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06352019a19ae31e527f37f7571c6dd7f0c5da37 | NEW: "I thought I was going to die," driver says .
Man says pickup truck was folded in half; he just has cut on face .
Driver: "I probably had a 30-, 35-foot free fall"
Minnesota bridge collapsed during rush hour Wednesday . | MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota Drivers who were on the Minneapolis bridge when it collapsed told harrowing tales of survival. "The whole bridge from one side of the Mississippi to the other just completely gave way, fell all the way down," survivor Gary Babineau told CNN. "I probably had a 30-, 35-foot free fall. And there's cars in the water, there's cars on fire. The whole bridge is down." He said his back was injured but he determined he could move around. "I realized there was a school bus right next to me, and me and a couple of other guys went over and started lifting the kids off the bridge. They were yelling, screaming, bleeding. I think there were some broken bones." Watch a driver describe his narrow escape » . At home when he heard about the disaster, Dr. John Hink, an emergency room physician, jumped into his car and rushed to the scene in 15 minutes. He arrived at the south side of the bridge, stood on the riverbank and saw dozens of people lying dazed on an expansive deck. They were in the middle of the Mississippi River, which was churning fast, and he had no way of getting to them. He went to the north side, where there was easier access to people. Ambulances were also having a hard time driving down to the river to get closer to the scene. Working feverishly, volunteers, EMTs and other officials managed to get 55 people into ambulances in less than two hours. Occasionally, a pickup truck with a medic inside would drive to get an injured person and bring him back up even ground, Hink told CNN. The rescue effort was controlled and organized, he said; the opposite of the lightning-quick collapse. "I could see the whole bridge as it was going down, as it was falling," Babineau said. "It just gave a rumble real quick, and it all just gave way, and it just fell completely, all the way to the ground. And there was dust everywhere and it was just like everyone has been saying: It was just like out of the movies." Babineau said the rear of his pickup truck was dangling over the edge of a broken-off section of the bridge. He said several vehicles slid past him into the water. "I stayed in my car for one or two seconds. I saw a couple cars fall," he said. "So I stayed in my car until the cars quit falling for a second, then I got out real quick, ran in front of my truck because behind my truck was just a hole and I helped a woman off of the bridge with me. "I just wanted off the bridge, and then I ran over to the school bus. I started grabbing kids and handing them down. It was just complete chaos." He said most of the children were crying or screaming. He and other rescuers set them on the ground and told them to run to the river bank, but a few needed to be carried because of their injuries. See rescuers clamber over rubble » . Babineau said he had no rescue training. "I just knew what I had to do at the moment." Melissa Hughes, 32, of Minneapolis, told The Associated Press that she was driving home when the western edge of the bridge collapsed under her. "You know that free-fall feeling? I felt that twice," Hughes said. A pickup landed on top of her car, but she was not hurt. "I had no idea there was a vehicle on my car," she told AP. "It's really very surreal." Babineau told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: "On the way down, I thought I was dead. I literally thought I was dead. "My truck was completely face down, pointed toward the ground, and my truck got ripped in half. It was folded in half, and I can't believe I'm alive." See and hear eyewitness accounts » . Bernie Toivonen told CNN's "American Morning" that his vehicle was on a part of the bridge that ended up tilted at a 45-degree angle. "I knew the deck was going down, there was no question about it, and I thought I was going to die," he said. After the bridge settled and his car remained upright, "I just put in park, turned the key off and said, 'Oh, I'm alive,' " he said. E-mail to a friend . |
a1ebb8bb4d370a1fdf28769206d572be60642d70 | Parents beam with pride, can't stop from smiling from outpouring of support .
Mom: "I was so happy I didn't know what to do"
Burn center in U.S. has offered to provide treatment for reconstructive surgeries .
