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Imagine taking the best characters and elements of your favorite fictional universe and weaving them into a new story that captures the imagination of fans.
In the dark, cinematic “Batman: Arkham Asylum,” Batman must escape from a spooky psychiatric hospital.
That’s what Emmy-winning TV writer Paul Dini did in creating “Batman: Arkham Asylum,” a video game coming out in late August. Buzz is building online for the dark, cinematic game, which reimagines a brooding Batman and his most notorious nemesis, the Joker, for an experience that’s reminiscent of “The Dark Knight” blockbuster movie. You want mayhem, insanity and brutality? Get ready for all of it. “This is the Batman movie I would have liked to have written,” said Dini, who was scheduled to discuss the game during a panel Saturday at Comic-Con International, the huge celebration of comic-book culture in San Diego, California. “This is him with all the good stuff.” The atmospheric game pits Batman against Joker in a battle of wits and brawn after the Clown Prince of Crime traps the Caped Crusader inside Arkham Asylum, Gotham’s psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane. After the trap is sprung, the Joker releases the inmates, including some of Batman’s most ferocious enemies: Bane, Harley Quinn, Mr. Zsasz, Poison Ivy and Killer Croc. Batman has appeared in video games since 1986, but none as ambitious or complex as “Arkham Asylum,” which draws much of its inspiration from the character’s comic mythology. The game will be released for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Microsoft Windows. It’s being developed by Rocksteady Studios and will be published by Eidos Interactive in conjunction with Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and DC Comics. (Warner Brothers Interactive Entertainment is a division of Time Warner, which owns CNN.)
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As the lead writer for the game, Dini said he was given a clean slate to work from. Because there was no movie, graphic novel or comic tie-in to follow, he was able to create an original story. Dini’s familiarity with the main character may help win the hearts and wallets of gamers. Winner of five Emmy awards, Dini has worked on Batman comic books and written episodes of “Batman: The Animated Series” and later, “Batman Beyond.” Dini, who has also written for the ABC-TV hit “Lost,” said he was influenced by Batman lore from character creator Bob Kane, the Batman comics of the 1960s and the Dark Knight graphic novels of Frank Miller. In creating his story’s look and tone, Dini said he chose his favorite elements from different incarnations of Batman. For example, the game emphasizes Batman’s intellect and use of technology by solving puzzles with the help of such tools as X-ray scanning and a pheromone tracker. “Detective work is a crucial game element,” Dini said. “There are a lot of forensics aspects to the story.” If you’re expecting a Heath Ledger-like Joker in “Batman: Arkham Asylum,” you may be disappointed. With his less-smudgy makeup, spiky green hair and maniacal cackle, Dini’s creation looks and acts more like earlier versions of the iconic villain. Kevin Conroy voices Batman in the game, while the Joker is voiced by Mark Hamill, known to millions as Luke Skywalker in the “Star Wars” movies. Conroy and Hamill were scheduled to join Dini at Comic-Con this weekend. Both actors also did the voices in “Batman: The Animated Series,” making the game feel very familiar. Sterling McGarvey, a senior editor for G4TV, said the game’s developers were smart to rely heavily on the animated TV series. “An entire generation of Batman fans grew up with the animated Batman,” he said. “It is a beloved, storied franchise with very few good games.” The Internet is full of videos showing glimpses of the game, including movie-like trailers, demo gameplay, characters and layouts of Arkham Asylum. Among Batman fans and gaming reviewers, early reviews have been strong. Brian Crecente, editor-in-chief of Kotaku.com, said he likes the way the developers combined elements to create the ultimate Batman from the fans’ perspective. “Part dark, broody Batman, part serious crime fighter, but also part detective,” Crecente said. “Batman has this huge universe. Why not cherry-pick the best stuff and put it in the game?” A key character in the game is Arkham Asylum itself, with its spooky corridors and Gothic architecture. Dini loves its “mix of dark, creepy, steam punk and Victorian” and calls it the perfect location in Gotham City for the gameplay. “It is a totally over the top mansion with gargoyles on the inside,” added Crecente. “Very cool.” Dini heaped praise on how the developers made his story come to life. He hopes fans who know Batman will love how familiar it feels, while gamers will love the action. “Fans of the canon will be happy,” McGarvey agreed. “But the game was designed more for the Batman fan than a hardcore gamer.” Crecente describes the game’s combat as fluid and quick, with a martial arts feel. Acting as Batman, players will be able to hide in the shadows and stealthily take out their enemies. All the gaming mechanics in the world won’t save Batman unless fans get drawn into the story. Remember Lego Batman? But Dini seems confident that gamers will respond to his vision. “Nobody loves a good Batman story more than I do,” he said.
Source:CNN

Harvard row highlights US tensions
By Max Deveson
BBC News, Washington
“There is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately.”That was how US President Barack Obama put the arrest of the black Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr into context. His comments – in particular his description of the arresting officer’s actions as “stupid” – have attracted criticism in conservative circles, forcing him to make a surprise appearance at the daily White House press briefing in an attempt to calm the situation. But for many in America, Mr Obama’s evocation of the country’s history of racial oppression will have great resonance. Traffic stopsProfessor Gates was arrested outside his own home. A passer-by had called the police after seeing him apparently attempting to force his way in through a damaged front door. When Sgt James Crowley arrived, Professor Gates indicated that he was the owner of the property and reportedly began accusing Sgt Crowley of racism. Sgt Crowley then arrested him for disorderly conduct, prompting Professor Gates, director of Harvard’s W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research, to allegdly start shouting: “This is what happens to black men in America.” Statistics suggest that he may have a point. Racial profiling is defined by the UN as “the practice of police and other law enforcement officers relying, to any degree, on race, colour, descent or national or ethnic origin as the basis for subjecting persons to investigatory activities or for determining whether an individual is engaged in criminal activity”.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has put together a dossier looking at incidences of racial profiling throughout the US. In Los Angeles – where memories of the police beating of an African-American man, Rodney King are still fresh – the ACLU cites a recent study by Professor Ian Ayres of Yale University which found that African-Americans are nearly three times as likely to be stopped by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) as whites. “These disparities are not justified by crime rates in different neighborhoods where people of color live,” Professor Ayres writes. “Nor do the disparities arise because more police are assigned to black or Latino neighborhoods.” In Illinois, a state-sponsored study revealed that black and Hispanic motorists were more than twice as likely as white motorists to be subjected to “consent searches” by the police, yet white motorists were twice as likely to be found with contraband as a result of the searches. AngerPresident Obama has a personal connection to the Illinois statistics. He sponsored the legislation (the Illinois Traffic Stops Statistics Act) that empowered the state authorities to collect the data on traffic stops. It is clearly an issue that Mr Obama feels strongly about. During his presidential campaign, he pledged to “ban racial profiling”, and his Attorney General, Eric Holder, has indicated that ending the practice is a “priority” for the administration. Ta-Nehisi Coates, an African-American blogger for the Atlantic Monthly magazine, who writes regularly about the issue of race in America, thinks that Mr Obama’s personal experiences may have informed his opposition to racial profiling, and his reaction to Professor Gates’s arrest.
“I would say that this is the sort of thing that angers upper middle-class black people even more than it angers anyone else, because they tend to be individuals who, by society’s lights, are very accomplished,” Mr Coates writes. “Obama has lived as a member of that class for a large portion of his adult life… [his reaction is] not shocking… ” Law enforcement officials in the US are – understandably – unwilling to accept that police officers engage in racial profiling. The LAPD, in its response to Professor Ayres’s study, acknowledged that the statistics showed that African-Americans and Latinos were more likely to be stopped than white people, but refused to concede that racial bias was causing the disparities. And in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Police Commissioner Robert Haas has insisted that Professor Gates’s arrest was not motivated by racism, and that Sgt Crowley “basically did the best with the situation that was presented to him.” But African-Americans clearly believe that racial profiling is a big problem in the US. The National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) is spearheading a campaign to pass the End Racial Profiling Act, which would outlaw the practice. With presidential backing, and the example of Professor Gates to grab the public’s attention, it may not be long before Congress acts to make racial profiling a thing of the past.

