun, which can cause sunburn, cataracts and skin cancer and damage vegetation.

Its depletion is caused by extreme cold temperatures at high altitude and a particular type of pollution, from chemicals often used in refrigeration, some plastic foams, or aerosol sprays, which have accumulated in the atmosphere.

Most of these chemicals, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), are being phased out under the 1987 Montreal Protocol, but they linger in the atmosphere for many years.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Coen brothers light up US box office with 'Burn' comedy

2008-09-16T17:23:00.000-07:00

LOS ANGELES ( 2008-09-16 10:42:42 ) :The Coen brothers conquered the weekend box office in the United States and Canada with their farcical "Burn After

Reading" only six months after winning an Oscar for a much darker film, industry figures showed Monday.

Starring Brad Pitt, George Clooney, John Malkovich, Frances McDormand and

Tilda Swinton, the spy comedy earned 19.1 million dollars from Friday to Sunday in its opening weekend.

The successful debut of the latest film from sibling directors Ethan and Joel Coen comes after the two won Best Picture at the Oscars for the grim and violent "No Country for Old Men."

The revenue for "Burn After Reading" marked the best commercial result at the box office for the directors since they started making movies more than 20 years ago.

The film with its goofy, rapid-fire dialogue has won mainly rave reviews and praise in particular for Pitt, who plays a clueless gym trainer. The movie tells the story of a fired CIA analyst, played by Malkovich, whose memoir falls into the hands of Pitt and his cohorts at a fitness gym.

"The Family that Preys" by playwright-turned-filmmaker Tyler Perry came in second place with earnings of 17.3 million in its weekend debut while another new release had a solid showing at third place, police thriller "Righteous

Kill." Starring screen giants Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino as New York police detectives, the film earned 16.3 million dollars, showing the two can still draw a big audience in their sixties -- though the movie got mixed reviews.The modern update of George Cukor's 1939 classic film "The Women," featuring Meg Ryan, was in fourth place with 10.1 million over the weekend.

The spoof "Tropic Thunder" -- Ben Stiller's movie-within-a-movie about filming a war flick in the middle of a real-life conflict zone fell to fifth place with a take of 4.2 million dollars, boosting its earnings beyond 100 million dollars over five weeks.

"House Bunny," about an ousted Playboy bunny who becomes a college sorority house mother, was in sixth with 4.15 million, followed by "Batman" sequel "The Dark Knight."

Still in the "Top Ten" after nine weeks, the latest Batman movie took in 4.12 million over the weekend for total earnings of 517.8 million, the second best box office showing after "Titanic" which earned 600.8 million.

Last week's box office winner "Bangkok Dangerous," starring Nicolas Cage as a ruthless hitman on assignment in Thailand, fell all the way to eighth this week, with 2.6 million in earnings.

"Traitor," a war-on-terror epic featuring Don Cheadle as a former US

Special Ops officer and potential international conspirator, was ninth, with 2.1 million.

In 10th place was "Death Race," an action-adventure flick about an

Ex convict competing against prison inmates in a freedom-or-death car race, taking in two million.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Parents can reduce exam stress in kids

2008-09-16T17:00:00.000-07:00

ISLAMABAD: Exam for students means a dreadful time to deal with. Exam time is very stressful for both parents and children.

Stress in life is very helpful, as it inspires us to perform tasks and propels to achieve things enthusiastically, Health news reported.

However, too much stress is very damaging and it generally occurs when we lack confidence and worry that we are incapable of doing anything efficiently.

When exams are nearby, children often worry about their exams and buckle under some stress and pressure. Parents, on the other hand, also worry as much as their children do. For them, it is something like experiencing their most horrible phase in life with full of stress.

This stress leads to regular irritation, depression, fatigue, sleeplessness, headache, body pains, and lack of appetite.

The parental stress can also affect children, if parents undergo excessive stress because of their child's exam.

Loss of interest to study, memory lapse, lack of ability to concentrate for long periods and headache, mild fever, and stomachache are the result of parental stress in children.

Often, parents feel that they can do nothing to reduce the exam stress and fear in their child. However, as a parent, you have several ways through which you can help your child-and yourself-pass through this stressful time.

As a parent, pay special attention towards your child and encourage him/her to overcome their worries and gain confidence to go through their exams successfully. Do not show over-attention and keep over-expectations.

Always be affectionate, supportive, and a study partner in their academic activities. Take time, spend with your child, and reassure that you are always with him/her to support and encourage.

Concentrate on the nutrition, as it can influence more on exam stress in you and your child. So, plan a balanced diet with lots of fruits and vegetables and low fat, low- sugar, and low-caffeine foods that increase memory power.

Also, ensure that your child is sleeping well for about 6-8 hours. This helps in increasing the thinking and concentration power of your child.

Remind your child that nervousness is a common phenomenon for every student. Explain the child that nervousness can make him/her lose confidence and the key is to set these nerves to activist use.

Focus on your kid's activeness. Encourage your child to follow an exercise routine, as it helps enhance their energy levels, ease stress and increases concentration and memory power.

Never set rules for studying; allow your child to go with his/her schedule while studying. Instead, assist your child in drawing up a regular study time schedule. Do not add stress and pressure, be a good listener and listen to them, give support and stay away from criticism.

After completing an exam, discuss about the paper and encourage your child to move ahead, focus on the next test, and do better in the coming exams. Also, encourage your child to concentrate on the next test rather than thinking on the finished exam that no one can change.

Remember that exam is not the end of everything. If the child does not do well in the exam, encourage him/her to take the exam again and succeed in it.

New coin of Prince Charles on 60th birthday

2008-09-16T06:55:00.001-07:00

LONDON: Britain's Royal Mint has issued a new collectors coin featuring images of Prince Charles and his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, to celebrate his 60th birthday.

Royal Mint officials say the coin is unusual because it features a member of the royal family on each side.

The last coin to feature an image of Charles -- who turns 60 on Nov. 14 -- on one side and the queen on the other was issued to mark the Prince's 50th birthday.

The Royal Mint released three versions of the coin Monday. The gold coin costs 925 pounds ($1,665). The solid silver coin costs 39.95 pounds ($72) and the nickel coin costs 9.95 pounds ($18).

Pakistani Lawyers movement (Efforts for restoration of judges): pictures

2008-09-14T12:20:00.000-07:00

Global economic slowdown to push 100m into poverty

2008-09-14T11:59:00.001-07:00

NAIROBI: Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary-General, warns in a new report that the gains made in reducing extreme poverty are under threat from the rise in global food and fuel prices and global economic slowdown.

In the UN's Millennium Development Goals Report 2008, launched on 11 September, Ban writes: "The largely benign development environment that has prevailed since the early years of this decade, and that has contributed to the successes to date, is now threatened. The economic slowdown will diminish the incomes of the poor; the food crisis will raise the number of hungry people in the world and push millions more into poverty; climate change will have a disproportionate impact on the poor."

According to World Bank data, the number of extreme poor has fallen - from 1.8 billion to 1.4 billion - between 1990 and 2005, with the biggest gains made in eastern Asia, in particular, China. In sub-Saharan Africa and the Commonwealth of Independent States, however, the number of poor has increased in the same period.

These figures confirm that the global poverty rate is likely to be halved by 2015 - achieving the first MDG.

However, the worldwide increases in food prices will push another 100 million people into absolute poverty, according to the UN report.

"Even though the proportion of people worldwide suffering from malnutrition and hunger has fallen since the early 1990s, the number of people lacking access to food has risen. With recent increases in food prices, it is estimated that one billion people will go hungry, while another two billion will be undernourished," the report states.

Sub-Saharan Africa's poverty rate is constant at 50 percent, while East Asia cut its rate over 25 years from almost 80 percent to less than 20 percent. Overall numbers are thus down from 52 percent in 1981 to 26 percent in 2005.

Slight improvements have been seen in primary school enrolment - up from 83 percent to 88 percent on average worldwide, although the rate for sub-Saharan Africa is only 71 percent, with 38 million children of primary school-going age not in school. In contrast, the enrolment ratio tops 90 percent in Southern Asia, although 18 million children do not attend school.

The fourth MDG, cutting child mortality, also saw improvements, with the number of deaths of under-fives falling below 10 million for the first time in 2006, to 9.7 million. The rate has declined from 93 to 72 deaths per 1,000 live births between 1990 and 2006.

However, in 62 countries under-five mortality is not falling fast enough to meet the target of reducing the mortality rate by two-thirds by 2015.

Worlds highest concentration of millionaires

2008-09-14T11:52:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK: The US may have the largest number of millionaires, but tiny Singapore rules the world when it comes to the highest concentration.

According to Boston Consulting Group’s latest Global Wealth report, an astounding one in 10 households in Singapore have investible assets of $1 million or more. That compares with 4.3% in the U.S., which ranks sixth.

Singapore, of course, is very small – it has about a million households. And its 112,000 millionaires are dwarfed by the 4,884,000 millionaires in the U.S., according to Boston Consulting’s calculations.

Of course, wealth surveys, by nature, are imprecise, given the small sample sizes, the agendas of the surveyors and the difficulty of polling the rich. Still, they can offer insights into broader trends and directional changes with the wealthy.

If you want to know where to go to have the highest chance of bumping into a millionaire, here are the top five:

1 — Singapore — 10.6%
2 — Qatar — 7.9%
3 — Switzerland — 7.3%
4 — United Arab Emirates — 6.6%
5 — Kuwait — 5.3%

Interestingly, the chances of running into a millionaire are almost twice as high in the U.S. than in Saudi Arabia, which has a millionaire density of 2.2%.

As for cities with the largest number of millionaires, the report found that nine of the top 15 are in the U.S., with New York topping the list, followed by London, Tokyo, Los Angeles and Chicago.

Oprah to ask viewers to support Senate bill

2008-09-14T11:47:00.000-07:00

CHICAGO: A few weeks after cheering presidential candidate Barack Obama at the Democratic National Convention, Oprah Winfrey will take up a different kind of political activism.

Monday's episode of "The Oprah Winfrey Show" will be dedicated to a Senate bill targeting child predators, according to a release issued Friday by Chicago-based Harpo Productions.

During the show, which will detail the "extent and pervasiveness of child pornography trafficking in America," Winfrey will ask viewers to contact their senators about U.S. Senate Bill 1738, the Protect Our Children Act, Harpo said.

"What you are going to see is going to shock you to the core, but I'm asking you to please not turn away because this is happening in our country, to our children, in the United States every day," Winfrey said in the release.

Harpo said the show will be rated TV-14.

In 1991, Winfrey testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in support of a national database of convicted child abusers. The "Oprah Bill" was signed into law in 1993.

In 2005, Winfrey, who has said she was also a victim of child abuse, launched the "Oprah's Child Predator Watch List" and pledged a $100,000 reward per case for information that leads to the arrest of fugitives featured on her show and Web site. Nine of the featured fugitives have been captured, Harpo said.

Winfrey has been a longtime supporter of Obama's and said she was moved to tears by his acceptance speech at the convention.

Kidman tops most overpaid star list in Hollywood

2008-09-14T11:45:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK: If you were wondering who made the most money in Hollywood without truly deserving it - apparently the answer is Nicole Kidman, at least according to Forbes magazine. She was named the most overpaid celebrities in the second annual list of least bankable stars.

Kidman's films were estimated to only earn $1 for every dollar the Oscar-winning actress was paid compared with $8 a year ago.

The article says, "Despite winning an Oscar for her performance in 2002's "The Hours," Kidman has become the most overpaid celebrity in Hollywood."

Second in the list came Jennifer Garner - who acted in 'The Kingdom' and 'Catch and Release', which have both under performed at the box office, earning roughly $3.60 for every $1 she was paid.

Kidman's ex-husband, Tom Cruise, came third in the list with a $4 return for every dollar he was paid, mostly because of the failure of last year's movie "Lions for Lambs."

Forbes said the ranking was compiled by looking at a star's past three films and dividing their total earnings by the films' gross income to get the actor's payback figure.

Here's my opinion - if I was one of these stars, I don't think I'd care too much about the list. After all, they're the ones making the money!

Hackers find black hole in atom smasher computers: report

2008-09-14T11:32:00.000-07:00

LONDON ( 2008-09-13 18:46:47 ) :Hackers claim they have broken into the computer system of the Large Hadron Collider, the mega-machine designed to expose secrets of the cosmos, British newspapers reported on Saturday.

A group calling itself the Greek Security Team left a rogue webpage mocking the technicians responsible for computer security at the giant atom smasher as "schoolkids", the Times and Daily Telegraph reported.