Dad says, "Anything for Youssif" | BAGHDAD, Iraq Dressed in a Superman shirt, 5-year-old Youssif held his sister's hand Friday, seemingly unaware that millions of people across the world have been touched by his story. Nearby, his parents talked about the new future and hope they have for their boy and the potential for recovery from his severe burns. Youssif holds his sister's hand Friday. He's wearing a facial mask often used to help burn victims. It's the best birthday present the Iraqi family could ever have imagined for their boy: Youssif turns 6 next Friday. "I was so happy I didn't know what to do with myself," his mother, Zainab, told CNN, a broad smile across her face. "I didn't think the reaction would be this big." His father said he was on the roof of his house when CNN called him with the news about the outpouring of support for his son. "We just want to thank everyone who has come forward," he said. "We knew there was kindness out there." Like his wife, he couldn't stop smiling. He talked about how he tried in vain to get help for his son in Baghdad, leaving "no stone unturned" on a mission to help his boy. There were many trips to the Ministry of Health. He says he even put in a request to Iraq's parliament for help. The family eventually told CNN their story that Youssif was grabbed by masked men outside their home on January 15, doused in gasoline and set on fire. Simply by coming forward, his parents put themselves in incredible danger. No one has been arrested or held accountable in Youssif's case. Watch CNN's Arwa Damon describe 'truly phenomenal' outpouring » . Shortly after Youssif's story aired Wednesday, the Children's Burn Foundation a nonprofit organization based in Sherman Oaks, California, that provides support for burn victims locally, nationally and internationally agreed to pay for the transportation for Youssif and his family to come to the United States and to set up a fund for donations. You can make a donation at the foundation's site by clicking here. There's a drop-down menu under the "general donation" area that is marked "Youssif's fund." The foundation says it will cover all medical costs from surgeries for Youssif to housing costs to any social rehabilitation that might be needed for him. Surgeries will be performed by Dr. Peter Grossman, a plastic surgeon with the affiliated Grossman Burn Center who is donating his services for Youssif's cause. Officials are still trying to get the appropriate visas for the family's travels. "We are prepared to have them come here, set them up in a housing situation, provide support for them and begin treatment," said Barbara Friedman, executive director of the Children's Burn Foundation. "We expect that the treatment will be from between six months to a year with many surgeries." She added, "He will be getting the absolute best care that's available." Youssif's parents said they know it's going to be a lengthy and difficult process and that adjusting to their stay in America may not be easy. But none of that matters getting help for their boy is first and foremost. "I will do anything for Youssif," his father said, pulling his son closer to him. "Our child is everything." His mother tried to coax Youssif to talk to us on this day. But he didn't want to; his mother says he's shy outside of their home. The biggest obstacle now is getting the visas to leave, and the serious security risks they face every day and hour they remain in Iraq. But this family which saw the very worst in humanity on that January day has new hope in the world. That is partly due to the tens of thousands of CNN.com users who were so moved by the story and wanted to act. CNN Iraqi staff central to bringing this story together were also overwhelmed with the generosity coming from people outside of their border. In a nation that largely feels abandoned by the rest of the world, it was a refreshing realization. E-mail to a friend . CNN.com senior producer Wayne Drash contributed to this report in Atlanta. |
f0d73bdab711763e745cdc75850861c9018f235d | Tomas Medina Caracas was a fugitive from a U.S. drug trafficking indictment .
"El Negro Acacio" allegedly helped manage extensive cocaine network .
U.S. Justice Department indicted him in 2002 .
Colombian military: He was killed in an attack on a guerrilla encampment . | BOGOTA, Colombia A key rebel commander and fugitive from a U.S. drug trafficking indictment was killed over the weekend in an air attack on a guerrilla encampment, the Colombian military said Monday. Alleged cocaine trafficker and FARC rebel Tomas Medina Caracas in an Interpol photo. Tomas Medina Caracas, known popularly as "El Negro Acacio," was a member of the high command of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia and, according to Colombian and U.S. officials, helped manage the group's extensive cocaine trafficking network. He had been in the cross-hairs of the U.S. Justice Department since 2002. He was charged with conspiracy to import cocaine into the United States and manufacturing and distributing cocaine within Colombia to fund the FARC's 42-year insurgency against the government. U.S. officials alleged Medina Caracas managed the rebel group's sales of cocaine to international drug traffickers, who in turn smuggled it into the United States. He was also indicted in the United States along with two other FARC commanders in November 2002 on charges of conspiring to kidnap two U.S. oil workers from neighboring Venezuela in 1997 and holding one of them for nine months until a $1 million ransom was paid. Officials said the army's Rapid Response Force, backed by elements of the Colombian Air Force, tracked Medina Caracas down at a FARC camp in the jungle in the south of the country. "After a bombardment, the troops occupied the camp, and they've found 14 dead rebels so far, along with rifles, pistols, communications equipment and ... four GPS systems," Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said at a news conference. "The death of 'El Negro Acacio' was confirmed by various sources, including members of FARC itself." Medina Caracas commanded FARC's 16th Front in the southern departments of Vichada and Guainia. Established in 1964 as the military wing of the Colombian Communist Party, FARC is Colombia's oldest, largest, most capable and best-equipped Marxist rebel group, according to the U.S. Department of State. E-mail to a friend . Journalist Fernando Ramos contributed to this report. |