Source:BBC

Pakistan’s South Waziristan puzzle
By Syed Shoaib Hasan, Islamabad
BBC News
What is Pakistan’s government up to in South Waziristan?Since the middle of May, the army has been conducting a military offensive against Pakistan’s Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud – whose hideout lies in the mountainous terrain there. But unlike the recent operation in the Swat valley, it says it has refrained from going all out against the militants so far. The reasons for this are not exactly clear. The army says it wants to surround the militants and use air power and artillery to ”soften them up”. “We are just punishing them at the moment,” says Maj General Athar Abbas, head of the army’s public relations wing. “This is so that when the operation starts they can’t stand up to us. We have surrounded the entire area where the Taliban are based,” he says.
If this is true, the army appears in a prime position to fulfil its mission to “eliminate” Baitullah Mehsud and his organisation. But it appears in no mood to begin the much-heralded military assault which already has a name – Rah-e-Nijat or Path to Deliverance. “We are waiting for the right time to launch the operation,” says Gen Abbas. Taliban truce?But the fact that people have had to wait so long for a serious assault on militants has led to fears, not without precedent, about a possible deal between the army and the Taliban. One of the allegations concerns correspondence between Baitullah Mehsud and the head of Pakistan’s army. Maj Gen Athar Abbas flatly denied the report. “The army will not even consider such a possibility. This is utter speculation,” he said. Gen Abbas said the army was fully committed to its goal of defeating the Taliban. But there are those who feel the army and the Taliban are engaging in battle only because of certain “misunderstandings”. Foremost among these is Shah Abdul Aziz, a former Pakistani parliamentarian.
He has been trying to negotiate a truce between Pakistan’s security forces and the Taliban. For some time Mr Aziz has acted as a mediator between the government and the Taliban and other extremists. He enjoys very close relations with the Taliban leadership and with radical clerics such as the head of Islamabad’s Red Mosque, Maulana Abdul Aziz. Mr Aziz played a key role when in 2007 Pakistani security forces laid siege to the Red Mosque after dozens of radical Islamists barricaded themselves inside. He was a key figure in mediating between the mosque administration and the government. Although that episode ended with troops storming the mosque killing scores of militants, Mr Aziz has continued in his role as a negotiator. He was the man behind the Taliban’s statement that it would cease operations against the army in December 2008, soon after the Mumbai attacks. Missing letterMr Aziz’s most recent project has been to try and “resolve” the stand-off between Baitullah Mehsud and the government.
In this regard, he is said to have delivered a letter from Baitullah Mehsud to General Ashfaq Kayani, the head of Pakistan’s army. Subsequently, Mr Aziz has gone missing amid reports he was arrested outside the house of radical cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz. “He was picked up on the morning of 27 May along with a man called Fidaullah,” says Khalid Khawaja, an ex-ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence agency] official turned human rights activist. Fidaullah was later produced by the Islamabad police in a highly publicised press conference as the “mastermind” of a spate of recent suicide bombings. Mr Aziz, however, has not been heard from. Senior security officials have told the BBC that he is in detention and being interrogated for his links with Baitullah Mehsud. They say a letter was discovered on his person from the Taliban commander, but it was for a former head of Pakistan’s ISI agency. The letter is said to discuss the various alternatives available to Baitullah Mehsud and his militants. But officials deny any letter addressed to the army chief was found or even existed. Mr Khawaja, a close confidant of Mr Aziz, denies that his friend was in any way directly involved in planning or abetting militant acts. “He was a peaceful and well intentioned man,” he says. “Shah Abdul Aziz did not want a conflict to take place between the Taliban and the army as it would cost the nation dear. “I have been trying to register a police complaint for his recovery, but the police have refused to act so far,” Mr Khawaja says.
As far as the mysterious letter letter to the head of Pakistan’s army is concerned, Mr Khawaja confirms its authenticity. “I have seen the letter, and it is has now been delivered to its destination,” he says. These developments come days after a pro-government tribal leader accused the government of making a deal with Baitullah Mehsud. Turkistan Bhittani, leader of the anti-Baitullah Mehsud group in Waziristan, had until recently been accorded the complete support of Pakistan’s security forces. But, on 14 July, he accused the authorities of closing down his offices in the Dera Ismail Khan district bordering Waziristan. “The government is openly supporting the Baitullah group and allowing it to re-establish itself,” he told reporters. Although, the government strongly rejects any such suggestion, every previous operation against the Taliban has ended in a peace deal.

Source:BBC

‘Customers pay’ as banks rebuild
By Brian Milligan
Business reporter, BBC News
Banks and building societies are trying to rebuild their profits at the expense of customers, according to Moneyfacts.The price of borrowing has continued to rise significantly, even though the Bank of England’s base rate has stayed at a record low, new figures show. Mortgage rates have seen the sharpest rise. Three months ago, the price of a typical two-year fixed mortgage was 4.65%. Now it’s 5.17%. Interest rates on credit cards have also risen, though by a smaller amount. The charges on cash loans have been steady since the start of the summer, although they are up by more than 2% since this time last year. Rebuilding ProfitsMost experts believe that banks are using the relatively low level of competition in the mortgage market to rebuild their profits.
At the moment just eight or nine big lenders are supplying the vast majority of mortgages. Michelle Slade, of the financial information website Moneyfacts, said lenders’ potential profit margins were the largest they had seen since they started keeping records in 1988. That is the difference between what it costs a bank to borrow the money itself and what it charges its customers to have a mortgage. “Typically we would have seen a 0.8% margin on top of their product. Now we are seeing a 3.1% margin,” said Ms Slade. JustificationThe banking industry has been quick to defend itself against the charge that it is using the situation to increase profits. The Council for Mortgage Lenders (CML) pointed out that the risk of customers defaulting on mortgages was much higher than it was. And even though the Bank of England’s base rate is at just 0.5%, the reality was that banks were having to use savers’ deposits to fund their lending, rather than borrowing on wholesale money markets. That meant their costs were much higher than they had been. “The cost of raising funds is the main pressure that lenders face,” said Sue Anderson, of the CML. The same goes for other types of lending too, such as credit cards, or cash loans. The British Bankers Association, which represents the wider activities of banks, said they were now required to hold much greater capital, as protection against losses. That made money for loans even more expensive. However there is an admission that both banks and building societies are aiming for higher profits, if only to ensure the stability of the banking system as a whole. “They need to get back to a level of profitability that makes the system sustainable without government support,” said Ms Anderson. “We’re not there yet, but it would be unrealistic to assume that is not what we are aiming at.”

Source:BBC

Ancient Roman shipwrecks found
Underwater archaeologists in Italy have discovered the wrecks of five ancient Roman ships in the Mediterranean, with their cargo still largely intact.The ships are lying in up to 150 metres (500 feet) of water off the tiny island of Ventotene, between Rome and Naples. They are between 1,600 and 1,900 years old, and were laden with – among other things – jars for carrying wine, olive oil and fish sauce. One expert said: “It is like an underwater museum.” Also on board were kitchen tools, and certain metal and glass objects which have not yet been identified. The discovery of wrecked ships is not unusual – there are said to be thousands dotted around the Mediterranean. But Annalisa Zarattini, from the Italian Culture Ministry, said the latest to be found are much better preserved than usual because they sank in deeper water, which protected them from destructive currents. The ships also sank without capsizing, she said, allowing examination of the cargo in almost the form it had been loaded. Officials say the latest finds are the result of a new drive by archaeologists to scan deeper waters – a plan prompted in part by a desire to prevent the looting of treasures. Because of improving technology, looters are now able to dive to greater depths than in the past.
“It’s important that we arrive there first,” said Ms Zarattini. The team of archaeologists and deep sea divers used sonar technology and miniature robotic submarines in their latest operation. The biggest of the ships discovered is about 20 metres long (60 feet). The area they were found in was on a major route for trade between Rome and its North African territories. Some of the objects are being put on display on Ventotene.