The hackers vowed they had no intention of disrupting the experiment at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) on the Swiss-French border, they just wanted to highlight the flaws in the computer system's security.

"We're pulling your pants down because we don't want to see you running around naked looking to hide yourselves when the panic comes," they wrote, according to the Daily Telegraph.

The hackers claimed to have gained access to a website open to other scientists on Wednesday as the LHC passed its first test with flying colours, the reports said.

They appear to have tried to gain access to the computer system of the Compact Muon Solenoid Experiment, one of the four detectors that will be analysing the progress of the experiment.

James Gillies, a spokesman for CERN, told the Times: "We don't know who they were but there seems to be no harm done. It appears to be people who want to make a point that CERN was hackable."

Scientists hailed the success of the start of the experiment on Wednesday in the Large Hadron Collider, the 27-kilometre (16.9-mile) circular tunnel in which parallel beams of protons will be accelerated to nearly the speed of light.

Superconducting magnets will then steer the counter-rotating beams so that strings of protons smash together in four huge laboratories, fleetingly replicating the conditions that prevailed at the "Big Bang" that created the Universe 13.7 billion years ago.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Nokia expending its device range

2008-09-14T11:27:00.000-07:00

KARACHI ( 2008-09-13 18:38:42 ) :Nokia Saturday announced that it is expanding its device range which enables Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync to all Nokia S60 3rd Edition devices.

An announcement here said that 43 Nokia devices will now feature the Mail for Exchange mobile email application, making Nokia's device range the largest ever to enable the solution chosen by more businesses than any other messaging solution.

It said that Nokia also announced Saturday that Mail for Exchange will be available out-of-the-box in future releases of Nokia Eseries and Nokia Nseries devices.

With this announcement, Nokia is enabling about 80 million mobile phone users which is the number of Nokia S60 3rd Edition converged devices shipped globally to date to connect to their email accounts on the Exchange Server.

Exchange Server 2007 provides customers with anywhere access to information, advanced built-in protection and greater operational efficiency.

`The Nokia-Microsoft collaboration to bring corporate mobile email to businesses and mobile professionals is truly unbeatable. No other device manufacturer provides the wide range of devices that we have, which immediately mobilize the hundreds of millions of email accounts from Microsoft Exchange', said Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President, Markets, and Nokia.

`The costs of mobility are contained as companies are able to utilize existing Microsoft Exchange infrastructure, and there is also the strong possibility that a large number of employees already have one or more of the 43 Nokia devices that enable Exchange ActiveSync'.

`Nokia is a valued partner and we are pleased they are making it easier for their approximately 80 million S60 3rd Edition customers to realize the benefits of Exchange Server', said Terry Myerson, Corporate Vice President, Exchange Server, Microsoft Corp.

`This announcement with Nokia further demonstrates the importance consumers and businesses place on accessing Exchange Server data from mobile devices in addition to traditional desktop clients. Nokia's announcement today will help give its users that access and help make them more productive'.

`We take corporate and IT security policies seriously, and a comparison study showed that the device management and security policies for devices such as the Nokia Eseries are robust', added Vanjoki.

`This should give business heads and IT managers greater confidence when choosing between device brands to mobilize their workforce'.

By connecting to the Exchange Server 2007, Mail for Exchange enables features such as Autodiscover, which drastically simplifies the set-up process by requiring the email account holder to only enter their email address, password, domain and usernames; Out of Office messaging, enabling busy professionals to set their out-of-office messages directly from their Nokia device; synchronization when roaming, a must-have feature for travelling businesspeople; and also Flag status for follow-ups.

While the Exchange ActiveSync protocol is compatible with many types of devices, Nokia device users will have access to features that are currently not available in other Exchange ActiveSync licensees' devices. Setting email priorities, alerts for meeting request conflicts, a standalone global address list application to search for a colleague's contact details quickly, downloading and editing all types of attachments, not just image files, are must-have factors that users will expect from their mobile email application.

Copyright APP (Associated Press of Pakistan), 2008

Breakthrough in understanding of speech offers hope to the deaf

2008-09-14T11:21:00.000-07:00

PARIS ( 2008-09-14 17:45:04 ) :Scientists on Sunday said intelligible speech is learnt in part through nerve signals from the vocal tract, a discovery that could open up an ambitious avenue of therapy for the deaf.

Muscles and receptors in the mouth and throat retain a memory of their position and feeling when a word is uttered, and their signals provide key input for the brain as it hones the power of speech, they suggest.

Researchers David Ostry and Sazzad Nasir at McGill University in Montreal carried out an unusual experiment into an enduring mystery: why is it that many deaf people are still able to speak coherently, sometimes years after losing their hearing?

They recruited five middle-aged people who had lost their hearing in adulthood and were now profoundly deaf but had a cochlear implant to pick up sounds.

With the implant turned off, the five were asked to repeat four specific words while the front of their lower jaw was gently pulled forwards by a small device attached to their bottom row of front teeth.

The movement was only tiny but it was sufficient to deform the sounds emitted from the volunteers' mouth.

The point of the experiment was to see whether the volunteers were able to adapt to the sudden speech deformation, even if they could not hear the sound they were making.

The four words were "saw," "say," "sass" and "sane," chosen because their vowel, dipthong and fricative -- the hiss of the "s" -- require a very precise jaw position to be pronounced intelligibly.

Even though they were unable to hear the deformed sounds they made, the volunteers progressively learnt to fix the errors in their pronunciation as they ran through a programme of 300 utterances.

In fact, they learned as fast as a comparison group of people of a similar age and with normal hearing who performed the same experiment.

"The deformation (by the machine) is in the orders of millimetres. Even when these individuals can't hear what they're saying, when the motion path of the jaw is changed just a tiny amount, it's enough to prompt a corrective response," Ostry told AFP.

The study is published online by the journal Nature Neuroscience.

He and Nasir attribute the remarkable adaptive power to "mechanoreceptors," or nerves and soft tissues in the vocal tract, which remember how they should feel when a word is pronounced properly.

Ostry said that the discovery shows that the brain corrects our speech through two simultaneous inputs -- through hearing the sound that we make, and also through these subtler feedback signals.

"When a child learns to talk, it gets two kinds of information," Ostry told AFP.

"One is the auditory information, being the sound of its own voice. At the same time, it also gets information from receptors that are in the skin and in the muscles.

"These receptors develop not only in expectation of what words should sound like, they also develop an expectation of what the word should feel like."

Ostry said the experiment focussed only on the muscles of the jaw and facial tissues, but the outcome suggests "mechanoreceptors" are also likely to exist in the lips, the tongue and the muscles of the larynx.

"It is conceivably a basis for speech therapy, absolutely," he said.

"When you're deaf, you've lost one of the two systems that basically support speech, but you still have the other one. And the other one accounts for an enormous proportion for the total sensory inflow that's associated with speech. "It's like having a flat [tyre] and discovering that you have a spare after all."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Paparazzi get duped by look-alike Spears at LAX

2008-09-14T11:19:00.000-07:00

LOS ANGELES ( 2008-09-12 21:44:53 ) :Cameras flashing and films rolling, a crowd of paparazzi surrounded a police escort, trying to get the perfect shot of Britney Spears' little sister as she left the Los Angeles International Airport.

Just one snag: The woman wasn't Jamie Lynn Spears.

In what appears to be a case of the old switcharoo, airport police on Wednesday duped paparazzi at the crowded terminal by leading an unidentified woman — wearing sunglasses and looking away from cameras — down an escalator and through a hallway while the real Jamie Lynn and her baby girl safely left the airport from another area.

Police denied any trickery and said they were not escorting the woman.

"All (the officers) did was follow the crowd down to the baggage area," said Sgt. Jim Holcomb of the Los Angeles airport police. "The people they were following assumed that this was Spears because she was blonde."

Despite the denial, a video posted by TMZ showed several officers tucked in tight around the woman, some giving paparazzi repeated warnings to "keep backing up" and "keep moving."

Several in the crowd greeted the woman with, "Hello, Jamie," and "How's the baby?" and later learned she was a decoy.

Holcomb said it's against department policy to provide security for celebrities, but officers were willing to do it after the Spears family asked for an escort for Jamie Lynn, her baby, her mother and her older sister Britney, who ended up being a no-show.

"If there's extenuating circumstances, we can do what we need to do," Holcomb said. "If there was no baby — hey, you're on your own. You're an adult."

He said police were concerned with the possibility of shoving in the crowd of 100 photographers and about 50 Delta Air Lines employees waiting for the group.

Holcomb said celebrity treatment is nearly impossible to get at the airport.

"A lot of times someone will call and tell us that they're coming in with a bunch of cars. They just want to park at the curb, and we always say, 'No,'" Holcomb said. "They want recognition, some attention paid to them."

Holcomb said the incident is under review, but added that such debriefings are not unusual.

"I think someone got the best of the paparazzi this time," Holcomb said.

A message left with Jamie Lynn Spears' publicist was not immediately returned Thursday night.

The 17-year-old actress, the younger sister of pop singer Britney Spears, starred in Nickelodeon's "Joey 101" and won a Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Award for Favorite TV actress in 2006.

Copyright www.Aaj.tv, 2008

Bollywood: Shahrukh Khan attacked in Mumbai

2008-09-11T11:45:00.001-07:00

MUMBAI: Raj Thackeray's uncle Bal Thackeray has targeted Bollywood actor Shahrukh Khan through the party mouthpiece. But why? For calling himself a Dilliwala.

The editorial in Saamna, the Sena mouthpiece, has questioned Shahrukh for calling himself a Dilliwala. "Mumbai made Khan a baadshah (king), but he still calls himself a Dilliwala. If that is the case, why did you come to Mumbai?" questioned the editorial.

Raj Thackeray, the Chief of Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), had attacked Jaya Bachchan a couple of days ago for commenting that she would speak in Hindi, as she belonged to Uttar Pradesh. Jaya has reportedly apologised for the comments as demanded by Raj Thackeray.

Seven years on, three big 9/11 lies

2008-09-11T11:36:00.000-07:00

HONG KONG: Dear, sweet Laura Bush told the biggest, baldest lie at last week's Republican National Convention. "Let's not forget," the first lady said, "President [George W] Bush has kept the American people safe."

Mrs Bush, your husband and his administration did not keep the American people safe. On September 11, 2001, nearly 3,000 people died, and more than 6,000 were injured as al-Qaeda hijackers crashed commercial aircraft into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon outside Washington. The Bush people act as if someone else was in charge when it happened.

It's the greatest political mystery of the 21st century, perhaps in American history: how have the Republicans avoided responsibility for 9/11? How can they keep claiming the deadliest attacks on the American mainland as a badge of honor, rather than a stain on their record?

Mrs Bush's whopper is one of three big lies that the Republicans keep telling on national security related to 9/11. The assault on the truth has gone on for seven years, and last week's convention video of the disaster suggests it will continue. Meanwhile, Democrats remain afraid to say the Bush administration has no clothes on when it comes to national security lest they be accused of politicizing 9/11, while Republicans keep flaunting the tragedy for partisan gain.

The Bush administration's steadfast refusal to take any responsibility for the attacks is absolutely mind-blowing. No appointee was fired for the most glaring national security cock-up since Pearl Harbor, if not the British torching of the White House in 1814. Then-national security advisor Condoleezza Rice contends no one anticipated terrorists using airplanes to hit skyscrapers, even though the Federal Bureau of Investigation analyzed the possibility in 1991. For her incompetence and lack of candor, she was promoted to secretary of state.

As with other massive failures to anticipate, Hurricane Katrina and administering Iraq, the Bush administration believes its appointees are always "doin' a great job". In truth, failures at the highest levels of the national security and intelligence communities set the stage of 9/11, but the Bush administration won't admit it, and no one has ever been held accountable.

After bragging that it has kept America safe, Republicans then boast that America hasn't been hit again. At the convention, Republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain talked about a second attack "that many thought was inevitable", even though no credible plot for further attacks has been found. While it's true there's hasn't been a strike on the American homeland since 9/11, taking bows for that is based on faulty logic. As Bill Clinton might say, it depends on how you define "again".

The same folks who say the US hasn't been hit again frequently contend the Iraq occupation lets the US fight the terrorists over there instead of fighting them in America. Never mind that were no international terrorists in Iraq before the US invasion, or the implicit suggestion of using American soldiers as sacrificial lambs to keep the bad guys away from the main flock. By the over-there logic, the US has been hit 4,152 times and counting since 9/11 in Iraq alone.