5e22bbfc7232418b8d2dd646b952e404df5bd048 | President Bush says Tony Snow "will battle cancer and win" Job of press secretary "has been a dream for me," Snow says Snow leaving on September 14, will be succeeded by Dana Perino . | WASHINGTON White House press secretary Tony Snow, who is undergoing treatment for cancer, will step down from his post September 14 and be replaced by deputy press secretary Dana Perino, the White House announced Friday. White House press secretary Tony Snow will step down from his post on September 14. President Bush told reporters Friday that he will "sadly accept" Snow's resignation. Flanked by Snow and Perino in the White House press room, the president spoke warmly of his departing press secretary. "It's been a joy to watch him spar with you," Bush told reporters. Watch the announcement about Snow leaving » . Bush said he was certain of two things in regard to Snow. "He'll battle cancer and win," Bush said, "and he'll be a solid contributor to society." Turning to Snow, the president then said: "I love you, and I wish you all the best." Snow, speaking after Bush at the start of the daily White House news conference, said he was leaving to earn more money. He took a big pay cut, he said, when he left his previous jobs as anchor and political analyst for Fox News. According to The Washington Post, Snow makes $168,000 as the White House spokesman. His family took out a loan when he started the job, "and that loan is now gone." "This job has really been a dream for me, a blast. I've had an enormous amount of fun and satisfaction," Snow said. He said he would continue to speak out on issues, and would do "some radio, some TV, but I don't anticipate full-time anchor duties." Snow said he's received great satisfaction from talking to people about his illness. Snow's cancer was diagnosed for the first time in February 2005. His colon was removed, and after six months of treatment, doctors said the cancer was in remission. Perino announced March 27 that Snow's cancer had recurred, and that doctors had removed a growth from his abdomen the day before. Sources told CNN two weeks ago that Snow was planning to leave his job, possibly as early as September. Bush tapped Snow to replace Scott McClellan in April 2006. Snow had been an anchor for "Fox News Sunday" and a political analyst for the Fox News Channel, which he joined in 1996. He also hosted "The Tony Snow Show" on Fox News Radio. On Thursday, Snow told CNN his health is improving, citing two medical tests this month that found the cancer has not spread. "The tumors are stable they are not growing," Snow said of the results from an MRI and a CAT scan. "And there are no new growths. The health is good." The press secretary, whose hair has turned gray during chemotherapy treatment, said his black hair is expected to grow back in about a month. "I'm also putting on weight again," he said after returning from a 10-day vacation. "I actually feel very good about" the health situation. Snow said on Friday he was to see his oncologist, and they will decide on some minor forms of chemotherapy to start as maintenance treatment. E-mail to a friend . |
613d6311ec2c1985bd44707d1796d275452fe156 | Empty anti-tank weapon turns up in front of New Jersey home .
Device handed over to Army ordnance disposal unit .
Weapon not capable of being reloaded, experts say . | Police and FBI agents are investigating the discovery of an empty rocket launcher tube on the front lawn of a Jersey City, New Jersey, home, FBI spokesman Sean Quinn said. Niranjan Desai discovered the 20-year-old AT4 anti-tank rocket launcher tube, a one-time-use device, lying on her lawn Friday morning, police said. The launcher has been turned over to U.S. Army officials at the 754th Ordnance Company, an explosive ordnance disposal unit, at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, Army officials said. The launcher "is no longer operable and not considered to be a hazard to public safety," police said, adding there was no indication the launcher had been fired recently. Army officials said they could not determine if the launcher had been fired, but indicated they should know once they find out where it came from. The nearest military base, Fort Dix, is more than 70 miles from Jersey City. The Joint Terrorism Task Force division of the FBI and Jersey City police are investigating the origin of the rocket launcher and the circumstance that led to its appearance on residential property. "Al Qaeda doesn't leave a rocket launcher on the lawn of middle-aged ladies," said Paul Cruickshank of New York University Law School's Center on Law and Security. A neighbor, Joe Quinn, said the object lying on Desai's lawn looked military, was brown, had a handle and strap, and "both ends were open, like you could shoot something with it." Quinn also said the device had a picture of a soldier on it and was 3 to 4 feet long. An Army official said the device is basically a shoulder-fired, direct-fire weapon used against ground targets a modern-day bazooka and it is not wire-guided. According to the Web site Globalsecurity.org, a loaded M136 AT4 anti-tank weapon has a 40-inch-long fiberglass-wrapped tube and weighs just 4 pounds. Its 84 millimeter shaped-charge missile can penetrate 14 inches of armor from a maximum of 985 feet. It is used once and discarded. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Carol Cratty, Dugald McConnell, and Mike Mount contributed to this report. |
017d27d00eb43678c15cb4a8dd4723a035323219 | President Bush to address the Veterans of Foreign Wars on Wednesday .