Source:BBC

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) –
Since Michael Jackson's sudden death on June 25, the rumor mill over details of his bizarre personal life has ground away nearly non-stop, and on Friday, one company said it was turning his hair into diamonds. That one is true.
The claims this week included a report in Rolling Stone magazine that a prosthetic nose he wore apparently went missing when he was taken to the morgue, and a British tabloid trumpeted a headline that he fathered a secret love-child.
In one by-product of the “Thriller” singer's death, a Chicago company said on Friday it had obtained some of the hair Jackson burned while filming a 1984 Pepsi commercial and planned to create a limited edition of diamonds from it.
“Absolutely this is for real,” said Dean VandenBiesen, founder of LifeGem, which has a patent on a process that extracts carbon from hair, turns it into crystals and then into high-quality laboratory diamonds.
VandenBiesen told Reuters he thought the company could make about 10 diamonds. No sale price has been set but VandenBiesen said LifeGem created three diamonds from locks of Beethoven's hair in 2007, and sold one of them for around $200,000.
Separately, the August 6 issue of Rolling Stone magazine reported that not only was the left arm of Jackson's dead body “scored with needle marks” — claims that have arisen before — but he wore an artificial nose that was missing when he was taken to the Los Angeles county morgue.
“The prosthesis that he normally attached to his damaged nose was missing, revealing bits of cartilage surrounding a small dark hole,” the magazine said in an unsourced report.
While that report could not be confirmed, Los Angeles coroner's officials did say earlier this week they were probing security breaches in their offices.
The coroner's office is expected to release an official cause of death next week which could shed light on some of the reports, including Jackson's possible use of powerful drugs.
And even as custody of Jackson's three children is set to be decided in court on August 3, The Sun newspaper speculated the singer may have had a love-child raised in Norway.
Omer Bhatti, 25, sparked interest when he was spotted sitting with the singer's immediate family at Jackson's public memorial earlier this month. Bhatti reportedly spent time with Jackson at his Neverland Valley Ranch in the 1990s and was known as “Little Michael”.
But another of Jackson's former proteges, singer Ricky Harlow, told celebrity website People.com on Friday that although they were close he doubted Bhatti was Jackson's son.
“They had a father-and-son type of connection,” Harlow, 26, told People, “but I never thought he (Jackson) was his biological father.”
In Jackson's 2002 will, the singer listed only three children now living: Prince Michael Jackson, Jr, Paris Michael Kathering Jackson and Prince Michael Joseph Jackson II.
(Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) –
Since Michael Jackson's sudden death on June 25, the rumor mill over details of his bizarre personal life has ground away nearly non-stop, and on Friday, one company said it was turning his hair into diamonds. That one is true.
The claims this week included a report in Rolling Stone magazine that a prosthetic nose he wore apparently went missing when he was taken to the morgue, and a British tabloid trumpeted a headline that he fathered a secret love-child.
In one by-product of the “Thriller” singer's death, a Chicago company said on Friday it had obtained some of the hair Jackson burned while filming a 1984 Pepsi commercial and planned to create a limited edition of diamonds from it.
“Absolutely this is for real,” said Dean VandenBiesen, founder of LifeGem, which has a patent on a process that extracts carbon from hair, turns it into crystals and then into high-quality laboratory diamonds.
VandenBiesen told Reuters he thought the company could make about 10 diamonds. No sale price has been set but VandenBiesen said LifeGem created three diamonds from locks of Beethoven's hair in 2007, and sold one of them for around $200,000.
Separately, the August 6 issue of Rolling Stone magazine reported that not only was the left arm of Jackson's dead body “scored with needle marks” — claims that have arisen before — but he wore an artificial nose that was missing when he was taken to the Los Angeles county morgue.
“The prosthesis that he normally attached to his damaged nose was missing, revealing bits of cartilage surrounding a small dark hole,” the magazine said in an unsourced report.
While that report could not be confirmed, Los Angeles coroner's officials did say earlier this week they were probing security breaches in their offices.
The coroner's office is expected to release an official cause of death next week which could shed light on some of the reports, including Jackson's possible use of powerful drugs.
And even as custody of Jackson's three children is set to be decided in court on August 3, The Sun newspaper speculated the singer may have had a love-child raised in Norway.
Omer Bhatti, 25, sparked interest when he was spotted sitting with the singer's immediate family at Jackson's public memorial earlier this month. Bhatti reportedly spent time with Jackson at his Neverland Valley Ranch in the 1990s and was known as “Little Michael”.
But another of Jackson's former proteges, singer Ricky Harlow, told celebrity website People.com on Friday that although they were close he doubted Bhatti was Jackson's son.
“They had a father-and-son type of connection,” Harlow, 26, told People, “but I never thought he (Jackson) was his biological father.”
In Jackson's 2002 will, the singer listed only three children now living: Prince Michael Jackson, Jr, Paris Michael Kathering Jackson and Prince Michael Joseph Jackson II.
(Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) –
Since Michael Jackson's sudden death on June 25, the rumor mill over details of his bizarre personal life has ground away nearly non-stop, and on Friday, one company said it was turning his hair into diamonds. That one is true.
The claims this week included a report in Rolling Stone magazine that a prosthetic nose he wore apparently went missing when he was taken to the morgue, and a British tabloid trumpeted a headline that he fathered a secret love-child.
In one by-product of the “Thriller” singer's death, a Chicago company said on Friday it had obtained some of the hair Jackson burned while filming a 1984 Pepsi commercial and planned to create a limited edition of diamonds from it.
“Absolutely this is for real,” said Dean VandenBiesen, founder of LifeGem, which has a patent on a process that extracts carbon from hair, turns it into crystals and then into high-quality laboratory diamonds.
VandenBiesen told Reuters he thought the company could make about 10 diamonds. No sale price has been set but VandenBiesen said LifeGem created three diamonds from locks of Beethoven's hair in 2007, and sold one of them for around $200,000.
Separately, the August 6 issue of Rolling Stone magazine reported that not only was the left arm of Jackson's dead body “scored with needle marks” — claims that have arisen before — but he wore an artificial nose that was missing when he was taken to the Los Angeles county morgue.
“The prosthesis that he normally attached to his damaged nose was missing, revealing bits of cartilage surrounding a small dark hole,” the magazine said in an unsourced report.
While that report could not be confirmed, Los Angeles coroner's officials did say earlier this week they were probing security breaches in their offices.
The coroner's office is expected to release an official cause of death next week which could shed light on some of the reports, including Jackson's possible use of powerful drugs.
And even as custody of Jackson's three children is set to be decided in court on August 3, The Sun newspaper speculated the singer may have had a love-child raised in Norway.
Omer Bhatti, 25, sparked interest when he was spotted sitting with the singer's immediate family at Jackson's public memorial earlier this month. Bhatti reportedly spent time with Jackson at his Neverland Valley Ranch in the 1990s and was known as “Little Michael”.
But another of Jackson's former proteges, singer Ricky Harlow, told celebrity website People.com on Friday that although they were close he doubted Bhatti was Jackson's son.
“They had a father-and-son type of connection,” Harlow, 26, told People, “but I never thought he (Jackson) was his biological father.”
In Jackson's 2002 will, the singer listed only three children now living: Prince Michael Jackson, Jr, Paris Michael Kathering Jackson and Prince Michael Joseph Jackson II.
(Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)

BAGHDAD, Iraq The transition of security duties in Iraq from coalition to Iraqi troops appears to be going well, Gen. David Petraeus, the head of U.S. Central Command, told CNN on Friday.
David Petraeus, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq, speaks in Cairo, Egypt, on June 29.
Petraeus, in charge of U.S. forces in the Middle East and Central Asia, arrived in Baghdad on Friday. He will be meeting with Gen. Raymond Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and other military and political officials. An assessment of security in Iraq after U.S. troops withdrew from the country’s urban areas on June 30 will be on the agenda during Petraeus’ trip. Petraeus said an initial assessment from Central Command shows that the transition is going well and that Iraqi security forces are performing more than adequately.
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Violence remains a concern in Iraq but has been dropping. A representative for Iraq’s Interior Ministry reported an attack on Friday: an explosion of a parked car bomb in northwestern Baghdad that wounded six civilians. Petraeus said that it is important to be wary of the continued presence of al Qaeda in Iraq and Iranian- backed militias. He said there are connections among militants from different countries throughout the region. His visit comes a day before a major political event in Iraqlocal elections in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region. There has been tension between the central government and Kurdish officials over the allocation of energy resources and the handling of territorial disputes. Petraeus also said that he is concerned that “political competition will turn from shouting to shooting.”
Source:CNN