Some may argue that the US has been hit in other senses, such as the erosion of constitutional rights at home and standing in the world (see lie number 3). Anyone who goes through US airport security, tries sending money overseas, or applies for a student visa with a name like Muhammad will see that the hits just keep coming.

But the biggest lie in contending that the US hasn't been hit again since 9/11 is that the US did, in fact, get hit again on 9/11. Those attacks weren't a first strike by an unknown foe but the highlight of a series of attacks by a dedicated enemy. Al-Qaeda's war on the US began at the World Trade Center in 1993 with an attempt to blow up the Twin Towers with a truck bomb in the garage. Al-Qaeda went on to bomb the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, and the USS Cole in Yemen in October 2000.

But when they entered office, the Bush people downgraded the Clinton administration's fight against al-Qaeda that included cruise missile attacks on targets in Somalia and Afghanistan. The Bush people demoted the chief counter-terrorism adviser to the National Security Council. Condoleezza Rice, and reportedly George W Bush, saw the August 2001 national security briefing memorandum entitled "Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States" and dismissed it. "It wasn't something that we felt we needed to do anything about," Rice told the 9/11 Commission. So America got hit again, in the very same spot where al-Qaeda first struck. Remember that old expression: Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

The final national security lie linked to 9/11 is the one that matters most now. The Republicans claim that America is safer now because of the invasion of Iraq. That's wrong by several measures.

Bush's two top reasons for the invasion were to destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and end its support for international terrorism. Both premises turned out to be false. Since Saddam Hussein's Iraq posed no threat to the US, overthrowing his government had negligible direct impact on American national security. But invasion under the doctrine of preventive war in defiance of international institutions and under false pretences, plus the deployment of more than 150,000 troops for more than five years has wrought far-reaching national security harm.

The Iraq invasion distracted the US military and the world from the real fight against al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. It also pre-empted providing Afghanistan with the political and infrastructure foundations needed to create a modern nation. Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden remains at large, and al-Qaeda has orchestrated attacks on London, Madrid and beyond that have taken hundreds of lives.

The Iraq invasion - a unilateral attack on a Muslim majority country - has served as al-Qaeda's best recruiting tool. It's given terrorists of all stripes a training ground, just as the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan did for Osama bin Laden's generation. But you don't have to be a jihadi or even a Muslim to have lost respect for America over the Iraq debacle. After enjoying virtually the entire world's goodwill after 9/11, polls showed America's standing in the world plummeted after the Iraq invasion. Favorable ratings are only recovering now because the Bush administration is approaching its end. It's impossible to calculate the impact of that tide of anti-Americanism in areas from the value of the US dollar to the potential Einsteins and their parents who have decided against moving to Bush's America.

Unless, that is, you accept September 11, 2001, as an example of keeping America safe. (By:- Muhammad Cohen, Courtesy: Asia Times)

70000 may suffer post-9/11 stress disorder: Study

2008-09-11T11:33:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK: New data from a public health registry that tracks the health effects of 9/11 suggest that as many as 70,000 people may have developed post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of the terrorist attacks.

The estimate, released Wednesday by New York City's Department of Health, is based on an analysis of the health of 71,437 people who enrolled in the World Trade Center Health Registry.

They agreed to be tracked for up to 20 years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and the study was based on answers they volunteered about their health two and three years after the attack.

Of the estimated 400,000 people believed to have been heavily exposed to pollution from the disaster, data suggests that 35,000 to 70,000 people developed PTSD and 3,800 to 12,600 may have developed asthma, city health officials said.

They include rescue and recovery workers, lower Manhattan residents, area workers, commuters and passers-by.

Overall, half of the respondents said they had been in the dust cloud from the collapsing towers; 70 percent witnessed a traumatic sight, such as a plane hitting the tower or falling bodies; and 13 percent sustained an injury that day.

"The consensus among physicians is that when it comes to physical health, the vast majority of people felt symptoms in the first year," said Lorna Thorpe, the deputy commissioner for epidemiology at the New York City Health Department.

"A small proportion of people, however, developed symptoms years later. And in some cases, it's hard to tell whether they're World Trade Center-related or a result of allergies or existing conditions."

The post-traumatic stress disorder rate was highest among injured, low-income and Hispanic study volunteers. In general, minorities and low-income respondents experienced higher rates of mental and physical problems, as did women.

The study was conducted by the city health department and the federal Centers for Disease Control's Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. It was released in the Journal of Urban Health.

The city offers free physical and mental health care to eligible people affected by the attacks.

Brush your teeth to avoid heart disease

2008-09-11T11:32:00.000-07:00

PARIS: Here's another reason to brush your teeth: poor dental hygiene boosts the risk of heart attacks and strokes, a pair of studies reported this week.

Heart disease is the number one killer worldwide, claiming upward of 17 million lives every year, according to the World Health Organization.

Smoking, obesity and high cholesterol are the most common culprits, but the new research shows that neglected gums can be added to the list.

"We now recognize that bacterial infections are an independent risk factor for heart diseases," said Howard Jenkins of the University of Bristol in Britain, at a meeting of the Society for General Microbiology in Dublin.

"In other words, it doesn't matter how fit, slim or healthy you are, you're adding to your chances of getting heart disease by having bad teeth," the professor said.

There are up to 700 different bacteria in the human mouth, and failing to scrub one's pearly whites helps those germs to flourish.

Most are benign, and some are essential to good health. But a few can trigger a biological cascade leading to diseases of the arteries linked to heart attacks and stroke, according to the new research.

"The mouth is probably the dirtiest place in the human body," Steve Kerrigan of the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin said.

"If you have an open blood vessel from bleeding gums, bacteria will gain entry to your bloodstream."

Once inside the blood, certain bacteria stick onto cells called platelets, causing them to clot inside the vessel and thus decreasing blood flow to the heart.

"We mimicked the pressure inside the blood vessels and in the heart, and demonstrated that bacteria use different mechanisms to cause platelets to clump together, allowing them to completely encase the bacteria," he said.

This not only created conditions that can provoke heart attacks and strokes, it also shielded the bacteria from both, immune system cells and antibiotics.

"These findings suggest why antibiotics do not always work in the treatment of infectious heart disease," Jenkins said.

In separate research, a team led by Greg Seymour of the University of Otago Dunedin in New Zealand showed how other bacteria from the mouth can provoke atherosclerosis, a disease that causes hardening of the arteries.

All organisms -- including humans and bacteria -- produce "stress proteins," molecules produced by conditions such as inflammation, toxins, starvation, or oxygen deprivation.

One function of stress proteins is to guide other proteins across cell membranes.

But they can also can latch onto foreign objects, called antigens, and deliver then to immune cells, provoking an immune reactions in the body.

Normally, the body does not attack its own stress proteins.

But bacterial stress proteins -- which are similar -- do trigger a response, and once that has happened the immune system can no longer differentiate between the two, said Seymour.

"White blood cells can build up in the tissue of arteries, causing atherosclerosis," he explained in a phone interview.

Obama to ask his donors to help storm victims

2008-08-31T11:48:00.000-07:00

LIMA, Ohio (Map, News) - Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama said Sunday he will tap his huge political network of donors and volunteers to help U.S. victims of Hurricane Gustav after it comes inland.

"I think we can get tons of volunteers to travel down there, if it becomes necessary," Obama told reporters after attending St. Luke's Lutheran Church in Lima, Ohio.

"I think we can activate an e-mail list of a couple of million people who want to give back," he said. Donations could include cash, goods and individual labor, he said.

Obama said he first would ask officials in the affected areas what is most needed, which may not be known for a few days.

"We don't want to solicit a bunch of canned goods that can't get there, or, you know, bottles of water where they already have water," he said.

Obama said he might visit storm-damaged areas once "things have settled down."

"The thing that I am always concerned about in the middle of a storm is whether we are drawing resources away from folks on the ground," he said, referring to the security demands his traveling entourage makes on local police and other officials.

Obama said he saw no problem with Republican rival John McCain's trip Sunday to Mississippi ahead of the storm's landfall. "I'm assuming that where he went, that wasn't an issue," Obama said.

Obama later conducted phone interviews with several Gulf Coast radio and TV stations, urging listeners to follow local officials' instructions about evacuations, his campaign said.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

McCain orders convention changes because of storm

2008-08-31T11:45:00.000-07:00

ST. PAUL, Minn. (Map, News) - John McCain ordered changes in the Republican National Convention that was to be a four-day celebration of his presidential nomination Sunday, to "redirect our efforts" to reflect the seriousness of Hurricane Gustav as it churned toward the Gulf Coast. President Bush, Vice President Cheney and prominent GOP governors decided to skip the gathering altogether.

"I pledge that tomorrow night, and if necessary throughout our convention, we will act as Americans and not as Republicans because America needs us now," McCain said.

McCain, his wife Cindy, and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, toured the emergency management center in Mississippi, a state that could be hit hard by the approaching hurricane.

The Bush White House and Republicans in general are still shadowed by criticism of their handling of relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina, which devastated New Orleans and parts of the Mississippi Gulf Coast three years ago. Party leaders fear that televised scenes of celebrations and partying at the convention could subject them to similar criticism now.

"We must redirect our efforts from the really celebratory event of the nomination of the president and vice president of our party to acting as all Americans," McCain told reporters.

Party leaders were considering shortening the big four-day event as Gustav approached the Gulf Coast with potentially deadly strength.

The McCain campaign was chartering a DC-9 jetliner from St. Paul for any delegates from the coastal region who wanted to return home.

The convention, a marquee event meant to send McCain into the fall campaign with a burst of energy and good feeling, already was becoming overwhelmed by alarming news of the hurricane just three years after deadly Katrina struck New Orleans.

GOP officials were tracking the path of the storm, trying to determine how to complete the official business of nominating McCain while also being sensitive to the thousands of people fleeing the Gulf Coast - more than 1,000 miles down the Mississippi from St. Paul.

Even as delegates streamed into the convention city, McCain and Palin got briefings from officials in Jackson. He was invited by Republican Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour.

President Bush said he would go to Texas on Monday to see emergency workers. He said he wouldn't go to Louisiana right away because he didn't want his presence to interfere with emergency operations. "I hope to be able to get to Louisiana as soon as conditions permit," he told reporters after meeting with federal emergency officials in Washington.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger backed out of his convention visit in an unrelated budget dispute with California legislators.

All three - Bush, Cheney and Schwarzenegger - had been scheduled to address the convention on Monday, its opening day.

Democrats turned their attention to the storm as well. Presidential nominee Barack Obama offered to tap his sprawling network of donors and volunteers to help any victims of Gustav.

"I think we can get tons of volunteers to travel down there if it becomes necessary," Obama told reporters after attending St. Luke's Lutheran Church in Lima, Ohio. "I think we can activate an e-mail list of a couple of million people who want to give back," he said.

He said donations could include cash, goods and individual labor.

Obama said he might visit storm-damaged areas once "things have settled down."

Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor who is scheduled to be the convention's keynote speaker, said Sunday, "We have to make sure the focus is on the South, on Gustav, make sure that all of the resources are there, and that anything that is done with regard to the convention doesn't take anything away from that and is done in a serious way."

He spoke on CBS' "Face the Nation."

McCain said he had conferred by phone with Govs. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Bob Riley of Alabama and Charlie Crist of Florida. Crist wasn't coming to St. Paul, even though he had been given a prominent speaking role, and the others weren't coming either.

McCain went to Mississippi as convention officials, GOP Chairman Mike Duncan, and McCain Campaign Manager Rick Davis huddled to determine what to do about the convention. Republicans with knowledge of the deliberations said shortening their four-day national convention - and packing necessary work into a couple of days - was one option.

Several officials said various possibilities were being considered - including adding more public-service elements, and trimming back the pep-rally segments.

Canceling the convention altogether seemed highly unlikely, given that the party has to take formal steps to make sure McCain is nominated and can get on the ballot.

"We're going to have a convention. We have to endorse a candidate. But it may be a different convention than what we thought of a couple days ago," said Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman.

Mississippi Republican Chairman Brad White said most of his state's 39 delegates were to arrive Sunday. About 10-15 delegates, mostly from Mississippi's three southernmost counties, were staying home, he said.

He said he did not know of any delegates who planned to take the McCain campaign up on its offer of a chartered plane to fly home. "Keep in mind, those areas are under a mandatory evacuation, so right now they couldn't go home anyway," White said.

Democrats were paring back their activities in St. Paul.