Bush to say that withdrawing from Vietnam emboldened today's terrorists .
Speech will be latest White House attempt to try to reframe the debate over Iraq . | WASHINGTON As he awaits a crucial progress report on Iraq, President Bush will try to put a twist on comparisons of the war to Vietnam by invoking the historical lessons of that conflict to argue against pulling out. President Bush pauses Tuesday during a news conference at the North American Leaders summit in Canada. On Wednesday in Kansas City, Missouri, Bush will tell members of the Veterans of Foreign Wars that "then, as now, people argued that the real problem was America's presence and that if we would just withdraw, the killing would end," according to speech excerpts released Tuesday by the White House. "Three decades later, there is a legitimate debate about how we got into the Vietnam War and how we left," Bush will say. "Whatever your position in that debate, one unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens, whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like 'boat people,' 're-education camps' and 'killing fields,' " the president will say. The president will also make the argument that withdrawing from Vietnam emboldened today's terrorists by compromising U.S. credibility, citing a quote from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden that the American people would rise against the Iraq war the same way they rose against the war in Vietnam, according to the excerpts. "Here at home, some can argue our withdrawal from Vietnam carried no price to American credibility, but the terrorists see things differently," Bush will say. On Tuesday, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, "President Bush's attempt to compare the war in Iraq to past military conflicts in East Asia ignores the fundamental difference between the two. Our nation was misled by the Bush Administration in an effort to gain support for the invasion of Iraq under false pretenses, leading to one of the worst foreign policy blunders in our history. "While the President continues to stay-the-course with his failed strategy in Iraq, paid for by the taxpayers, American lives are being lost and there is still no political solution within the Iraqi government. It is time to change direction in Iraq, and Congress will again work to do so in the fall." The White House is billing the speech, along with another address next week to the American Legion, as an effort to "provide broader context" for the debate over the upcoming Iraq progress report by Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander, and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad. President Bush has frequently asked lawmakers and the American people to withhold judgment on his troop "surge" in Iraq until the report comes out in September. Watch Bush criticize the Iraqi government » . It is being closely watched on Capitol Hill, particularly by Republicans nervous about the political fallout from an increasingly unpopular war. Earlier this month, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he would wait for the report before deciding when a drawdown of the 160,000 U.S. troops in Iraq might begin. Bush's speeches Wednesday and next week are the latest in a series of attempts by the White House to try to reframe the debate over Iraq, as public support for the war continues to sag. A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that almost two-thirds of Americans 64 percent now oppose the Iraq war, and 72 percent say that even if Petraeus reports progress, it won't change their opinion. The poll also found a great deal of skepticism about the report; 53 percent said they do not trust Petraeus to give an accurate assessment of the situation in Iraq. In addition to his analogy to Vietnam, Bush in Wednesday's speech will invoke other historical comparisons from Asia, including the U.S. defeat and occupation of Japan after World War II and the Korean War in the 1950s, according to the excerpts. "In the aftermath of Japan's surrender, many thought it naive to help the Japanese transform themselves into a democracy. Then, as now, the critics argued that some people were simply not fit for freedom," Bush will say. "Today, in defiance of the critics, Japan ... stands as one of the world's great free societies." Speaking about the Korean War, Bush will note that at the time "critics argued that the war was futile, that we never should have sent our troops in, or that America's intervention was divisive here at home." "While it is true that the Korean War had its share of challenges, America never broke its word," Bush will say. "Without America's intervention during the war, and our willingness to stick with the South Koreans after the war, millions of South Koreans would now be living under a brutal and repressive regime." E-mail to a friend . |
35f0e33de7923036a97ac245d899f990bda5e242 | President Bush will have a routine colonoscopy Saturday .
While he's anesthetized, his powers will be transferred to the vice president .
Bush had last colonoscopy in 2002, which found no problems . | WASHINGTON Vice President Dick Cheney will serve as acting president briefly Saturday while President Bush is anesthetized for a routine colonoscopy, White House spokesman Tony Snow said Friday. Bush is scheduled to have the medical procedure, expected to take about 2 1/2 hours, at the presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland, Snow said. Bush's last colonoscopy was in June 2002, and no abnormalities were found, Snow said. The president's doctor had recommended a repeat procedure in about five years. The procedure will be supervised by Dr. Richard Tubb and conducted by a multidisciplinary team from the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, Snow said. A colonoscopy is the most sensitive test for colon cancer, rectal cancer and polyps, small clumps of cells that can become cancerous, according to the Mayo Clinic. Small polyps may be removed during the procedure. Snow said that was the case when Bush had colonoscopies before becoming president. Snow himself is undergoing chemotherapy for cancer that began in his colon and spread to his liver. Snow told reporters he had a chemo session scheduled later Friday. Watch Snow talk about Bush's procedure and his own colon cancer » . "The president wants to encourage everybody to use surveillance," Snow said. The American Cancer Society recommends that people without high-risk factors or symptoms begin getting screened for signs of colorectal cancer at age 50. E-mail to a friend . |
2ad31cae96512af5105b9b23f9b681dc732b2605 | 2,000 customers without electricity, power company says .