A jury in Arkansas convicted evangelist Tony Alamo on Friday of 10 federal counts of taking minors across state lines for sex, according to the court in the Western District in Arkansas.
Evangelist Tony Alamo was convicted of all 10 counts against him and will be sentenced later.
Authorities in September charged Alamo, the 74-year-old founder and leader of Tony Alamo Christian Ministries, and raided his 15-acre compound near Texarkana, Arkansas. Jurors reached the verdict after more than eight hours of deliberations. Each count carries a maximum sentence of 10 years. Between March 1994 and October 2005, Alamo transported five girls younger than 18 across state lines for sex, according to the indictment. The criminal complaint included accounts from three of the girls, two of whom were 17 when the complaint was filed last year and one who was 14. All three said Alamo sexually abused them. Alamo, whose real name is Bernie Hoffman, had denied all wrongdoing. In a phone interview last year with CNN, he called the accusations a hoax.
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“They’re just trying to make our church look evil … by saying I’m a pornographer. Saying that I rape little children. … I love children. I don’t abuse them. Never have. Never will.” Asked why authorities were searching the property, Alamo compared himself to Christ. “Why were they after Jesus,” he asked. “It’s the same reason. Jesus is living within me.” Alamo also has compounds in Oklahoma and New Jersey. The Southern Poverty Law Center says Tony Alamo Christian Ministries is anti-Catholic and a cult.
Source:CNN

Indian school for rogue monkeys
Wildlife officials in India plan to build a special school to improve the behaviour of delinquent monkeys.They say the aim is to target monkeys that pose a serious threat to people in the state of Punjab. Officials say monkeys are a growing menace in Punjab as the animals move into towns and cities looking for food. The state government has asked India’s Central Zoo Authority for funds to build the country’s first monkey rescue and rehabilitation centre.Punjab has more than 65,000 wild monkeys. As more and more forests disappear, they are increasingly encroaching into human settlements, say experts. Humans attackedMany of the animals now live in towns and villages and it is not uncommon for them to attack humans as they forage for food. The problem of rogue monkeys is particularly severe in towns close to India’s north-western border with Pakistan. Officials accuse them of a variety of bad behaviour from terrorising children, snatching food from people and destroying property.
Macaque monkeys routinely destroy TV antennae, tear down clothes-lines and damage parked scooters and motorcycles. “Besides people landing in hospitals after encounters with monkeys, the animals also often get hurt when house owners try to chase them away or keep them out by using live electric wires and other means,” chief wildlife warden RK Luna told the BBC. The proposed new monkey school will take in the “worst offenders” and put them through a crash course in good manners. “We have proposed a composite facility where scientific methods will be employed to change and alter the social habits of the monkeys,” Mr Luna said. Wildlife officials hope to reduce aggression and train the monkeys to be more like the wild animals they originally were. Temporary homeIt is hoped that the school will eventually become a temporary home for up to 100 rogue monkeys. It will begin with 15-20 animals complete with a quarantine area and a veterinary hospital. The monkey rehabilitation centre is planned as an extension to a mini zoo near the city of Patiala, in a thickly forested area that was once the royal hunting grounds of the princely state of Patiala. It replaces an earlier – now defunct – holding facility or “jail” for rogue monkeys also located at the site several years ago. Mr Luna said work on the school would begin as soon as possible.

Source:BBC

WASHINGTONHouse Democrats split sharply over the issue of health care reform Friday as a key committee chairman said he would not negotiate further with party conservatives worried about spiraling medical costs.
Rep. Mike Ross, D-Arkansas, says the “fundamental change” of health care reform deserves careful attention.
A leader of the party’s conservative faction in turn declared that the party’s internal negotiations over health care had failed and warned the party leadership not to ram the current version of the health care bill through by circumventing the traditional legislative process. The escalating public dissension within the ranks of House Democrats raised new questions about the bill’s prospects. House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman said on Capitol Hill that he is willing to keep talking with members of the Blue Dog coalition, an influential group of fiscal conservatives, but also made clear that he intends to move forward with the legislation. Waxman, a California Democrat, indicated that he would bypass a committee vote if necessary and bring the bill directly to the House floor for a final vote. “We’re not going to let [the conservatives] empower the Republicans. I don’t see any other alternative,” he said. Waxman’s is one of three House committees that is supposed to clear the health care bill; the other two have already done so. Legislation is typically approved by the relevant committees before being considered by the full House. On rare occasions, however, House leaders can remove a bill from a committee and bring it directly to a vote by the full House. Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross, a key member of the Blue Dog coalition, predicted that the bill would fail if Waxman circumvented the committee. “I think it would be a huge mistake if they removed the bill from our committee of jurisdiction and simply [took] it to the House floor,” he said.
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“We’re not empowering Republicans,” he insisted. “We’re trying to save this bill and save our party.” Several representatives of the 52-member Blue Dog coalition have expressed concern that the legislation being pushed through the House of Representatives does not do enough to rein in health care inflation. “Let’s not rush it. Let’s slow down. Let’s get it right and ensure that the American people get the kind of health care that they need and deserve,” Ross said earlier in the day on CNN’s “American Morning.” The bill as currently drafted “doesn’t do nearly enough to contain … costs [and] get after the kind of fundamental reforms and changes that we need in how we deliver and pay for health care,” he said. Watch a Senate Republican speak out about health reform » On Thursday, the top Democrat in the U.S. Senate said his chamber won’t vote on a health care reform bill until after the upcoming August recess. The announcement by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada went against President Obama’s stated timetable for both the House and Senate to turn out bills before the August break.
After Reid’s statement, Obama said he would accept a delay so long as work toward passing a bill continued. Obama met with Reid and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus at the White House on Friday to discuss the state of the bill.
Source:CNN

Usain Bolt gave further evidence if any was needed of his superlative form ahead of the world championships with an outstanding victory over 100 meters in the London Grand Prix on Friday night.
Bolt crosses the line in the 100m in London with Powell left trailing.
The Jamaican superstar ran a blistering 9.91 seconds into a strong 1.7 meter headwind to leave a world class field, including arch-Jamaica rival Asafa Powell trailing. Compatriot Yohan Blake finished second in 10.11 seconds with Antigua’s Daniel Bailey third. Powell faded to sixth in 10.26 seconds. But the performance was overshadowed by a doping controversy in Jamaica, with the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) confirming that five athletes from the Caribbean island had tested positive. The athletes, four men and a woman, are not thought to be any of the high-profile medal winners from the Beijing Olympics and after his heat at Crystal Palace, Bolt shrugged off the reports. Bolt told BBC Sport: “My friend called me and told me some tests were positive but I’m not worried.”
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IAAF spokesman Nick Davies would not identify the athletes or the substances involved. “It’s very, very early in the process so we cannot say who they are or what the substance is,” he told Press Association. Jamaican prime minister Bruce Golding has called top athletics officials to an emergency meeting in the capital Kingston to discuss the situation. Jamaica, led by triple gold medal winner Bolt, dominated the sprint events at the 2008 Olympics and look set for a repeat in the world championships in Berlin next month. Bolt’s showdown with American Tyson Gay, who is running in the sprint relay in London on Saturday, is set to be one of the highlights. Despite his incredible performances, Bolt says he can be beaten. “I’m not invincible,” he told BBC Sport after his 100 meter stroll, easing down as he crossed the line in his trademark style. “I just keep having good days, but one day I might have a bad day,” he added before entertaining the crowd by showing off his dance moves with two local youngsters. In other action, Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva suffered a shock defeat which ending a six-year winning streak at Crystal Palace. The 27-year-old Russian was beaten by Anna Rogowska of Poland, who won on countback after both cleared 4.68 meters.
Source:CNN