Party spokesman Brad Woodhouse said the Democrats had canceled a "More of the Same" rally that had been slated for Monday. He said the tone of the Democratic rapid response effort would depend on the changes Republicans make in their convention program.

In other convention news, the Republican candidate's wife, Cindy McCain, said her husband's choice of Palin, a first-term Alaska governor little known outside her home state, was "a marvelous choice."

"They're a perfect match," she told ABC's "This Week" in a taped interview. Why? "Because she's a reformer. And she thinks outside the box, the way my husband does," Cindy McCain said. "You know, Washington is just a quagmire. It's a mess right now. And both of them have been serious reformers."

As to Palin's lack of national security experience, Cindy McCain said, "Alaska is the closest part of our continent to Russia. So, it's not as if she doesn't understand what's at stake here. It's also about making decisions and be targeted in what she thinks. She has a great mind. And she has a very serious direction in where she goes."

Also defending McCain's running mate choice was Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, passed over by McCain for the No. 2 spot. He called Palin "a maverick with a record of reform."

---

Associated Press writers Liz Sidoti, Charles Babington in Lima, Ohio, and Beth Fouhy in Jackson, Miss., contributed to this report.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

5 Fashion Trends Men Hate the Most

2008-08-23T01:28:00.000-07:00

We all know that men are no longer those poor, lost souls when it comes to fashion or, as a matter of fact, to most things that have been, until now, deemed "feminine" par excellence. Which is why, since they do make the best cooks, hair and makeup stylists, and designers, we should probably also listen to what they have to say when it comes to some of the fashion trends that are sweeping the world (and dragging along millions of women in the process) like crazy.

Now, some of what follows are probably items that many women would not even consider donning in the first place – so don’t expect something new, or anything close to some sort of epiphany. However, having these five items together in the same place and, even more, with their many cons described by a man who certainly does know one or two things about fashion, like Simon writing for the Fashion Victims website is, could serve as a lesson for many girls/women out there who follow trends indiscriminately and, most often than not, completely sheepishly. On a side note, for at least three out of the five worst accessories this year, we can thank celebutante extraordinaire Paris Hilton and the likes.

Monroe piercing

Also known as cheek or upper lip piercing. Although its name clearly refers to one of the most emblematic women of modern times, Marilyn Monroe, and to her equally famous beauty spot, it seems that this piercing is no longer the "accidental" fashion statement it used to be, like, five years ago. This is all the more true in a time when unique rebelliousness no longer translates into anything that might make those around you picture you walking around the house with a nail gun, looking for potentially surprising places where to put an earring into.

Because today you can go a bit emo-ish for that dash at rebelliousness that you occasionally experience. Men clearly see it that way. Or, as Simon puts it, "When you’ve run out of original places to stud your head, don’t go random. That’s like a musician saying ‘wehhh, all melodies have been done before. I’m gonna play random notes wherever and I’ll be so different I’ll be cool.’ You’re not cool." Full stop.

Giant / bugeyed sunglasses

Nothing seems to ruin a wonderfully put together outfit or a perfectly shaped face like shades that look so heavy as if one’s head is this close to crumbling down under their sheer weight. As a general rule in the "science" of accessorizing, larger sunglasses can be perfect for certain occasions, when they can actually make you look twice as good as you actually do. But this is never the case with those black shades that cover two thirds of your face, leaving you looking not like the siren that you probably picture yourself but more like some alien type of creature come to feed off the blood of the innocent.

Simon has yet another description for women who are overtly fond of giant sunglasses, especially if they are also excessively skinny and wear quirky clothes – praying mantises he calls them. "You may be proud that not the smallest beam in the slightest crack of space will get in your deflector shield eye booth, but you look like a bug on hind legs. A bug! The stick thin skin-and-bones body type completes the preying mantis fashion statement." he writes.

Excessive makeup / foundation

This should have probably come first because if it’s a condition that is met, it can ruin everything else as well. We all know just how much trouble women go through in order to look as "natural" as possible, just like we’re way too familiar with the now legendary phrase of "give me 15 minutes to freshen up." However, when you take that timeframe and multiply it by, say, four, what you get is not a prettily made-up face on which some of the imperfections are barely visible, but a mask. And, for those girls/women out there who still think that men can’t tell the difference unless you’re standing in bright sunlight – they can, and they do.

"Here’s the problem: lots of cover up is actually worth covering up. You may think that a pimple mount of height X necessitates a layer of foundation of X + 1 thickness, but really you’ve managed to expand the ‘problem area’ to your entire face. You don’t look like porcelain, you look crusty. If you can’t tan, don’t manufacture a layer of grainy fakeskin. Some guys like pale chicks." Simon writes.

Pet accessories

Paris Hilton is hot, as she herself always says. So much so that, even if most would disagree with this statement, there still are plenty of women willing (dying) to follow in her footsteps by emulating whatever she does. Naturally, first thing on the list is her pet pooch, the fabulous Chihuahua Tinkerbell. So, faster than you can say "That’s hot!" the dog is no longer a companion but a genuine accessory which, as a rule, you must use wisely in order to make the best of your outfits. Aside from the PETA-ish implications of such a decision, this trend is almost always frowned upon. Because it’s simply not cool, just in case you were still wondering.

Cue to Simon: "Living. Creatures. Are. Not. Accessories. While I appreciate, on some level, the pimping out of an otherwise evolutionary abomination into some kind of social use, this is a problem. You have no idea of the statements you make when you walk around with these fashion rats, or the thoughts that go through every guy’s mind." We’ll just have to take his word on that.

High belts

This is arguably the weakest item on Simon’s list, unless we also mention that it’s a wrong trend to follow only in the case of certain body types. When used randomly or just for the sake of keeping up with what your friends are wearing, high belts can do more damage than good because, instead of emphasizing your torso and waistline, they make you look all bulky and, why not say it outright, fat. Disproportionate. Eager to hide those very flaws that you ironically make more obvious with that belt.

"There’s beauty in proportion, and nothing messes with that more than a blatant misplacing of a standard item. If you’re willing to constrict your ribs, do us all a favor and wear a corset." Simon writes, stressing that sometimes more is definitely… well, more.

Of course you can all disagree with all of the above, especially since, like all other worst/best tops, this one too comes with a high degree of subjectivity. Even more, in good circumstances, these five items can actually prove to be like the cherry on the cake instead of the straw that breaks the camel’s back. In the end, it’s all a matter of perspective and, most important, of taste. So don’t flaunt it if you ain’t got it, and choose what trends you follow wisely, always keeping your personality and what’s suitable for it in mind.

5 Styles Women Hate in Men

2008-08-23T00:06:00.001-07:00

- Fashion taken to extremes
By: Elena Gorgan, Life & Style Editor

Women and fashion are such best friends that their coming together rarely leaves room for anything or anyone else. But that doesn’t mean they’re safe from the so-called "faux pas" phenomenon, also known as that common disease that affects those ladies who, out of their desire to be trendy, end up looking like just fresh out of a garage sale. Quite on the contrary. Now, since a few days ago we saw which the five trends men hate the most in women were, it’s time to turn the tables on them and analyze five of the styles that are generally over-abused by them, as well as explain why they’re not as cool as they seem to think they are.

The girls at All Women’s Talk drew up the following chart as some sort of payback to Simon's post that we already talked about. However, anyone is free to disagree with it, as well as to add new items that are not present in it, like wearing socks with sandals in the summertime, wearing cutoffs (pants and shirts) or see-through tees, cladding oneself all in tight leather, or whatever else comes to mind. So let’s begin with our countdown.

Backpacks with suits

A suit is generally seen as a sign of ultimate elegance, thus excluding from the very start the idea of comfort. On the other hand, you have the backpack which, as useful as it may be (and it is), seems to cry outdoors, practicality and freedom of movement. Whoever sees how these could ever come together needs to take a good look at the way people (to read, women) are looking at him on the street and go and buy himself a nice and fancy murse or a regular briefcase.

A bag as an accessory for men is not a new idea so what’s so wrong about this combo is not the combination itself, but rather the nature of the two elements. There are always ways to avoid looking this awkward, and they are so varied that it would be almost pointless to try to enumerate them all. But, whatever guys choose to carry their stuff to work in, they must remember that suit plus backpack almost always equals "high school kid playing dress up with his dad’s suit," as the girls from All Women’s Talk so delicately put it. And that’s just not cool.

Comb-overs

This one, naturally, applies to men who are already of a certain age. Be that as it may, nothing in this world can excuse a Donald Trump hairstyle – unless, of course, we’re talking about the Donald himself. Sure, losing one’s hair can be a pretty traumatizing experience and it’s only understandable that the man in question tries to do his best to make it less obvious.

Nevertheless, comb-overs are never the solution. Just because Trump can pull it off doesn’t mean that regular guys can too. And the explanation for this is pretty simple: given the Donald’s money, fame and reputation, he could as well go out of the house in nothing but a bathrobe (if Hugh Hefner does it, why couldn’t he?) and he would still be seen as the epitome of… whatever Trump stands for. For regular folks, however, the solution can only be either cutting the hair close to the head or going completely bald. Sometimes, they say, less is more, and this certainly applies in the case of hair of "follicly challenged" men.

Wacky ties

There was once a time when wacky ties were seen as a must in every guy’s wardrobe, as they were deemed the only accessory that could bring some spunk into an otherwise boring office outfit. That was back in the ‘90s so, unless you’re living in the past or you’re trying to set the trend (wrong one, this time), it’s best to keep ties as simple as possible. Make no mistake, women do love it when they see that you still haven’t lost touch with that child in you, but maybe wearing Tweety ties is not the answer to finding the key to their hearts.

"It may look cute for some, but wacky ties just look - well, wacky - on some men. Stick with the basics." write the girls who came up with this chart. However, we might as well mention that there are certain types of men who can, and do, get away with the craziest and most colorful ties and even bow-ties. They are usually cool by definition and, to them, fashion is not a science but rather the most natural way they have of expressing themselves. Needless to say, unless you happen to be among those very few lucky ones, you might as well stop trying to impress your work mates with your ties. Trust us, they’re not jealous of you because you have so many. Really, they’re not.

Too tight clothes

While girls are encouraged to wear clothes as tight as possible (actually, the word is "fitting"), few other sights are as laughable as that of a guy donning clothes two numbers too small, in what can only be a desperate attempt at looking buffer. Machos are all the rage right now, and have been so ever since we can remember, but those who flaunt it without having it are guilty of first degree wannabe-ism, and are treated by those around them accordingly.

Bear in mind that the opposite can also apply but, most often than not, it’s not a fashion crime that women frown upon as much as in the case of too tight clothes. Either way, it’s pretty obvious for women when a guy goes out and buys an S tee when he’s actually an XL, just to create the impression that he’s bulkier in the chest and arms area than he really is. If he also matches the tee with the "cocky walk" (you know, the one where he keeps his arms slightly farther away from the sides of his body, as if all those muscles are constantly getting in the way of him walking normally) and equally tight jeans, he should not be that amazed that chicks don’t swoon at his feet whenever he walks by. It’s never going to happen.

Funky facial hair

There’s rugged, and then there’s just… unkempt. Also, there’s facial hair, and then there’s the goatee. For some reason or another, men seem to think it’s ok not to shave for days, as if taking care of themselves would be some kind of favor they’re doing us women. Sadly, they’re wrong and, with each day that they conveniently forget to take care of their looks, their hotness factor goes down. Facial hair and unkemptness can only look good if the guy in question makes sure they do.

"You may not know about the meaning of fashion - but please, get rid of those goatees which make you look exactly what the name implies! If you need that ‘stache to keep your macho image, keep it trimmed - neatly!" say the girls from All Women’s Talk. Just like with the mullet and its many recent variations, facial hair is not for everyone because it can make a guy, if not the right type, look like a trucker, to avoid a more offensive term. So make sure you know in which category you belong and that you’re willing to take great care of your looks if you really want to go for facial hair.

These being said, it’s pretty clear that men, just like women, can sometimes be found guilty of falling victims to the trends they so much criticize. And, as in the case of the latter, the solution is never to overdo it – just stick to being yourself and doing/wearing whatever best suits you as an individual, and you will certainly not be stared at on the street, for all the wrong reasons.

Google: Britney Isn't Hot Anymore!

2008-08-23T00:02:00.001-07:00

- The company updated Google Trends
By: Bogdan Popa, Security and Search Engines Editor

The Mountain View company rolled out a brand new update for Google Trends, the online service that shows you the most popular Google searches. Until now, the service displayed the hot searches for a certain period of time such as weeks, months or years. Now, the new function, codenamed Google Hot Trends, shows even more, refreshing the provided information several times per day. According to Reuters, the service will display the hot searches with one hour delay, meaning that you're now able to view the most popular searches conducted one hour ago using the Google search technology.