Magnitude 4.2 quake set off home alarms, says Oakland police dispatcher .
"It was fairly mild," police say, no immediate reports of injuries, damage .
It was centered two miles east-northeast of Oakland, about 3.6 miles deep . | SAN FRANCISCO, California A magnitude 4.2 earthquake shook the San Francisco area Friday at 4:42 a.m. PT (7:42 a.m. ET), the U.S. Geological Survey reported. The quake left about 2,000 customers without power, said David Eisenhower, a spokesman for Pacific Gas and Light. Under the USGS classification, a magnitude 4.2 earthquake is considered "light," which it says usually causes minimal damage. "We had quite a spike in calls, mostly calls of inquiry, none of any injury, none of any damage that was reported," said Capt. Al Casciato of the San Francisco police. "It was fairly mild." Watch police describe concerned calls immediately after the quake » . The quake was centered about two miles east-northeast of Oakland, at a depth of 3.6 miles, the USGS said. Oakland is just east of San Francisco, across San Francisco Bay. An Oakland police dispatcher told CNN the quake set off alarms at people's homes. The shaking lasted about 50 seconds, said CNN meteorologist Chad Myers. According to the USGS, magnitude 4.2 quakes are felt indoors and may break dishes and windows and overturn unstable objects. Pendulum clocks may stop. E-mail to a friend . |
0d43b97000ff852282c89d8d105e41495c0ee9bd | NEW: President Bush says he and first lady are deeply saddened by the tragedy .
Mine Safety and Health Administration chief: We've run out of options.
The six men have been trapped underground since August 6 .
Seven bore holes drilled into the mountain have found no signs of life . | WASHINGTON There is "no remaining hope" of finding six men trapped for almost a month in a Utah coal mine alive, a federal official said Saturday. Isaac Arellano holds a candle and sings during a fundraiser for miners Tuesday in Price, Utah. "Over the past 25 days, the Mine Safety and Health Administration has exhausted all known options in our attempt to reach the six miners," Richard Stickler, head of the agency, said in a statement. "The thoughts and prayers of the dedicated professionals at MSHA are with the families." Sympathy for the failed efforts also came Saturday from the White House. "Last night, a difficult decision was made to end the search," President Bush said in a statement. "Laura and I are deeply saddened by this tragedy and continue to pray for the families of these men." Labor Secretary Elaine Chao called the ordeal "heartbreaking." "The grueling around-the-clock rescue operation that claimed three lives and injured six others has also taken a tremendous toll on the many brave rescuers and the local community, and our thoughts and prayers are with them all," Chao said in a statement. After drilling seven holes into mine tunnels from the mountaintop above, there has been no sign of the miners and microphones have picked up no sound from the men. See a timeline of rescue efforts » . Tests showed underground oxygen levels were too low to sustain human life. "We basically told the families that at this point in time we've run out of options," Stickler said at a news conference late Friday. "We've consulted with the people that we have here, we've consulted with the technical support in Pittsburgh and we've consulted with private consultants in terms of where we can go," he said. "And basically, through all the information we've gleaned over the past nearly four weeks in terms of the conditions we found, in terms of the air readings we found down there and ... everything else, we just don't know where else we can put a hole to get any other information." See photos of the rescue mission » . There were no public statements Saturday from Bob Murray, president and CEO of Murray Mining, co-owner of the Crandall Canyon Mine, who was the outspoken face of the rescue operation for the first three weeks, then largely disappeared from public view. Federal officials became the spokesmen. No one from Murray Mining was present at Friday's news conference. "They are done. It's finished," the attorney for the families said, according to the Saturday edition of The Salt Lake Tribune. "It's a hard and bitter pill for our families, and there were quite a few tears shed," the newspaper quotes Colin King as saying. The men were trapped during a collapse on August 6, and it is not known whether they survived the cave-in. Efforts to reach them were suspended 10 days later when two rescuers and a federal mining official were killed, and six people were injured in a second collapse as they tried to tunnel horizontally toward the area where the men had been working. Murray said last week that the search effort would stop if no signs of life were found at the sixth hole. Under pressure from the families, however, he agreed to try one more time. Families wanted officials to drill a hole large enough to send down a rescue capsule. The effort to lower the robotic device down a seventh hole had been called "a long shot" by an official. MSHA's Stickler said that hole was drilled into the Crandall Canyon Mine on Thursday, but there were problems with a robotic camera that teams were trying to lower into it. Work resumed Friday, this time at the fourth hole, but the camera could only descend about 7 feet, he said. "Basically, what it saw was really not that much. There was quite a bit of mud in there, water coming down the hole. It really couldn't go any farther than seven feet," he said of the latest try. In addition, the roof was sagging. "The families asked many, many questions and we answered them all the best we could, basically coming to the conclusion that we had run out of options." Murray said last Saturday he has already filed paperwork with federal regulators to permanently close and seal the Crandall Canyon mine. "I will never come back to that evil mountain," he said. Friends and family have identified the six missing miners as Luis Hernandez, Manuel Sanchez, Kerry Allred, Carlos Payan, Brandon Phillips and Don Erickson. E-mail to a friend . |
2f43e9dfaa43ffbddbce339a8b6403ddce43b38a | Beckham has agreed to a five-year contract with Los Angeles Galaxy .