Joe Biden’s tough love diplomacy
By Jonathan Beale
BBC News, Tbilisi
On foreign trips, US Vice-President Joe Biden looks like a man who is really enjoying himself.His predecessor, Dick Cheney, could – at best – muster a rather sinister-looking grin. But Mr Biden just never stops smiling. He smiled as he shook the hands of a never-ending stream of Ukranian and Georgian politicians. And it looked genuine – not the usual diplomatic grab and grin. Broad smilesHe even appeared to take a delight in the long list of ceremonial duties – like inspecting the guard of honour, or planting a tree at a memorial garden. And – like any tourist – he enjoyed a bit of local colour. On an impromptu visit to a Kiev pub he waxed lyrical about Ukrainian women, calling called them “the most beautiful in the world”. Despite having spent most of his life in the US Senate, Mr Biden can still convey the impression of being a “regular guy”. But on his travels to Georgia and Ukraine there has also been another side to the vice-president. A steely side that shows he can be tough, even with his friends. Teddy Roosevelt famously defined American diplomacy as “speak softly and carry a big stick”. Mr Biden has his own doctrine: smile broadly and give them a prod.
In Ukraine and Georgia he was among friends not enemies. So there was no need to prod too hard. Ukraine’s President, Viktor Yushchenko, helped bring about the Orange Revolution. Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili was instrumental in his country’s “Rose Revolution”. Both men were at the vanguard of breaking from the bonds of communism and old-style Soviet corruption. The US vice-president smiled as he reminisced about the strides his friends had made. He was full of admiration for the way they had inspired the world (they love their technicolour revolutions in America). And after he had heaped on the praise, old Joe stuck one in the ribs. He made clear that both countries were in danger of losing their way. Ukraine’s Viktor Yushchenko is now a deeply unpopular president. His enthusiasm to join Nato is not shared by his people. The country’s economy has taken a dive. Mr Yushchenko may have once been poisoned by his enemies – his face still bears the scars – but now he is part of the poison that is damaging his own political system. Shiny palaceIn a speech in Kiev, Mr Biden accused his friends of posturing. He told them in no uncertain terms that they were behaving like children. Show the same political maturity as the rest of the population, he chided. Mr Biden managed to smile as he did it, but this was the same as talking softly while carrying a big stick. Tblisi, Georgia, would provide an even greater challenge. Mikhail Saakashvili, or Mika to his friends, had not only rolled out the red carpet, he had brought on the dancing girls (the traditional variety), wheeled out the orchestra and bestowed on his “dear friend Joe” Georgia’s highest honour – a glitzy medal. Mr Biden continued to smile, but he was not seduced.

Perhaps the Georgian president’s shiny new palace signalled that something might be amiss – one of Mr Saakashvili’s opponents has dubbed it “Caligula’s Palace”. His “good friend Joe” was here to tell some plainer home truths. In a speech to the Georgian parliament, Mr Biden listed Georgia’s remarkable achievements – but then came the poke. The government must be transparent, he urged, before stressing the importance of a free press and issuing a warning that no military option will re-unite Georgia with its separated territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. But the toughest message of all was for America’s old adversary Russia. The Obama administration has promised to “reset” relations with Moscow. But this trip showed that it will not be at any cost. Washington is not about to abandon Georgia or Ukraine, but nor will it use them as bargaining chips to appease Moscow. Vice President Biden rejected outright Russia’s claim to a “sphere of influence” over its neighbours. Better ties with Moscow would not come at Georgia or Ukraine’s expense, the vice president repeated time and again. And the US would support both countries’ bids for Nato membership, if that was what they wanted. This trip was an attempt to prod some allies in the right direction. But more importantly it set out a few red lines for Russia.

Source:BBC

Iraqi Kurds vote in ‘vibrant’ elections
By Jim Muir
BBC News, Suleimaniya, Iraqi Kurdistan
Voters in Kurdistan in northern Iraq go to the polls on Saturday in a double election, to choose a new parliament and a president for their autonomous region.The elections have been the most vibrant and exciting since 1992, when the Kurds held their first-ever free polls after winning de facto autonomy. That first election saw a massive turnout, with huge crowds of Kurds besieging the polling stations until after midnight, thrilled by the novelty of choosing their own leaders by ballot. The choice at that time was basically between the two big factions which emerged out of decades of armed opposition to Baghdad – the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) headed by Masood Barzani, and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), led by the current Iraqi President, Jalal Talabani.
The two groups went on to battle one another in a vicious civil war in the mid-1990s which has left many lingering resentments and grudges below the surface. But they later mended their fences, unified their rival governments and set up a coalition government, presenting joint lists of candidates in elections for the regional parliament. So recent polls have been pretty dull affairs with no real issues or significant competition, simply consolidating the rule of the two big parties. This one has been very different. For the first time, the two factions have faced a serious challenge, launched by reformists from within their own ranks.
Leading the charge is Noshirwan Mustafa, a former stalwart of the PUK who was President Talabani’s deputy in the party until he split off. The movement launched by Mr Mustafa took the word Change (Goran in Kurdish) as both its title and its slogan. It attracted an impressive upsurge of support, especially among the young and the poor, most visibly in the PUK-influenced areas in eastern Kurdistan, including the big city of Suleimaniya. Mr Mustafa’s denunciation of the corruption, nepotism and cronyism which he says riddles the two big factions, evidently struck a chord. Vigorous campaigningSuleimaniya and adjacent areas have seen big rallies and spontaneous noisy demonstrations by Change supporters, waving the movement’s blue flag emblazoned with a white candle. Support for the movement in traditional KDP areas to the west, such as Erbil and Duhok, has been more muted. But even there, the Change movement has provided the big talking-point, with unverifiable rumours that many plan to vote for it without declaring their support for fear of reprisals such as losing their jobs. The two big factions rose to the challenge, plunging into weeks of vigorous campaigning with an unprecedented sense of urgency and purpose.
Posters show Iraqi President Talabani, left, and Kurdish President Barzani
Reflecting the seriousness of the challenge, Mr Talabani laid aside his day-job as the whole country’s president and has been addressing rallies throughout Kurdistan, promoting his own PUK and its KDP allies for parliament, and Masood Barzani for the Kurdistan presidency. Mr Barzani is already President of Kurdistan, and is seeking re-election in a contest which for the first time is being held as a direct popular vote. There are four other candidates challenging him. None is expected to come close. But the fact that they are standing at all is significant, given Mr Barzani’s prestige. His father, Mullah Mustafa Barzani, pioneered the Iraqi Kurdish struggle for freedom from Baghdad. But one of the presidential candidates is something of a political embarrassment to President Talabani.
It is his own brother-in-law, Halo Ibrahim Ahmad. “Kurdistan needs new thinking and it needs new policies,” said Mr Ahmad. “The economy, corruption, lack of transparency in the workings of the parliament and government – all this has created a lot of pressure from the grassroots, from the man on the street, for change.” But Noshirwan Mustafa’s defection, after 40 years in the PUK, is far more damaging, and his movement has shaken the foundations of the Kurdish political establishment. He told the BBC he had decided to mount his challenge after failing to bring about reform from within. “The political parties [are] interfering in everything, in the parliament, in the cabinet, in the universities, in the market, in the judiciary powers,” he said. “Beside the financial corruption, we have nepotism and cronyism too. If you are not a relative of one of the leaders, or a member of one of the political parties, you have no chance to be a minister, deputy minister, general director, ambassador, or anything else.” ‘Still in business’President Talabani said he was personally saddened by Mr Mustafa’s defection after decades of loyalty to the party. He has pledged reforms, and publicly stated that he wants another party stalwart, Barham Salih, to be the next prime minister of Kurdistan. Mr Salih is currently the deputy prime minister of Iraq and is a reform-minded technocrat. But the Kurdistan premiership is currently held by Masood Barzani’s nephew Netchervan, and the KDP is believed to be reluctant to relinquish the post. While acknowledging faults, President Talabani insists the PUK and KDP are still in business. “Both parties I think are still popular among the people,” he told the BBC. “They have their mistakes, of course. There are some shortcomings. They are not angels coming from the sky. Like ordinary people they are making mistakes of course. “But I think that the Kurdish people and Kurdish society still need these two parties to consolidate what we have, and to gain what we are still struggling to achieve.” The two big factions also mounted huge rallies and clearly still command a great deal of support, as well as controlling an entrenched network of patronage. “They gave us a government and institutions, and Kurdistan is more prosperous than most countries in the region,” said 20-year-old computer science student Saz, who said she planned to vote for the ruling coalition. “I really believe it will be much better this time, and the Change movement will encourage the two parties to perform better because it has woken them up.” Election arithmeticBut many people in the streets of Suleimaniya and at Change rallies had a different view. “We didn’t see any service for our nation, we have two parties just working for themselves, collecting money and power,” said one Change supporter. “My whole family want to change this government and parliament, and let the parliament return to the people, not the parties,” said a middle-aged man with a young son at a Change rally. Suleimaniya, where Change has clearly had an impact, fills 42 seats from the 100 in contention (11 others are reserved for minorities). Some optimistic Change supporters believe they will take more than half of the Suleimaniya seats, add some more from Erbil and Dohuk, and have enough to hook up with other opposition groups – the Islamists and leftists who have around 20 seats in the current chamber – and block the two big factions from forming a majority. But even if Change only gets 15 or 20 seats, or even less, as other predictions maintain, it will be enough to give it a vocal presence in parliament and introduce an element of challenge that has been lacking so far. “It is a new experience,” said Noshirwan Mustafa. “For the first time, we are trying to create opposition inside parliament, and real competition between the parties. “For the first time, we opened the door to the younger generation – our list includes about 30 men and women under 30. And for the first time we will try to bring to parliament people who are not party members.” Political analysts say the campaign has reinvigorated Kurdish politics, which after an 11-year head start had begun to lag behind the rest of Iraq.