"There are events going on all the time that most of us aren't aware of happening. After we find what trends that are interesting, users will want to know why are they important?[…]We are helping you find an explanation: There is some investigation that has to be done by the user," Amit Patel, a Hot Trends software engineer, said according to Reuters.

In the past, the Mountain View-company returned some expected trends concerning the search queries conducted using its technology. At that time, Britney Spears and Paris Hilton were the most popular keywords typed on Google, managing to beat IT-related searches such as Windows or Microsoft. Now, the trends are quite different as the most searched things are "avandia" and "jaclyn nesheiwat".

"Google Trends analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you enter relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time. We then show you a graph with the results -- our search-volume graph -- plotted on a linear scale," the search giant describes its technology. However, the company shows only the US trends, meaning that it analyzes only the queries conducted from this country.

Russian pullback in Georgia 'far too slow': US

2008-08-22T05:24:00.001-07:00

GORI ( 2008-08-22 13:28:04 ) :Russia promised to complete a partial pullback of troops from Georgia by the end of Friday but said an unspecified number of 'peacekeeping forces' would stay inside the country, angering the West.

A top US general visiting Georgia condemned the pullout as "far too little, far too slow."

"If they are moving, it's at a snail's pace," General John Craddock, head of the U.S. European Command, told reporters at Tbilisi airport, where he watched the arrival of a US military plane bringing in aid.

Russia and Georgia went to war after Tbilisi attempted on August 7-8 to retake the Russian-backed rebel province of South Ossetia by force, provoking a massive counter-attack from Moscow by land, sea and air.

Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement that military units supporting its peacekeepers would pull back by the end of Friday to South Ossetia from Georgia proper. President Dmitry Medvedev made a similar pledge earlier this week.

But within a new Russian-controlled security zone inside Georgia, the Defense Ministry statement said "peacekeepers at special checkpoints in the quantities needed to ensure security will remain."

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili said he would not accept that. "There will be no buffer zones. We will never live with any buffer zones. We'll never allow anything like this," he told Reuters in Tbilisi.

Russia says it needs to maintain a force in Georgia to prevent further bloodshed and protect South Ossetians -- most of whom hold Russian passports -- from Georgian attacks. Tbilisi says Moscow is trying to annex its territory.

With the size of the new security zone unclear and the difference between regular Russian troops and Russian peacekeepers increasingly blurred, it was uncertain what Moscow's pledges actually amounted to.

"There are some checkpoints where one day they are federal troops and the next day peacekeepers," Kakha Lomaia, secretary of Georgia's Security Council, told Reuters.

The six-point peace plan brokered by France gives Russia the right to take unspecified additional security measures in Georgia pending the arrival of an international force.

Copyright Reuters, 2008

Sierra Leone agency wants ban on Blood Diamond film

2008-08-22T05:20:00.000-07:00

FREETOWN ( 2008-08-22 03:51:45 ) :With the 2007 Hollywood movie 'Blood Diamond' still pulling big crowds into Freetown's movie halls, Sierra Leone's new promotion agency would like nothing better than to see it banned.

'This 'Blood Diamond' film is sending bad signals to the world about Sierra Leone,' the state-run Sierra Leone Investment and Export Promotion Agency (SLIPA) said Thursday.

The agency is urging the government and other partners "to ban the film with immediate effect," SLIPA head Adeyormie Sandy told AFP.

Set at the height Sierra Leone's 1991-2002 civil war, the movie stars Leonardo DiCaprio as an unscrupulous diamond trader. The film shows gruesome scenes of fighting in Sierra Leone and details how rebels force civilians to mine diamonds for them to fund the war effort.

While the movie awakened the world to the problem of conflict diamonds, the promotion agency argues it hampers its efforts to rebrand Sierra Leone to lure new investors.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Convicted ex-rocker Glitter due in London

2008-08-22T05:10:00.001-07:00

LONDON ( 2008-08-22 11:42:24 ) :Former glam rocker and convicted paedophile Gary Glitter was due to arrive in London on Friday morning, three days after being released from a Vietnamese prison.

A British foreign ministry spokesman confirmed Glitter's departure to London after Hong Kong refused to allow him in, and Thailand declared him persona non grata.

The 64-year-old was released from a Vietnamese prison on Tuesday after serving nearly three years for committing obscene acts with two girls aged 11 and 12.

He had initially been booked to fly to London that night via Bangkok, but refused to get on the plane to the British capital, instead spending 24 hours in a transit lounge in Bangkok before agreeing to take a flight to Hong Kong.

Chinese authorities refused him entry, however, and he was sent back to Thailand, where he had also been declared persona non grata.

"I can confirm that he has now left on the flight to London," the spokesman

told AFP Thursday evening.

Glitter, whose real name is Paul Francis Gadd, had reportedly been contacting countries around Asia in hopes of finding one that would allow him in, before finally being forced to return to Britain.

Once famous for his flamboyant bouffant wigs and silver jumpsuits, Glitter was arrested in 1997 and served prison time in Britain after taking his computer to a repair shop, where hardcore child pornographic material was found on its hard drive.

He was sentenced in 1999 to four months in prison on child pornography charges, of which he served two.

Keen to avoid the media, Glitter reportedly moved to Cuba and then Cambodia, where he was expelled in 2002, allegedly for trawling for underage sex.

Having settled in communist Vietnam, where a British newspaper reported he was living with an underage girl, he was arrested at Ho Chi Minh City airport in November 2005 while trying to leave for Thailand.

In March 2006 he was sentenced to three years in prison, the minimum term under Vietnamese law, which was later cut by three months.

The singer maintained his innocence, blamed a media conspiracy and claimed he was teaching the girls English and allowed them to stay overnight because they were scared of ghosts.

He continued to profess his innocence as he shuttled desperately among Asian airports.

"God, am I happy to be leaving Vietnam and that jail. I should never have been in there," he said on one flight, according to The Sun newspaper in Britain.

Although Britain has not announced any outstanding charges against the singer, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said he would be forced to sign a sex offenders register and warned that he should not be allowed to travel overseas again.

In the 1970s, Glitter racked up several hit songs including "I'm The Leader Of The Gang (I Am!)" and "Do You Wanna Touch Me?"

The 1972 hit "Rock and Roll" is still often chanted in British and US sports stadiums.

He has spoken about trying to revive his music career and penning a book that he says would exonerate him.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Akshay Kumar signed as the brand ambassador for Levi's

2008-08-22T05:07:00.000-07:00

MUMBAI ( 2008-08-22 12:32:28 ) :After the unprecedented success of the Anees Bazmee directed Singh Is Kinng, Akshay Kumar is on top of the world. The film has not just upped his Bollywood status, but has also made him the advertiser's darling.

After endorsing brands like Thumbs Up and Grasim, Akshay has now been roped in as the Brand Ambassador for the American Jeans and casual wear manufacturer, Levi Strauss, for launching its brand Levi's 501 in India. According to reliable sources, Akshay has been paid a whopping sum for the endorsement of the jeans brand, whose ads have been shot in some of the most stunning locations of Los Angeles. These ads are expected to go on air from the last week of this month.

Copyright Aaj TV, 2008

Mandela home to become museum

2008-08-21T11:45:00.000-07:00

CAPE TOWN: Nelson Mandela signed over his Cape Town home to be used as a living museum. The house was Mandela's only residence outside of prison. The former South-African president spent 27 years in prison. Wednesday 20 August 2008

Former South African President Nelson Mandela on Wednesday signed his Cape Town home over to the city for use as a living museum.

Jakes Gerwel, chairman of the Mandela Rhodes Foundation, one of Mandela's three charity organisations, said the house had been Mandela's "only home outside of prison in the Western Cape."

The nobel peace prize laureate, who was South Africa's first black president, spent 27 years imprisoned in jailhouses in the province by the white minority apartheid government.

A frail, but smiling Mandela sat through Wednesday's proceedings without speaking.

City premier Lynne Brown said the project would see Mandela's home become "our investment for young people" and would in future host youth leadership programmes.

The Foundation also announced that Mandela's prestigious scholarship programme had been boosted by major donations, including 10.5 million rand (1.3 million US dollars) from South Africa's Absa Bank and 2.5 million pounds (4.6 million dollars) from the London-based Leverhume Trust.

The donations would provide a further 13 scholarships a year for young Africans.

Matt Damon, wife welcome 2nd baby girl

2008-08-21T11:41:00.001-07:00

LOS ANGELES: Hollywood actor Matt Damon and his wife Luciana on Wednesday announced the birth of their second child, a baby girl named Gia Zavala, US media reported.

"Everyone's doing great," Damon's rep, Jennifer Allen, told People magazine.

"She is a healthy baby girl."

Damon, 37, met Luciana at the Miami bar where she worked in 2003, when he was filming the movie "Stuck on You."

The couple married in December 2005. They live with their first-born daughter, Isabella, 2, and Alexia, 10, who is Luciana's daughter from a previous relationship.

Damon was voted People's "Sexiest Man Alive" this year and shared the Oscar for best screenplay writing with co-star Ben Affleck in 1997's "Good Will Hunting."

Georgian rebels demand Russian recognition

2008-08-21T10:32:00.001-07:00

TSKHINVALI: South Ossetia will ask the Kremlin to recognise its independence from Georgia, the leader of the breakaway region told a rally including widows and mourning mothers in his war-ravaged capital on Thursday.

Eduard Kokoity, who styles himself president of a country not recognised by any other nation, told a rally of several thousand that Georgia had undermined its own statehood by trying to seize his region by force on Aug 7-8.

Widows and mothers in black, with photographs of their loved ones pinned to their chests, shed tears in the shadows of bombed-out houses on the central square of Tskhinvali as Kokoity lambasted Georgia and its Western backers.

The small, pro-Russian province in the Caucasus mountains, which broke away from Georgian rule in 1992 after a war, saw renewed fighting this month after Georgia tried to impose
control in a failed invasion repelled by Russian forces.

"I have already prepared an address to the President of the Russian Federation, to the Federation Council and State Duma, and to the heads of state of the international community, with a request to recognise our independence," Kokoity said.

"Georgia itself has driven a nail into the coffin of its statehood," said Kokoity, a former Soviet wrestling champion, who wiped away tears as he spoke under a beating sun.

"We proudly say today that we deserve to live in a free and independent republic of South Ossetia," he said. "The recognition of our independence is not a whim of the Ossetians; this is a security guarantee for our tiny people."

US pullout from Iraq may start by June: US army

2008-08-21T10:30:00.001-07:00

WASHINGTON: US forces could begin withdrawing from Iraqi cities as early as June under a draft agreement reached between US and Iraqi negotiators, a senior US military official said Thursday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the agreement on the US status of forces still awaited final approval.

But the official said that under the draft agreement a withdrawal of US forces from Iraqi cities "could be as early as June, conditions permitting."

Putin vows $24b for Russian hi-tech: report

2008-08-21T10:28:00.000-07:00

MOSCOW: Russia is to invest 600 billion rubles (24.6 billion dollars, 16.7 billion euros) in hi-tech industries over two years, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Wednesday.

"We have never put this kind of money into this area," Putin was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.

"Between 2008 and 2010 we expect to assign 600 billion rubles to various state hi-tech programs," he told the meeting.

Putin has said investment in the technology sector is key to Russia's efforts to wean itself off dependence on the export of natural resources, such as oil, gas and metals, whose prices can fluctuate wildly

Ricky Martin father of twins: representative

2008-08-21T10:26:00.001-07:00

SAN JUAN ( 2008-08-21 10:16:59 ) :Latin pop star Ricky Martin is now father of twin baby boys, born by a surrogate mother, representatives for the spunky Puerto Rican crooner said on Wednesday.

Martin, 36, known for his hits "Livin' La Vida Loca," and "She Bangs," became a father a few weeks ago and plans to spend the rest of the year with the babies, according to a statement by Perfect Partners.

"In recent weeks, Ricky Martin became a proud father by the birth of twin sons. The children, delivered via gestational surrogacy, are healthy and already under Ricky's full-time care," the statement said.

"Ricky is elated to begin this new chapter in his life as a parent and will be spending the remainder of the year out of the public spotlight in order to spend time with his children."

No further details were released about the mother or the babies.