New contract took effect July 1, 2007 .
Former English captain to meet press, unveil new shirt number Friday .
CNN to look at Beckham as footballer, fashion icon and global phenomenon . | Football superstar, celebrity, fashion icon, multimillion-dollar heartthrob. Now, David Beckham is headed for the Hollywood Hills as he takes his game to U.S. Major League Soccer. CNN looks at how Bekham fulfilled his dream of playing for Manchester United, and his time playing for England. The world's famous footballer has begun a five-year contract with the Los Angeles Galaxy team, and on Friday Beckham will meet the press and reveal his new shirt number. This week, we take an in depth look at the life and times of Beckham, as CNN's very own "Becks," Becky Anderson, sets out to examine what makes the man tick as footballer, fashion icon and global phenomenon. It's a long way from the streets of east London to the Hollywood Hills and Becky charts Beckham's incredible rise to football stardom, a journey that has seen his skills grace the greatest stages in world soccer. She goes in pursuit of the current hottest property on the sports/celebrity circuit in the U.S. and along the way explores exactly what's behind the man with the golden boot. CNN will look back at the life of Beckham, the wonderfully talented youngster who fulfilled his dream of playing for Manchester United, his marriage to pop star Victoria, and the trials and tribulations of playing for England. We'll look at the highs (scoring against Greece), the lows (being sent off during the World Cup), the Man. U departure for the Galacticos of Madrid and now the Home Depot stadium in L.A. We'll ask how Beckham and his family will adapt to life in Los Angeles the people, the places to see and be seen and the celebrity endorsement. Beckham is no stranger to exposure. He has teamed with Reggie Bush in an Adidas commercial, is the face of Motorola, is the face on a PlayStation game and doesn't need fashion tips as he has his own international clothing line. But what does the star couple need to do to become an accepted part of Tinseltown's glitterati? The road to major league football in the U.S.A. is a well-worn route for some of the world's greatest players. We talk to some of the former greats who came before him and examine what impact these overseas stars had on U.S. soccer and look at what is different now. We also get a rare glimpse inside the David Beckham academy in L.A, find out what drives the kids and who are their heroes. The perception that in the U.S.A. soccer is a "game for girls" after the teenage years is changing. More and more young kids are choosing the European game over the traditional U.S. sports. E-mail to a friend . |
eb68bc51ed4fc727a1af058192a3fef0916c91e7 | Colony collapse disorder has killed millions of bees .
Scientists suspect a virus may combine with other factors to collapse colonies .
Disorder first cropped up in 2004, as bees were imported from Australia .