Source:BBC

With Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s resignation this weekend, she will leave behind many of the problems and frustrations she has had running the state.
A dismissed claim called Sarah Palin’s wearing of an Arctic Cat logo at a snowmobile race a conflict of interest.
But she will have to continue to deal with one of her biggest complaints: the series of ethics accusations lodged against her that will follow her after she leaves office. Since her bombshell resignation announcement, several new ethics complaints have been filed with state authorities, including one saying that she should not be able to claim per diem funds when she stays at her Wasilla, Alaska, home instead of Anchorage or Juneau, where she has offices. The governor’s mansion is in Juneau. At issue is a contention that she was charging the state when she stayed in Wasilla and commuted to her offices. Just this week, a complaint was filed alleging Palin failed to submit completed and signed gift disclosure forms. Palin says she is the target of the “politics of personal destruction,” as she and some staff members face about 20 filings regarding allegations of ethics violations. “It doesn’t cost the critics anything to file frivolous lawsuits or ethics violation charges. It costs our state such a great dealthousands of staff hours, millions of dollars in public resources that aren’t going to things that it should be going to,” Palin told CNN earlier this month. “We haven’t violated the ethics code.”
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A preliminary report by an independent investigator said a legal defense fund set up by Palin supporters may have violated state ethics laws because it was billed as the official fund. The report, a copy of which CNN obtained this week, recommended the outgoing governor refuse money from the fund and ask the state to pay legal fees for ethics complaints that were dismissed. “I find the notion that I have taken any action pertaining to the legal defense fund misguided and factually in error,” Palin said in a statement this week. “I have not ‘acted’ relative to the defense fund and it is misleading to say I have.” The pressure and financial cost of such ethics investigations are a major reason cited by the governor in her decision not to finish her term. She said her family is facing more than 500,000 in legal fees and has set up a legal defense fund to help defray the costs. Many of the complaints filed against Palin or her staff have been dismissed. But Palin last month reimbursed the state more than 8,000 for travel expenses for nine trips, accompanied by her children, after the state paid for them. Another inquiry led to some new ethics training for a staff member. In all, state officials say they have spent 1,963,840 to answer records requests from the ethics filings and to respond in other ways to them. Records show that since January 1, 2008, the state has spent 296,043 on such investigations. The inquiry that cost the most and drew the most attention was centered on whether Palin inappropriately fired the state’s director of public safety. This complaint had been filed weeks before Palin’s run for vice president. The public safety director said he was let go because of his refusal to fire a state trooper who was Palin’s former brother-in-law and was locked in a bitter divorce and custody battle with the governor’s sister. Palin and her supporters said he was let go because the director was insubordinate. An independent investigator found that she had a right to fire him, but in doing so had violated a state ethics law. The investigation also found that she had abused the powers of her office by pressuring employees to get the trooper fired. Although the governor and her supporters have criticized the investigations, Andree McLeod, who has filed six complaints against Palin, thinks they are appropriate. “I don’t really care what other people think. I am holding the governor accountable. Other people’s ignorance is not going to stymie me,” McLeod told CNN, surrounded by stacks of state documents she has collected from filing information requests and ethics complaints. “I am exercising my right to get these public records to discover what Sarah Palin is up to,” she said. McLeod, a registered Republican, has filed several complaints since Palin announced her decision to step down, including the one regarding gift disclosures. She has also filed two lawsuits, including one regarding whether it was appropriate for state business to be discussed using private e-mail addresses. When ethics complaints are filed against the governor or her staff, the state has to hire an independent counsel to investigate the claims to avoid a conflict of interest. Among other claims against Palin cite her wearing an Arctic Cat logo on a piece of clothing during a snowmobile race as a conflict of interest and another saying that an interview she did after the presidential election in her state office was inappropriate. Those were dismissed. James Muller, a political science professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage, told CNN that, “Some of [the complaints against Palin] are clearly fanciful, farcical. “I think most of these ethical complaints are trivial. Almost all have been dismissed by the various levels of review that have taken them on,” Muller said. Any filings already in process before she leaves office will be concluded, and state law allows complaints to be filed even after her resignation.
Palin had signed a law making it easier to file such complaints. “She’d been pushing for that even before she was governor. To have it used in this way, to have it abused in the manner that it was, is shameful. It’s much like the boy who cried ‘wolf,’ ” Thomas Van Flein, Palin’s attorney, told CNN.
Source:CNN