The singer, who has been active in children's causes through his Ricky Martin Foundation, maintains residences in New York and Miami.-

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Storm Fay floods hundreds of Florida homes

2008-08-20T21:06:00.000-07:00

FLORIDA: Emergency crews launched airboats into submerged streets Wednesday to rescue central Florida residents trapped by rising floodwaters from a stalled Tropical Storm Fay, which soaked the state for a third consecutive day.

Calling the flooding "catastrophic," Governor Charlie Crist requested an emergency disaster declaration from the federal government to defray rising debris and response costs.

The White House said the Federal Emergency Management Agency was reviewing the request.

Flooding was reported in hundreds of homes in Brevard and St. Lucie counties, some by up to 5 feet of standing water.

In three towns, rising waters backed up sewage systems. It wasn't immediately clear how many residents had been displaced or were stranded, but county officials reported making dozens of rescues.

The storm could dump 30 inches of rain in some areas of Florida and the National Hurricane Center said up to 22 inches had already fallen near Melbourne, just south of Cape Canaveral on the state's central Atlantic coast.

By Wednesday evening, the storm's center had moved over the Atlantic Ocean, and its winds had picked up speed.

Forecasters expected the storm to strengthen slightly before turning back toward the mainland Thursday and hitting Florida for the third time this week.

But National Hurricane Center meteorologist Corey Walton said it was unlikely the storm would gain enough energy over the water to become a hurricane.

The erratic storm first struck Monday in the Florida Keys, then veered out to sea before traversing east across the state, briefly strengthening, then stalling.

For much of Wednesday, the storm barely moved, dumping inches and inches of rain over coastal central Florida.

If Fay strikes Florida again as expected, it would be just the fourth storm in recorded history to hit the peninsula with tropical storm intensity three separate times. The most recent was Hurricane Donna in 1960, said Daniel Brown, hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center.

At least 21 killed in Madrid air crash

2008-08-20T08:04:00.000-07:00

MADRID: At least 21 people were killed when a Spanair passenger jet crashed on takeoff at Madrid airport on Wednesday and 40 were hurt, a source at Spanish emergency services said.

A Spanish jet skidded off the runway and crashed at Madrid airport Wednesday and billowing smoke came from the wreckage, television images showed.

An emergency services spokesman, quoted by Spanish national radio, said the plane had been attempting an emergency landing just after taking off from the airport.

Eleven fire trucks were at the scene.

A spokesman for the fire service at Madrid's Barajas airport said the plane had a capacity of 166 passengers.

Spanair is Spain's second biggest airline after Iberia and is a subsidiary of Scandinavian carrier SAS.

Iraq to sign long-term oil deals

2008-08-20T06:15:00.001-07:00

BAGHDAD: Iraq will soon sign its first big international oil deal since the fall of Saddam Hussein, a $1.2 billion oil service contract with China, oil minister Hussain Al-Shahristani was quoted as saying on Tuesday.

The deal covers a small field producing just 90,000 barrels per day and replaces an earlier deal signed under Saddam. But the terms described by Al-Shahristani give a clue to the tough line Baghdad is likely to take in deals with other foreign firms.

It replaces a production sharing agreement that would have given a Chinese firm a long-term stake in profits from the Adhab oilfield with a services contract in which the Chinese receive fees for work, but Baghdad keeps the future profits.

"We have held talks with [the Chinese] for a year, and the terms of the deal were changed to a service contract. The Chinese have agreed on that, with a value of $1.2 billion," Al-Shahristani told the An-Noor newspaper.

Foreign firms are keen to have access to the OPEC country's oilfields, the world's third largest. But with oil prices high Baghdad has been negotiating from a position of strength, while war has kept firms from setting up a presence in Baghdad.

The oil minister is traveling to China at the end of this month to discuss the deal, which was originally signed in 1997 between Iraq and the China National Petroleum Company (CNPC).

The original deal was valued at $670 million at a time when oil prices were much lower than today, but it would have become far more lucrative for the Chinese if they were allowed to keep the production sharing terms at today's prices.

Iraq had said in the past it would honour the Saddam-era deal with the Chinese, but wanted to renegotiate it.

Iraq now exports about 2 million barrels of oil per day, roughly equivalent to exports under Saddam, but says that it can quickly boost production when it begins repairing infrastructure that was neglected during decades of sanctions and war.

The high price of oil means Baghdad is flush with cash and has little need of foreign financing for projects, although it wants to import expertise and technology from foreign firms.

Iraq is negotiating six other short-term service contracts worth about $500 million each with foreign firms or consortiums, but those deals have been long delayed. A US diplomat said this week he expected most or all of them would be scrapped.

Foreign oil companies are seen as much keener on production sharing deals, which would give them a stake in future oil profits, rather than service contracts.Dozens of oil firms are expected to compete for long-term deals which the government says it hopes to open for bidding next year.

Shahristani repudiated a Saddam Hussein-era deal with Russia's largest private oil company LUKOIL, saying the contract was political and its terms "totally unfair".

"Relating to the Russian contract, it was signed with the former regime for political reasons and scrapped by the former regime also for political reasons," he said. "It is a totally unfair contract."

He said the field covered by that deal, Phase II of the West Qurna oilfield, was one of the biggest in Iraq.

LUKOIL has already been informed that rights to the field will be offered in a second round of bidding coming soon, he said.

He also said a deal was almost complete with a large global firm on a joint venture to produce natural gas to generate electricity at home while liquefying and exporting the surplus.

He did not name the company, but Shahristani has previously discussed negotiations with Royal Dutch Shell on a project that would collect gas Iraq now burns off at oilfields.

Bush defends terror war in speech to veterans

2008-08-20T06:13:00.001-07:00

CRAWFORD, Texas: President George W Bush is defending his line-in-the-sand approach to the fight against terrorism, following presidential rivals John McCain and Barack Obama in a speech to a major veterans group.

His address Wednesday in Orlando, Florida, was to highlight themes Republican hopeful McCain has been using to argue that he is better qualified to be commander in chief than Obama, the Democratic nominee-in-waiting.

Bush, in remarks to the annual convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, also was expected to address the conflict between Russia and Georgia, White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said .

Yet it is the nearly seven-year battle against nebulous terror groups such as al-Qaida that has dominated Bush's presidency and will carry over to a new administration next year.

Bush was to travel to Florida from his Texas ranch, where he is spending most of the remainder of August.

The president also was stopping in New Orleans and Gulfport, Mississippi, to talk about recovery efforts from Hurricane Katrina, which devastated the Gulf Coast in August 2005 and brought heavy criticism of the Bush administration for its sluggish response

Five Americans held as China steps up scrutiny

2008-08-20T06:11:00.001-07:00

BEIJING: Five American blogger-activists and a foreign artist have been detained in Beijing as the government intensifies a crackdown on pro-Tibetan protests in the home stretch of the Olympics, rights groups said on Wednesday.

Students for a Free Tibet said authorities detained on Tuesday five self-styled "citizen journalists" who were in Beijing to promote Tibetan freedom. They said activist-artist James Powderly had also been nabbed.

The Beijing Olympics have not been dogged by the widespread demonstrations that authorities had feared. Several protesters advocating for Tibet independence have nonetheless managed to breach tight security, in one case hanging a "Free Tibet" banner outside the headquarters of the state broadcaster.

China is particularly sensitive to criticism of its rule in Tibet, the far-western region Communist troops entered in 1950.

"In relation to foreigners holding demonstrations in Beijing in support of Tibet independence, competent authorities have the right to handle these things according to law," Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told a news conference on Wednesday.

"I'd also like to emphasize that in China, activities that support Tibet independence will be strongly condemned by the Chinese people and will not be welcomed."

The Committee to Protect Journalists said China had blocked more than 50 websites carrying news or advocating on behalf of pro-Tibetan groups, including their own (www.cpj.org), before the Games began, reneging on pre-Olympics promises of Internet freedoms.

New York-based Human Rights in China says 24 protesters -- critics of the Communist Party and their family members -- had been detained or put under watch before the Olympics opened.

Many others had been captured in the months prior to silence dissent as global attention turned to the Olympics.

Beijing resident Dong Jiqin said his wife Ni Yulan was jailed in April when authorities began clearing out activists and others they felt may draw media attention away from the Games.

"I cannot watch the Games," Dong said from his cluttered apartment in the heart of the capital. "I'm afraid my wife isn't safe. We think the Olympics should be held, but I am just not in the mood to watch it."

In another case, petitioners Wu Dianyuan, 79, and Wang Xiuying, 77, were sentenced to one year of "re-education through labor" after repeatedly applying to demonstrate in areas set aside for protests during the Games, Human Rights in China said.

"In China, as in other countries, applications for demonstrations must go through legal procedures," the Foreign Ministry's Qin said when asked about the two petitioners.

None of dozens of applications to protest has been approved.

"They wanted to see us stuck in jail so the Olympics would look better," said Dong.

Algeria bombing kills 43

2008-08-19T09:44:00.000-07:00

ALGIERS: A bomb attack east of Algiers on Tuesday killed 43 people and wounded 38, the Algerian interior ministry said, in one of the bloodiest incidents in years in the OPEC member state.

A ministry statement carried by the official APS news agency, said the attack targeted a paramilitary gendarmerie training school at Issers, 55 km (34 miles) east of the capital.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

In recent months the mountainous region east of Algiers has seen numerous attacks by al Qaeda's north Africa wing, which is fighting to set up purist Islamic rule in the north African country, a major oil and gas supplier to Europe.

A suicide car bombing killed at least six civilians in Zemmouri, also east of Algiers, on Aug 10 in an attack on a coast guard barracks and an adjacent post of the gendarmerie.

The government said the attack may have been retaliation for an army ambush that killed 12 rebels in mountainous Kabylie region during the night of August 7 to 8.

Newspapers have said that ambush was part of the army's pursuit of rebels who orchestrated a suicide car bombing which wounded 25 people in Tizi Ouzou town east of Algiers on August 3.

That attack was claimed by al Qaeda's north Africa wing, the al Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Saturday's attack.

The group has links with like-minded militants in other north African countries and is the most effective armed rebel organization in the country of 34 million, Africa's second largest country by area.

The group has claimed several attacks in the past including the twin suicide bombings of U.N. offices and a court building in Algiers in December 2007, which killed 41 people, 17 of them United Nations staff.

Algeria, an important supplier of gas to Europe, is emerging from more than a decade of conflict that began when in 1992 the military-backed government scrapped legislative elections a radical Islamic party was poised to win.

About 150,000 people have died during the ensuing violence.

The bloodshed has subsided in recent years and in 2006 the government freed more than 2,000 former Islamist guerrillas under an amnesty designed to put an end to the conflict.

But a hard core of several hundred rebels fights on as members of al Qaeda's north Africa wing, which was previously known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat or GSPC.

The group's leader, Abdelmalek Droukdel, told the New York Times last month that increasing numbers of young men around the region were joining the group out of persistent poverty and anger at what he called the West's war on Islam.