$15 billion in U.S. crops each year dependent on bees for pollination . | A virus found in healthy Australian honey bees may be playing a role in the collapse of honey bee colonies across the United States, researchers reported Thursday. Honey bees walk on a moveable comb hive at the Bee Research Laboratory, in Beltsville, Maryland. Colony collapse disorder has killed millions of bees up to 90 percent of colonies in some U.S. beekeeping operations imperiling the crops largely dependent upon bees for pollination, such as oranges, blueberries, apples and almonds. The U.S. Department of Agriculture says honey bees are responsible for pollinating $15 billion worth of crops each year in the United States. More than 90 fruits and vegetables worldwide depend on them for pollination. Signs of colony collapse disorder were first reported in the United States in 2004, the same year American beekeepers started importing bees from Australia. The disorder is marked by hives left with a queen, a few newly hatched adults and plenty of food, but the worker bees responsible for pollination gone. The virus identified in the healthy Australian bees is Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus named that because it was discovered by Hebrew University researchers. Although worker bees in colony collapse disorder vanish, bees infected with IAPV die close to the hive, after developing shivering wings and paralysis. For some reason, the Australian bees seem to be resistant to IAPV and do not come down with symptoms. Scientists used genetic analyses of bees collected over the past three years and found that IAPV was present in bees that had come from colony collapse disorder hives 96 percent of the time. But the study released Thursday on the Science Express Web site, operated by the journal Science, cautioned that collapse disorder is likely caused by several factors. "This research give us a very good lead to follow, but we do not believe IAPV is acting alone," said Jeffery S. Pettis of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Bee Research Laboratory and a co-author of the study. "Other stressors on the colony are likely involved." This could explain why bees in Australia may be resistant to colony collapse. "There are no cases ... in Australia at all," entomologist Dave Britton of the Australian Museum told the Sydney Morning Herald last month. "It is a Northern Hemisphere phenomenon." Bee ecology expert and University of Florida professor Jamie Ellis said earlier this year that genetic weakness bred into bees over time, pathogens spread by parasites and the effects of pesticides and pollutants might be other factors. Researchers also say varroa mites affect all hives on the U.S. mainland but are not found in Australia. University of Georgia bee researcher Keith S. Delaplane said Thursday the study offers a warning and hope. "One nagging problem has been a general inability to treat or vaccinate bees against viruses of any kind," said Delaplane, who has been trying to breed bees resistant to the varroa mite. "But in the case of IAPV, there is evidence that some bees carry genetic resistance to the disorder. This is yet one more argument for beekeepers to use honey bee stocks that are genetically disease- and pest-resistant." Bee researchers will now look for stresses that may combine to kill bees. "The next step is to ascertain whether IAPV, alone or in concert with other factors, can induce CCD [colony collapse disorder] in healthy bees," said Ian Lipkin, director of the Center for Infection and Immunity at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Besides the Columbia and USDA researchers, others involved in the study released Thursday include researchers from Pennsylvania State University, the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture, the University of Arizona and 454 Life Sciences. E-mail to a friend . |
ad021a7924ee57491cee8576499ac196b1afeb23 | Savers at leading UK mortgage bank lined up to empty their accounts .
Northern Rock was bailed out by the Bank of England a day earlier .
Reassurances that banks was safe have gone unheeded by many . | LONDON, England Savers at a leading UK mortgage bank lined up for a second day to empty their accounts Saturday, a day after the lender was bailed out by the Bank of England after heavily slashing profit forecasts. Fearful customers line up to withdraw cash from a Northern Rock branch in southeast London on Friday. Long lines formed before counters opened at the Northern Rock building society, one of the UK's top five lenders, as worried customers ignored reassurances from the bank and the government. Customers are believed to have already withdrawn about £1 billion ($2 billion) since the bank's woes were revealed, prompting speculation that the global credit crunch made raising funds through commercial borrowing difficult. Shares in Northern Rock dropped up to 30 percent in Friday trading, with problems spilling over the European banking sector . The British Bankers' Association has urged customers to "calm down," according to the UK Press Association. It said: "Northern Rock is a sound and safe bank and there is absolutely no reason for either mortgage customers or savers to worry." Meanwhile, finance minister Alistair Darling said the Bank of England had stepped in "to create a stable banking system". He said: "People can use their accounts in the usual way, they can carry on making their mortgage payments in the usual way. Northern Rock will be able to carry on its business." Northern Rock chief executive Adam Applegarth said yesterday that the bank had yet to draw on the emergency cash, which he called "a backdrop in case we need to use it", according to PA. E-mail to a friend . |
08450c1bc03472825196be1acb02ac0e13bef939 | Because of troubles, Lindsay Lohan likely difficult to insure .