LAS MANOS, Nicaragua Ousted Honduran President Jose Manuel Zelaya arrived Friday at the Honduras-Nicaragua border as he attempts to return to his country nearly a month after being removed in a military-led coup, a broadcast on Telesur showed.
Honduran soldiers stand at a roadblock Friday in Las Manos along the border with Nicaragua.
Zelaya stopped about 100 yards short of the border and sat in his vehicle for several minutes under a strong rainstorm. It was not immediately known whether he would try to cross into Honduras any time soon. His arrival came minutes after police and soldiers fired on his supporters in the Honduran city of El Paraiso, across the border from the Nicaraguan town of Las Manos, where Zelaya stopped. Two people were wounded, CNN en Español Jorge Jimenez said. The police and soldiers fired tear gas at the demonstrators for about 15 to 20 minutes before letting off a barrage of 15 to 20 shots, Jimenez said. About 1,500 police and soldiers have faced off with Zelaya supporters in El Paraiso, about seven miles (12 kilometers) from the border with Nicaragua. The apparent shootings happened minutes after Zelaya held a news conference on the Nicaraguan side of the border and asked police and soldiers to let him back into his country. “Allow me to return to my country,” Zelaya said, directly addressing his nation’s police and army. “To embrace my fellow countrymen, my children, my wife, my mother.”
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Provisional Honduran President Roberto Micheletti has said Zelaya would be arrested if he crosses over into the country. Zelaya, whom the military ousted June 28, led a convoy Thursday to the Nicaraguan city of Esteli, near the border with Honduras, and spent the night there. He left Friday morning in a 20-vehicle caravan to continue the trek toward the border. TV images showed Zelaya driving his own vehicle, wearing a white shirt, black vest and his trademark white hat. Micheletti warned Zelaya against attempting to return, saying that Honduras cannot be held responsible for any bloodshed that could occur. Honduran police and soldiers set up roadblocks between Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, and the border, and were preventing all buses from crossing through, according to news reports. Some Zelaya supporters in El Paraiso told Telesur they had taken back roads through the mountains to avoid the roadblocks. Salomon Escoto Salinas, the National Police director, said in a televised news conference that cars and people were being searched for weapons. “Our job is to maintain order of the people who are protesting,” Escoto Salinas said. “If there is any vandalism, the police will act and we will apply the laws.” Escoto Salinas declined to say in an interview with CNN en Español whether Zelaya would be arrested if he crossed into Honduras. The National Police has a plan, and it will be carried out, he said. The United States has asked Zelaya not to attempt a return. “Any step that would add to the risk of violence in Honduras or in the area, we think would be unwise,” Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley said Thursday. U.S. officials reiterated that request Friday. Zelaya told reporters Thursday night in Nicaragua he hopes border guards in Honduras will recognize him as president and commander in chief and put down their weapons when he attempts to cross. “We go with a white flag, with a flag of peace,” Zelaya said. Micheletti’s government announced a curfew Thursday in the border area from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. A less-restrictive curfew remained in effect in other parts of the country. The increasing tensions come after the apparent failure of a peace accord offered Wednesday by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, who mediated two rounds of unsuccessful talks between the two sides. The document, dubbed the San Jose Accord, calls for Zelaya’s return to power, the creation of a unity government and early elections. The accord was similar to a plan Arias suggested over the weekend, but with more details and the creation of a truth commission to investigate the events that led to the crisis. The proposal also included a timeline for its implementation, which placed Zelaya back in Honduras by Friday. But Zelaya seemed intent to return on his own timeline, as neither side has signed the agreement. Hopes were slim that the agreement would be signed, as the Zelaya camp publicly said it rejected the document, and Micheletti’s side said it would have to seek approval from the other branches of government before proceeding. The Honduran Supreme Court has said it would not accept Zelaya’s return under any circumstances. On Thursday, the United States and Organization of American States expressed support for the San Jose Accord. “A favorable response to this proposal opens a path of reconciliation,” OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza said in Washington. “A rejection of this proposal opens a path toward confrontation. And I want to say very frankly, we don’t want a path toward conflict.” The Honduran political crisis stems from Zelaya’s desire to hold a referendum that could have led to extending term limits by changing the constitution, even though Congress had outlawed the vote and the Supreme Court ruled it illegal. The takeover has drawn international condemnation, including demands by the U.N. General Assembly, OAS and European Union that Zelaya be reinstated. Micheletti has rejected the characterization of the takeover as a coup, saying Zelaya’s removal was a constitutional transfer of power.
Source:CNN

A U.S. Border Patrol agent who was shot and killed in California was identified Friday.
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says, “This act of violence will not stand.”
“Agent Robert Rosas was gunned down while protecting our nation’s Southwest border,” Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Friday in a statement. “This act of violence will not standnor will any act of violence against the Border Patrol.” The agent was shot Thursday night in San Diego County, California, a spokesman for the federal Customs and Border Protection agency said. He suffered multiple gunshot wounds while on duty in the Campo area, said Michael Reilly, the agency’s assistant chief for border security operations. Ross is the ninth Border Patrol agent to be killed while on duty since 2006, according to the agency’s Web site. Napolitano vowed to “find and bring to justice” those responsible for the killing. “His death is a vivid reminder that we are engaged in a serious effort to secure our border and that thousands of Border Patrol agents and other [Department of Homeland Security] employees risk their lives every single day to protect and defend our nation,” she said.
Source:CNN

Ousted Honduran leader on border
The ousted president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, is on the country’s border with Nicaragua, as he tries to return home.Mr Zelaya has been in exile for nearly a month after he was forced from his position by a coup, and has previously tried to return by plane. The interim government has said it will arrest him if he sets foot in Honduras. Talks in Costa Rica aimed at resolving the political crisis collapsed two weeks ago with no agreement. Mr Zelaya was exiled on 28 June after a crisis erupted over his attempts to hold a vote on changing the constitution. On Friday, he was reported to have arrived at the Las Manos border post between Honduras and Nicaragua, where he has been staying. He previously an attempt to return home on 5 July, but his plane was prevented from landing when the Honduran military blocked the runway.

Source:BBC

America’s great healthcare debate
By Kevin Connolly
BBC News, Chiacgo
When a political topic is hot in America it dominates the cable chatter on 24-hour TV channels.When it’s REALLY hot, it dominates the advert breaks too – and no topic is hotter than health care. Rival lobbying organisations are spending millions of dollars on airtime – offering startlingly different diagnoses of what is wrong with the American healthcare system, and different prescriptions for treating it. Some call straightforwardly for the government to expand its own role as a provider of health coverage, as it currently provides only for the old and the poor. Others warn of the dangers of “socialised medicine” – the most riveting of them carry warnings from Britain and Canada about the dire consequences which will follow if the United States copies their government-funded systems. You would almost get the impression that the streets of those countries are piled high with the unburied dead – but behind the oversimplifications, it is clear that America is engaged in a debate about how big a role government should play in rationing healthcare. No insuranceTo get a sense of what that debate means in the daily lives of what journalists tend – rather irritatingly – to call “real people”, I travelled to Illinois, Barack Obama’s home base, where he engaged with this issue: first as a community organiser, then as a young state senator. On one side of the debate in the town of Aurora, I found Kathy Hunter, a mother of two children who used to have health insurance through her husband’s policy and who lost it when they were divorced. So Kathy is now one of the 47 million or so Americans who have no health insurance – a statistic bandied about so often that it is easy to forget the lives which lie behind it.
We sat together at Kathy’s kitchen table and sorted through the bills which arrived after a brief trip to the emergency room after she suffered an anxiety attack a few months back. There was – happily – nothing wrong, but the total cost of a few tests and a few reassuring words from a doctor totted up to around 4,000 (2,437). The government-funded medical welfare system Medicaid might agree to pick up the tab, but it might not and if it does not Kathy has no idea how she will pay the bill. From her point of view, the problem is huge, but it is also simple. “I sit here at night and I wonder: “What am I going to do, where am I going to come up with this money?’” she tells me. “If they have in Washington, or in state government, this wonderful care – why don’t I? Why am I not entitled to that as a human being? And that’s what I don’t understand, why can’t we figure out a way for everyone that everyone can be covered – at least for the basic care.” From the vantage point of Kathy’s kitchen table, it is hard to disagree with the notion that something must be done – but politics of course is the business of settling exactly what. And healthcare makes for particularly difficult politics because it throws up questions about where American society is heading. ‘My choice’We know now, in broad outline at least, what Barack Obama thinks should be done. He wants a government insurance scheme to run in parallel with and in competition with private insurance providers. But there are problems with that plan. America already spends more than any other developed country on healthcare (around 16% of GDP where 10 or 11 is the norm). And it is not noticeably a healthier society as a result. In the short term, providing a government scheme would be costly. And in the long term, if it was both good and affordable, it might put private insurers out of business – and that would mean that by default America would start moving towards a state-provided system.
Which brings me to Sandy Westlund-Deenihan and the other side of the argument. Sandy runs a light engineering company on the outskirts of Chicago. Like her father and grandfather before her, she takes pride in providing healthcare for her workers. She pays 65% of the costs of insuring her employees (they make up the rest) and even though it is a significant cost for a small business, Sandy would not have it any other way. “I am in favour of insuring the people who don’t have any insurance, but don’t handcuff me because I’m doing the right thing,” she told me. “I really want to have a choice, and I really don’t want the government interfering. If I want to take that out of the profits, and give it to my employees, that’s my choice.” It is only fair to point out that Sandy is not opposed to healthcare reform – she would like to see something done to help people like Kathy for example – but she shares the instinctive horror that many Americans feel for the idea of the government running the healthcare system. Politically vulnerableDemocrats often argue that the barrier to healthcare reform is an efficient and well-funded lobbying system run by the insurance and drug companies that make money from the current system. But things are never quite that simple.
To many people here – certainly to many conservatives – the idea of government healthcare conjures an impression of a federal bureaucrat deciding what tests and treatments you may or may not have. From that point of view, an expanded role for government is the problem, not the solution. This is the political minefield that Barack Obama is currently negotiating – is there a way through it that will protect Kathy without alienating Sandy? At the heart of this, of course, is a battle between two competing visions of America’s future. Does it want to become more European or will it stick to the view which has allowed it to prosper – that the free market is the most creative and efficient way to allocate resources, even when those resources are hospital beds to treat the badly injured or the terminally-ill. It is a problem that former presidents Roosevelt, Kennedy, Truman and Clinton all grappled with in the course of their presidencies with varying degrees of success, but Mr Obama has been relying on his undeniable mandate for change and his extraordinary powers of persuasion to ensure that things turn out differently this time around. He wanted it sorted out before the summer recess on Capitol Hill but has been forced to accept now that it will not be. And there are big politics at play in all this too – Republicans sense that Mr Obama is vulnerable on this issue and they are pushing back hard against his plans. If they can stop him on this, they reason, they can rob his presidency of much of its momentum. The summer months are normally fairly quiet in Washington, but with the White House keen to see all this go to a vote in September there is every chance that the summer of 2009 will see a real battle raging in America’s capital.