Russia not keeping its word on Georgia: US

2008-08-19T04:38:00.000-07:00

CRAWFORD ( 2008-08-19 10:18:18 ) :The United States accused Russia on Monday of not keeping its word to start withdrawing its forces from Georgia and vowed to look into charges of 'ethnic cleansing' in the former Soviet republic.US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, bound for crisis talks at Nato headquarters in Brussels, said Russian President Dmitry Medevdev had failed to fulfill his pull-out pledge under a France-brokered ceasefire plan."(I wonder) why the Russian president either will not or cannot keep his word," Rice told reporters on her airplane hours after the White House demanded that Moscow proceed with its withdrawal "without delay.""The Russians have said that their withdrawal would start at midday today. We will continue to closely monitor Russian actions in Georgia for confirmation of the withdrawal," said spokesman Gordon Johndroe.But hours later, a US defense official speaking on condition of anonymity said in Washington those US officials monitoring the situation "have not seen any significant Russian movement out of Georgia today."US President George W. Bush, watching the crisis from his Texas ranch, stayed out of sight after ordering Rice to Europe to seek a common Nato position in support of Georgia and reaffirm US solidarity with its ally.Johndroe also said Washington would investigate charges, most recently levelled by staunch Georgia allies Lithuania and Poland, that Russian troops were guilty of "ethnic cleansing" as part of their offensive."That's a serious charge and we take it seriously and are looking into the matter," Johndroe told reporters, citing "charges from both sides" and stressing: "It's clear this was an ugly conflict on the ground."Russia made similar charges against Tbilisi shortly after the conflict flared up August 6 with a Georgian incursion into the breakaway region of South Ossetia and escalated with an all-out Russian offensive two days later.Johndroe declined to confirm reports, denied by Moscow, that Russia had rolled short-range SS-21 missiles into Georgia, but said any troops or equipment that came in when the conflict flared up August 6 must leave under the ceasefire."Let me be clear: If it rolled in after August 6, it needs to roll out" under the terms of a French-brokered ceasefire pact, said Johndroe. "That would be in keeping with the Russian commitment on withdrawal."The United States will help Georgia rebuild its battered infrastructure but also its security forces, said Johndroe, who declined to discuss possible US aid for specific military hardware like radar installations."I think it's premature to talk about any specifics of what that reconstruction effort might be. But there should be no doubt that the United States is committed to helping Georgia rebuild," he said.In Brussels, Rice was to hold talks with key Nato allies as well as European Union heavyweights including French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, and European Commissioner for External Relations Benita Fererro-Waldner, Rice's office said.She was also to sign a key missile defense shield pact with Warsaw that green lights the basing of US interceptor missiles on Polish territory -- a step that has drawn angry reactions from Russia.Moscow is furious at Georgia's attempt to join Nato, and alliance foreign ministers will meet on Tuesday to show their support for Georgia. But they remain divided on how to deal with a resurgent Moscow, with some western leaders unwilling to see ties with oil-rich Russia deteriorate any further.Rice said Washington would not try to speed up Georgia and Ukraine's path to membership in Nato, but said the alliance must make it clear to Moscow that it cannot prevent former Soviet countries from building closer ties with the West.
Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2008

Majority rejoice over Musharraf resignation: survey

2008-08-19T02:44:00.000-07:00

ISLAMABAD: The Gallup survey (Pakistan) Tuesday revealed that 63 per cent people rejoice over President Musharraf's resignation, while only 15 per cent regret it. "20 per cent were ambivalent about saying they were neither happy or unhappy", the survey added. According to the survey, soon after Pervez Musharraf announced his resignation on Monday the poll was carried out by Gallup Pakistan (Pakistan Institute of Public Opinion) the Pakistani affiliate of Gallup International. The sample size was approximately 560 men and women statistically chosen from major urban areas of the country comprising a cross-section of all ages, socio-economic and linguistic groups. Demands for Musharraf's resignation had been rising consistently since November last year when Musharraf suspended the constitution. According to Musharraf, the reason for imposing `emergency' was to safeguard Pakistan. In his resignation speech, he again cited Pakistan's best interests as the reason behind his departure. However, 70 per cent dispute Musharraf's claim to have resigned with the motive of Pakistan first. Instead, they said he resigned in personal interest-'Musharraf first' approach. The majority of Pakistanis, 64 per cent, also reject his claims of economic accomplishments and good government during his last nine-year tenure. Surveys have shown that, rightly or wrongly, majority of Pakistanis attribute current economic crisis and inflation to bad policies of Musharraf regime. The majority of Pakistanis take a pessimistic view of the past nine years, 70 per cent said it was bad or vary bad and only 18 per cent said it was good or very good. The remaining did not give a view. As his tenure comes to an end, 55 per cent Pakistanis expect that conditions in the country would improve with Musharraf's resignation, 19 per cent take a pessimistic view said conditions will worsen; 19 per cent expect no change. Although there is uncertainty as to whether charges will be pressed against the former President, for suspending the constitution among others things, 65 per cent support holding a proper trial while only 26 per cent are in favor of the "forgive and forget" option. On the issues of restoring deposed judges, 85 per cent want Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry and other judges to be restored immediately, 6 per cent oppose restoration, while 9 per cent advise not to take up the issue right now.

Musharraf resigns: Reactions from world leaders

2008-08-19T00:53:00.000-07:00

LONDON: Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has said he will resign after nine years in office. World figures have been giving their reaction.Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesmanWe hope that the resignation will have a positive impact on strengthening the government and democracy in Pakistan. Afghanistan wishes a stable, democratic Pakistan based on the rule of law.Spokesman for the British PM Gordon BrownDuring President Musharraf's time in office we have seen a deepening of UK-Pakistan relations. We wish him well in the future. But relations between the UK and Pakistan don't depend on individuals and, as we have made clear, we support measures that promote strong democratic institutions which lead to greater stability, democracy and rule of law in Pakistan.David Miliband, British Foreign SecretaryPakistan is a vital friend of the UK and it is essential for Britain's security that it has a strong and democratic government with a clear mandate. The responsibilities on political leaders in Pakistan are now significant. They need to come together to ensure that the recently-elected government carries forward an economic and security agenda consistent with the long-term interests of the Pakistani people.Yasuo Fukuda, Japanese Prime MinisterWhat kind of changes does this bring to the "war-on-terror" and the Afghan situation? I don't expect any significant change for now. I would expect different things would occur later. But it is not a time for us to make predictions.Pranab Mukherjee, Indian Foreign MinisterIt is an internal matter of Pakistan. During my [recent] visit to Pakistan, I had, in fact, developed a personal relationship with the leaders of that country. From Nawaz Sharif to Asif Ali Zardari and Yusuf Gilani, I have cordial discussions with all of them and it seems to me that a positive approach could be made in improving our relations.Russian Ministry of Foreign AffairsRussia hopes that the resignation of Pervez Musharraf will have no negative consequences for the political stability of this great Asian state. We hope that the situation in Pakistan will not leave the limits of the constitutional framework and will remain within the framework of legality and respect for order.Spokesman for European CommissionThere is not a lot to say; the European Commission considers the resignation of Pakistan President Musharraf as essentially a matter of internal politics in Pakistan.Spokesman for German Foreign MinistryWe expect that we will continue to deal with a Pakistan government (and) with a Pakistani president in the future who does not only have an eye on the situation in Pakistan itself but also on regional stability and who does his part to contribute to peace and stability in Afghanistan... Peaceful conflict resolution with its neighbors and decisiveness in fighting terrorism in all its forms are of crucial importance to us... Germany will continue to stand by Pakistan in the future as the country develops and stabilizes its democracy.Stephen Smith, Australian Foreign MinisterPolitical stability is now required in Pakistan following the resignation of President Pervez Musharraf [as] political instability in Pakistan is not in the interests of Pakistan nor the regional or international community... The Pakistani Government needed to renew efforts to deal with its security and economic problems. It is important that the government of Pakistan now moves with purpose to tackle the security and economic challenges facing the country… These challenges have regional and international implications... Australia - as a friend of Pakistan - would look to assist it in dealing with the challenges especially in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.(Courtesy: bbc.co.uk)

China's lunar satellite survives eclipse

2008-08-19T00:50:00.000-07:00

BEIJING: China's first lunar satellite, which has been orbiting around the moon for nearly nine months, has withstood the test of a solar eclipse that cut its solar energy supply, state media reported. Scientists altered the Chang'e 1's orbit and temporarily turned off some functions before losing contact with the satellite for more than three hours on Sunday, the Beijing News reported. Signals sent by the satellite after the eclipse indicated it was operating "as expected" the newspaper reported, citing Liu Junze, a scientist at the Beijing Aerospace Control Centre. The ground control centre changed the satellite's orbit so that it would only be out of direct sunlight for 168 minutes instead of the 220 minutes it would have faced otherwise -- which would have exceeded the probe's power reserves, the report said. The eclipse occurred between 3:35 am and 6:44 am Sunday (1935 GMT and 2244 GMT Saturday), the report said. It was the second challenge for Chang'e 1 after it had to adopt similar tactics during an eclipse in February. Chang'e 1 is part of China's three-stage moon mission, which is expected to include a landing on the moon and the launch of a rover vehicle which will return to Earth with soil and stone samples around 2017, according to the Xinhua news agency.

Manissha have no regrets

2008-08-19T00:45:00.000-07:00

MUMBAI: Bachna Ae Haseeno’ has hit the cinema halls, and is busy collecting the box office earning as well the reactions of the audiences. The much talked about movie has lived up to its expectations. The enormous star cast is well known, but we think many of us still are not well acquainted with the fresh tulip beauty, Manissha Lamba.The girl who started with an off-beat role in ‘Yahan’, to doing a second lead role in Bhandrakar’s Corporate, Lamba has come a long way.Manissha’s character in her latest flick ‘Bachna Ae Haseeno’ is being admired by millions. She plays a sweet romantic girl Mahi, who meets Raj (Ranbir) on her way to Zurich. You can’t simply ignore the confidence this girl has in her voice. Her costumes, which display mixing of Patiala salwars denim jackets and halter tops, are already becoming popular among the girls. At this, the actress laughs and replies, “Really, the clothes suit Mahi, the character I play. I didn’t think of making a fashion statement consciously, but sure if I become more visible thanks to them, it’s fun.”The actress completely denies of any moments of insecurity while she was shooting as there were other two beauties too on the sets- Bipasha and Ranbir’s real lady, Deepika. Supposedly there were no catfights, too bad.Talking about Bipasha, Lamba says, “even if she’s a successful actor, Bipasha is friendly, down-to-earth and very endearing. I didn’t get to know her too well, but I’d like to do more films with her.”And what about the freshest heartthrob of the nation, Ranbir Kapoor? “Well, he’s a very talented actor. He’s easy to get along with and a true gentleman. Working with him was fun and a fabulous experience,” she expresses.The girl doesn’t regret anything in her life. Eventually this graduate in English literature wanted to become a journalist, then how did she enter the field of acting? At this Manissha replies, “The growing process is on. I need to learn lot more from here. The three years that I spent in the profession have been worth a life-time experience. I’ve become more professional and aware of my surroundings.”The beauty who maintains a low profile is still single and in her own statement “ready to mingle”, so all you singles on a search out, keep dreaming!

NEW DELHI: India is acquiring sophisticated equipment to videotape rai

2008-08-19T00:41:00.001-07:00

NEW DELHI: India is acquiring sophisticated equipment to videotape railway passengers travelling between Pakistan and India at the Atari and Munnabao railway stations. Media reports quoting Indian Home Ministry source said an integrated surveillance system will be established for this purpose. The Indian Intelligence Bureau (IB) will record the arrival and departure of passengers at the two stations. According to details, top-end closed circuit television (CCTV) equipped with state-of-the-art camera with zoom lens and video converters, video management system software, high resolution LCD panel for round the clock control room monitoring will be part of the equipment being acquired by the Home Ministry.

Musharraf can go anywhere: Boucher

2008-08-19T00:34:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON: US Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher has said that the former president Musharraf can go anywhere including United States. In an interview to American media Boucher said Pervez Musharraf was a friend of United States, adding that the US will continue cooperation with the new government in Pakistan.

Referring to Musharraf’s past role in war on terror that is said to have declined his popularity among masses he said, that was his own decision and the current government of Pakistan is committed to follow the footsteps of ex-president of Pakistan in war on terror. Responding to a question regarding Dr. Aafia Siddiqi he said that, US army apprehended her on 17 July this year as she was charged with firing on US army however only she can reveal as to where she remained for past five years.US forces did not torture Aafia and such reports are baseless, he added.

Israel cracks down on Arabic Harry Potter

2008-08-18T02:28:00.000-07:00

HELD AL-QUDS: Harry Potter and Pinocchio are apparently not welcome in Israel, at least in their Arabic translations imported from Syria and Lebanon.Arab-Israeli publisher Salah Abassi told Israeli public radio on Monday that authorities ordered him to stop importing Arabic-language children's books from the two longtime foes of Israel.The ban includes translations of such books as Pinocchio and Harry Potter as well as Arabic classics."The trade and industry ministry and treasury warned me that importing those books is illegal," said Abassi, who imported the books through Jordan.The ban is based on a decree from 1939 -- when the area was under British mandate -- prohibiting the importation of books from countries that are at war with Israel.Abassi told the Maariv daily most of the books can be found only in Lebanon and Syria."If they were printed in Jordan or Egypt, which are friendly to Israel, I would lose no time in buying them there. Now the significance is that the Arabic reading public in Israel will not be able to enjoy the best literature," he said.