Source:BBC

Obama regrets ‘stupid’ comments
US President Barack Obama has told reporters he should not have described the arrest of a black Harvard professor as “stupid”. Mr Obama has faced criticism for wading into the controversy during a televised news conference on Wednesday. Professor Gates was apprehended at his own home after a witness saw him apparently trying to force his way in. He was held for disorderly conduct after allegedly accusing the arresting officer, Sgt James Crowley, of racism. Making a surprise appearance at the daily White House press briefing, Mr Obama said he should have chosen his words more carefully at his Wednesday news conference. “Because this has been ratcheting up and I obviously helped to contribute ratcheting it up, I wanted to make clear in my choice of words I think I unfortunately gave an impression that I was maligning the Cambridge Police Department or Sgt Crowley specifically,” Mr Obama said. “I could have calibrated those words differently,” he added. Mr Obama also revealed that he had spoken to Sgt Crowley on the telephone, and described him as an “outstanding” officer.

Source:BBC

Jamaican athletes fail drug tests
Five Jamaican athletes have tested positive for a banned substance, the sport’s governing body has confirmed.The athletes – four men and one woman – are not thought to include any of Jamaica’s 2008 Olympic medallists. IAAF spokesman Nick Davies said: “It’s very early in the process so we cannot name them or the substance.” An unnamed Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission (Jadco) official had earlier told news agency Reuters: “None of the world stars are involved.” Reports in the Caribbean claimed that the five are all sprinters included in the 46-strong Jamaica team selected for the upcoming World Championships. Davies said: “We have just received the paperwork from Jamaica, it is five – four guys and one girl. These are in-competition tests. “We now inform the (Jamaican) federation who will then inform the athletes, and then they are asked if they want the B sample tested.” Davies added that he believes the issue will be resolved before the World Championships, which start on 15 August in Berlin. Jadco’s executive director Dr Patrece Charles-Freeman has been quoted in the Jamaican media as saying an investigation is now under way. Jamaica’s Prime Minister Bruce Golding has called top officials from Jadco and the Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association to an emergency meeting in Kingston so he can be briefed on the situation. The Caribbean nation dominated last summer’s Olympic sprint races and is hoping for similar success in Germany. Former world 100m record holder Asafa Powell commented on the news after racing in a heat at the Aviva London Grand Prix on Friday, saying: “It’s disappointing, but I have to do what I have to do. I just have to stay that way and stay clean.” Aleen Bailey, competing in the women’s 200m event in London, was visibly shocked by the news. “You never want anybody from your country or your team to be tested positive,” she told BBC Sport.

Source:BBC

Swine flu ‘reaches 160 countries’
The swine flu virus has reached 160 countries and could infect two billion people within the next two years, the World Health Organization has said.A senior WHO official, Keiji Fukuda, said the virus was still in its early stages and would continue to spread for some time. Mr Fukuda said work on a vaccine was intensifying but safety could not be compromised by rushing the process. The virus is thought to have killed almost 800 people in recent months. Mr Fukuda, the WHO’s Assistant Director General for Health Security, said the agency had been reporting only laboratory-confirmed cases, but that this was always going to be “only a subset of the total number of cases”. “Even if we have hundreds of thousands of cases or a few millions of cases, we’re relatively early in the pandemic,” he told the Associated Press news agency. “One of the things that is relatively clear is that we will continue to see spread of the virus; even though we are now three to four months into the pandemic, this is still pretty early into the overall period,” he said. Mr Fukuda said the WHO estimates two billion people, one third of the global population, could eventually be infected. He said the figure was a reasonable prediction, based on analysis of previous pandemics, but that it was “really impossible to predict what the future will hold”. Pregnancy risk
Mr Fukuda said officials and drug manufacturers were investigating how to speed up the process of developing a vaccine against the H1N1 swine flu strain. But he said there could be no doubt over the safety and efficacy of the drug before it was publicly distributed. “There is always a balance in this sort of situation. You of course want to get out vaccine and as much vaccine as possible, as quickly as possible. On the other hand there are certain things which cannot be compromised,” he said. “There are certain areas where you can make economies, perhaps, but certain areas where you simply do not try to make any economies.” The WHO says that in most affected countries, the majority of cases appear to be occurring in young people, around the ages of 12 to 17, although some reports suggest it is mainly older people who have required hospital treatment. The organisation also said there was “accumulating evidence suggesting pregnant women are at higher risk of more severe disease”. But Mr Fukuda said the WHO “certainly has no recommendations on whether women should try to have children now”.

Source:BBC

TEHRAN, IranA fundamentalist supporter of Iran’s president urged him Friday to reconsider appointing a controversial confidant to the post of Iran’s top vice president.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent pick for the country’s top vice president continues to draw fire.
According to the semi-official Fars News Agency, Ayatollah Seyed Ahmad Khatami said in a sermon during Friday prayers that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should rethink the appointment of Esfandyar Rahim Mashaie. During his Friday sermon, the ayatollah said he regarded the present government to be legal, a reflection of his support for Ahmadinejadwhose controversial victory in last month’s presidential elections stoked widespread unrest in Iran. But he urged Ahmadinejad “to heed the advice of his friends.” “We consider this government to be legal and support it, but based on our fondness for the president we ask that he reconsiders his appointment of the first vice president,” the ayatollah said. The criticism is the latest in a flurry of opposition to the appointment of Mashaiewhose daughter is married to Ahmadinejad’s son. Mashaie has been controversial because of comments he reportedly made last year, saying that the Iranian people are friends with all people, including Israelis. Critics also found fault with Mashaie for reportedly not leaving an area in Turkey where female dancers were performing.
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But Ahmadinejad has defended Mashaie, despite the criticism surrounding the appointment. He is among the Iranian president’s closest confidants, and he was previously the head of the Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization, Fars reported. And the appointment to the position reflects that closeness. Although there are 12 vice presidents in Iran, the first vice president is the only one who can lead a Cabinet meeting if Ahmadinejad is unable to do so. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the nation’s supreme leader, reportedly has called on Ahmadinejad to remove Mashaie from the top vice president post. While Khamenei has not confirmed that directly, his Web site has posted a news item quoting Parliament’s vice speaker supporting that stance. At the Friday prayers, Ayatollah Seyed Ahmad Khatami reportedly said “we would like” Ahmadinejad “to remain a powerful and popular president.” “We wish that there would have been no need for the supreme leader to express an opinion in this regard. But now that he has, his opinion must be heeded immediately because the legality of all things in the Islamic System (of government) comes from the supreme leader.” Other news reports say that other Iranian voices have come out against Mashaie, including rightist lawmakers, the Council of Experts, and Grand Ayatollah Nasser Makarem.
Source:CNN