China to become world's biggest economy in 2035

2008-08-18T02:24:00.000-07:00

China's economy will overtake that of the United States by 2035 and be twice its size by the midcentury, a study by a US research organization concluded.The report by economist Albert Keidel of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said China's rapid growth is driven by domestic demand more than exports, which will be sustainable over the coming decades."Its growth this decade has averaged more than 10 percent a year and is still going strong in the first half of 2008. Because its success in recent decades has not been export-led but driven by domestic demand, its rapid growth can continue well into the 21st century, unfettered by world market limitation."Keidel, who has worked as a World Bank economist and US Treasury official, said the rise of China to the world's biggest economy will happen regardless of the method of calculation.Under current market-based estimates, China's gross domestic product is about three trillion dollars compared to 14 trillion for the United States.Based on a more controversial purchasing power parity (PPP) measure used by the World Bank and others to correct low labor-cost distortions, he said China's GDP is roughly half of that of the United States."Despite this low starting point, if China's expansion is anywhere near as fast as the earlier expansion of other East Asian modernizers at a comparable stage of development, the power of compound growth rates means that China's economy will be larger than America's by midcentury -- no matter how it is converted to dollars," Keidel wrote.Keidel's calculations suggest that using the PPP method, China will catch up with the United States as an economic power by 2020, with an equivalent GDP of 18 trillion dollars.Based on the more commonly accepted market method, the turning point will come by 2035. By 2050, he estimated Chinese GDP at some 82 trillion dollars compared with 44 trillion for the United States.The dramatic economic change will make help China become a more important power in other areas including military and diplomatic affairs, according to Keidel."China's financial clout will spill into every conceivable dimension of international relations," he writes."Leadership of international institutions will gravitate toward China. This movement could include the equivalents at that time of the United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, regional international development banks, and more specialized bodies. Various headquarters could shift to Beijing and Shanghai."He said the United States "will have an important secondary influence, like Europe, but it will need to compromise and its sphere for unilateral action will be increasingly curtailed."However, the Chinese standard of living will remain lower -- with per capita GDP in China between half and two-thirds the level of that in the United States in 2050, according to the report.Keidel said poverty will remain a significant problem in China for decades despite considerable progress.

South Ossetia's president sacks government, declares emergency

2008-08-18T02:20:00.001-07:00

MOSCOW: The president of Georgia's pro-Russian separatist republic of South Ossetia, Eduard Kokoity, late Sunday dismissed his government and proclaimed a state of emergency in the rebel region, Russia's television reported. "I have signed three decrees including one on the resignation of the government, another on proclamation of a state of emergency in South Ossetia and the third on setting up an emergency committee to settle the consequences of the Georgian aggression," Kokoity told the channel. He accused his government of being slow in distributing humanitarian aid to the residents of South Ossetia, stressing that a public servant "must work for his people and not to make profit for himself." South Ossetia, which is officially part of Georgia but declared independence in 1992 after the fall of the Soviet Union, is determined to win recognition after the failure of a Georgian military operation to reclaim it by force. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Saturday signed a peace deal a day after Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, and a week after Russian forces invaded Georgia in support of separatists in the South Ossetia and Abkhazia regions.

President Musharraf announces resignation

2008-08-18T02:16:00.001-07:00

ISLAMABAD: President Pervez Musharraf announced in a televised address to the nation Monday that he had decided to resign after nine years in power to avoid the threat of impeachment."After viewing the situation and consulting legal advisers and political allies, with their advice I have decided to resign," a grim-faced Musharraf said, backed by Pakistani flags and a portrait of the country's founder."I leave my future in the hands of people."Musharraf made the shock announcement after denying that any of the impeachment charges against him could stand and launching into a lengthy defence of his time in power."Not a single charge in the impeachment can stand against me," Musharraf said. "No charge can be proved against me because I never did anything for myself, it was all for Pakistan."He said that there was now law and order in the country, that human rights and democracy had been improved and that Pakistan was now an crucial country internationally."On the map of the world, Pakistan is now an important country, by the grace of Allah," he said.The President dismissed the “false allegations” being leveled against him by the coalition government and said he was neither afraid of the charges against him, nor shy to face these through impeachment. “For me it is always Pakistan first”, Musharraf said and added that politics of confrontation must come to an end and instead a policy of reconciliation be pursued. He stressed immediate measure be taken to arrest the economic downturn and said the nation has the resilience to withstand any challenge.He said it was not a time to show bravado, but to get serious as country’s dignity was at stake, the office of Presidency would bear the brunt.“For 44 years I have safeguarded the country and will continue to do so.” “No charge sheet can stand against me. Not even a single charge can be proven against me as I have full trust in Allah Almighty and I did everything with the belief of Pakistan First.” The President said he took all decisions with consultation, took all stakeholders onboard, on the most difficult decisions. “All stake holders, whether they were soldiers, politicians, bureaucrats, members of civil society, Ulema were consulted in all decisions. “I have nothing to worry about the charge sheet,” Musharraf said.

Heavy storms in Europe kill 6, injure scores

2008-08-17T04:00:00.000-07:00

WARSAW: Heavy storms hit parts of Europe, killing at least six people, injuring scores and damaging houses, according to media reports Saturday. Southern Poland was hardest hit, with three deaths and 34 injuries when a tornado and heavy rain storms late Friday tore the roofs off homes, knocked down trees and overturned vehicles.Two of those killed were in the southern province of Silesia, where a man near Czestochowa died after a tree crashed into his vacation home and a woman was crushed by the ceiling of her house in Rusinowice. Separately, a woman in the central city of Lodz was electrocuted by wires pulled ripped off by heavy winds.In the Italian Alps, a guide found two bodies on the Monte Rosa peak in the Aosta region, at an altitude of 13,000 feet (4,000 meters) on Saturday. Authorities said the victims, a man from the Netherlands and another man from Britain, apparently froze to death during a storm that hit the mountain on Friday.Local Alpine rescue service personnel told Sky TG24 TV that the men had set out late Friday morning to climb the mountain, despite storm warnings. Authorities were working to establish their identities.Meanwhile, one death was reported in Austria, where a 41-year-old woman was killed Friday when she was hit by a falling tree in a small village in the province of Styria, the Austria Press Agency reported.The woman was part of a group of hikers taking cover from a hailstorm when the tree collapsed in a forest in St. Stefan.

Coalition forces kill 90 Taliban in Afghanistan: report

2008-08-17T03:57:00.000-07:00

KABUL: A bomb struck the convoy of Afghanistan's education minister and parliamentarians on the outskirts of the capital Kabul, wounding a driver, a ministry spokesman said.Education Minister Mohamad Hanif Atmar was not hurt in the blast, which hit one of the last vehicles in a convoy that had just left an event to distribute books to nomad children, ministry spokesman said. A driver of one of the MPs was wounded, Elmi said, adding the minister continued his programme.Moreover, two Iranian nationals were kidnapped by Taliban in Herat. Unknown armed men kidnapped two Iranian businessmen in Afghanistan's western Herat province and police have yet to locate them, police spokesman in western region Abdul said."Riza Azimyan and Hasan Farsi were on their way between Herat and Islam Qala border town on Wednesday afternoon when unknown armed men took them away to unknown location," Ahmadi told Xinhua via telephone.Both the abducted people were businessmen and working for an Iranian road construction company building Torghundi highway in the province, he added. Afghan ministry of interior has said that the coalition forces in collaboration with Afghan troops killed 90 Taliban wihin last few days.

With 8th gold, Phelps swims into history … and now on to London

2008-08-17T03:52:00.000-07:00

As teammate Jason Lezak stroked to the wall, Michael Phelps glanced up at the bubbled ceiling of the Water Cube. His smile seemed to stretch from one end of the pool to the other.
He whooped for joy. After nine days of immersion, Phelps was ready to dry off.
With Lezak's winning touch in the 4x100-meter medley relay, in the world record time of 3:29.34, Phelps achieved his goal of capturing eight gold medals in one Olympic Games. He punched the air while Aaron Piersol slapped his chest. Phelps hugged his teammates. He had eclipsed a storied record, Mark Spitz's seven golds of 1972. He had dominated his sport like no other athlete. Nine days, 17 races, seven world records, eight golds.
Incredible numbers, breathtaking numbers, surreal numbers, but no longer impossible numbers. Five years ago, when Phelps first plotted his record, it seemed like a presumptuous, wacky fantasy. He was like a baseball player declaring he would break Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak. He was like an astronaut declaring he would step foot on Mars.
Once in a while we need someone who doesn't ask why but why not?
With single-minded dedication, Phelps took on history.
On Sunday, Phelps sprung from the starting block in third place but by the turn of his butterfly leg, he had regained the lead for the U.S. Lezak lengthened it, and the Americans beat Australia in the finale by seven tenths of a second.
In the end, not only were Phelps' arms and legs tired, so was his neck. Eight times Phelps stepped to the top of the podium to have a gold medal draped over his head.
He climbed into the stands to embrace his mother, Debbie, and two sisters, Whitney and Hilary, and their emotions poured forth.
"She cried, my sisters cried, I cried," Phelps said. "It's been a really fun week."
Certain athletes are linked forever as the signature stars of their Games: Jesse Owens in Berlin, Bob Beamon in Mexico City, Nadia Comaneci in Montreal, Carl Lewis in Los Angeles. Beijing belongs to Phelps.
He'll probably celebrate with a couple pizzas and a pile of pancakes. The U.S. has fallen in love with Phelps not only because he is a winner but because he is exactly what you see: An unpretentious 23-year-old young man who likes to eat, sleep, play video games and race. Son of a Maryland state trooper and a Baltimore principal, he's still the hyperactive little brother who found his second home at the pool.
"My mom and I joke - I think I was in middle school and an English teacher said I'd never be a success," he said.
He's not trying to be a renaissance man, just a renaissance swimmer, shredding the record book of his sport. After the Olympics, swimming leaves prime time and returns to its regularly scheduled 5:30 a.m. time slot, but with a higher worldwide profile. Phelps, swimming's first multi-millionaire, vowed to keep working to popularize it.
"I don't want this sport to be an every-four-years sport," Phelps said. "In between there's not the exposure I'd like. Over the past four years, it's skyrocketed. I'm honored to help this sport for the next generation of swimmers who will have it better than I have."
When he's doing his laps, staring at the black line on the bottom of the pool that stretches to infinity, he's not writing a novel or solving algebra problems. He is focusing on the force of his kick, the lift of his arms, the position of his head.
His coach, Bob Bowman, plays Mozart sonatas and manages a stable of thoroughbreds in his spare time. But when he chats with his protege, it's about the Baltimore Ravens and Washington Nationals.

"Michael is not into political issues," Bowman joked. "He's more likely to say, 'Oh, is this an election year?'"
Phelps does one thing better than just about anybody else has ever done one thing.
But he's not a tortured soul. He's an artist, but he's no Van Gogh. His medium is water, and Phelps, savant of the stopwatch, hits even his splits with metronomic precision.
In Beijing, Phelps won every kind of way. He won by cruising, winning the 400 individual medley by a body length. He won by the narrowest of margins, swooping to the wall with his final stroke in the 100-meter butterfly to out-touch Milorad Cavic by one one-hundredth of a second. He won when his goggles leaked. He won when Lezak saved the streak by streaking through the final leg of the 4x100 relay.
With 14 career golds, Phelps has surpassed four other Olympians who had held the record with nine.
A journalist from Finland asked Phelps to put it in perspective, considering that his own country has never won a single Summer Games medal, since the Olympics began in 1896.
"I'm just lucky to have the drive that I have, the talent that I have and the excitement for the sport," Phelps said, grinning in his endearing, sheepish way.
Incredible numbers, breathtaking numbers, surreal numbers, but no longer impossible numbers.
And Phelps will be back for more in 2012. Nine golds in London? Why not?

By LINDA ROBERTSON
McClatchy Newspapers

Pakistani scientists patent anticonvulsant drug

2008-08-16T05:29:00.001-07:00

ISLAMABAD: A new anticonvulsant drug and its use in the treatment of a variety of disorders has been patented in USA. The team of researchers includes Dr. Iqbal Choudhry, Dr. Farzana Shaheen, Dr.Arun Ganesan, Dr. Shabana Usman Simjee and Dr. A. Mohsin Raza from the International Centre of Chemical and Biological Sciences at the University of Karachi and Dr. Atta-ur-Rahman, Chairman Higher Education Commission. The invention is based on investigations on a plant, Delphinium, which has been traditionally used as anticonvulsant but without recognizing the source of its activity or structure of the active principle. The compound possesses potent anticonvulsant activity and is therefore potentially useful in the treatment or prevention of anxiety, mania, depression, panic disorders, epilepsy , Parkinson's disease, migraine, sleep disorders, neuralgia etc. In an effort to encourage scientists to patent their findings, the Higher Education Commission has developed a programme to encourage innovation. Under this programme, researchers can submit research ideas, published papers, thesis synopsis for evaluation for patentability. The submission remains completely confidential. The purpose of this evaluation is to determine patentability. In case an invention is determined to be patentable the inventor is encouraged to file for an international patent.