Lohan supposed to appear in Shirley MacLaine film "Poor Things"
Insurance rates may cost 1 to 3 percent of film's production budget . | LOS ANGELES, California "To insure or not to insure?" It isn't Shakespeare, but it is the dramatic question Hollywood filmmakers are asking about Lindsay Lohan following her legal troubles this week. Lindsay Lohan may still get work after her legal problems are settled, but the cost will be high. It is an important question, too, because whether companies insure Lohan's future movies may determine whether she will quickly fall off Hollywood's A-list. But Lohan fans have little to fear because no actor is uninsurable, say underwriting experts. While some producers may balk at conditions for hiring problematic stars, experts say that unless an actor is serving time in prison, even the most volatile can be covered albeit at a high cost. "For a price, anything can be done, although an insurance carrier can make things so unpalatable that at times the makers of the film just won't be interested," said Ross Miller, partner with insurance brokerage D.R. Reiff & Associates Inc. Lohan's arrest this week in Los Angeles on suspicion of drunken driving and cocaine possession has left Hollywood wondering if the actress, who shot to fame as a child in Disney films like "The Parent Trap," is too risky to cast in a film. Timeline: Lindsay Lohan's troubles » . It remains to be seen whether her latest relapse and brush with the law will cost her a role in "Poor Things," a film produced by and starring Oscar-winner Shirley MacLaine. See a gallery of Lohan's films » . A statement was expected early next week on whether the movie, already delayed this spring due to an earlier rehab stint by Lohan, will proceed with or without her. Insurance experts say the industry has long dealt with similar situations, although they may seem more frequent with the recent heavy media scrutiny of Lohan and fellow troubled party girls Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. "I don't think it (a problematic artist) is any more of an issue," said Wendy Diaz, entertainment underwriting director at Fireman's Fund Insurance Co., the leading film underwriter. "It's pretty standard year to year." But Diaz did say the terms for covering Lohan would likely be "serious at this point." She said Fireman's Fund, in such a case, would likely put in higher deductibles, or ask the star to put their salary into escrow to pay for any losses if production was disrupted. Last July, a producer on Lohan's last film, "Georgia Rule," scolded her publicly for repeatedly showing up late on the set, costing the movie's makers hundreds of thousands of dollars. Brian Kingman, a managing director with entertainment insurance broker Aon/Albert G. Ruben said covering situations like Lohan's required a lot of calculation and risk management. Insurance rates for errant actors can range anywhere from 1 percent to 3 percent of a movie's production budget, which can range from $5 million to $100 million or more, he said. "Filmmakers fall in love with certain actors for certain roles and my job is to find risk-takers to take on the risk," Kingman said. He said actors were always required to undergo a medical exam before getting insurance. In certain circumstances, drug screening is conducted and actors are required to provide blood and urine samples. In cases of known drug abuse, "minders" are sometimes required on set to keep an eye on the actor. Kingman said he had even helped craft policies for actors in the event they risked the possibility of incarceration. "I have been successful in finding and creating incarceration coverage for certain actors on probation which can be revoked if they break certain rules," he said, citing the case of Robert Downey Jr., another high-profile star with a history of legal, drug and alcohol problems. E-mail to a friend . Copyright 2007 Reuters. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. |
414a5b8ecbe189d2767c75b839775a1dcafaf4d3 | Two employees bought, sold weapons on their own, company says .
Company fired workers, turned them in to ATF, says source .
Feds investigating claims Blackwater employees made illegal arms deals .
Blackwater in spotlight after shootings last weekend that killed 20 Iraqis . | WASHINGTON Allegations that Blackwater USA whose operations were suspended after 20 Iraqi civilians were shot to death last weekend was "in any way associated or complicit in unlawful arms activities are baseless," the company asserted Saturday. Blackwater employees patrol Baghdad by air in a February 2005 photograph. Federal prosecutors are investigating allegations that employees of Blackwater illegally purchased weapons and sold them in Iraq, according to U.S. government sources. A U.S. government official has said the U.S. attorney's office in Raleigh, North Carolina, is in the early stages of an investigation that focuses on individual company employees, and not the firm. Blackwater, which is based in Moyock, North Carolina, is a security firm hired by the State Department to guard U.S. staff in Iraq. "The company has no knowledge of any employee improperly exporting weapons," the Blackwater statement said. "When it was uncovered internally that two employees were stealing from the company, Blackwater immediately fired them and invited the ATF to conduct a thorough investigation." Watch a report on Blackwater's response to the allegations » . The first public hint that an investigation was under way came earlier this week in a statement from State Department Inspector General Howard Krongard after he was accused of blocking fraud investigations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Krongard said the State Department has been cooperating with the prosecutors in the Blackwater probe. "In particular, I made one of my best investigators available to help assistant U.S. attorneys in North Carolina in their investigation into alleged smuggling of weapons into Iraq by a contractor," Krongard's statement said. Blackwater resumed normal security operations in Iraq on Friday, the State Department said, after a brief hiatus following the lethal incident last Sunday. The Iraqi government was outraged by the shootings and disputes the U.S. and Blackwater's claim that the guards were responding to an attack. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Elise Labott and Kelli Arena contributed to this report. |
17e43e8e7d2bbbb237df78537d108c3fa917d9fb | Several famous songs written by men for a woman .
Beethoven's "Für Elise" may have been written "for Therese"
Songwriters make up stories about who is behind "867-5309/Jenny" | 1. "Für Elise" Bob Dylan wrote "It Ain't Me, Babe" for Joan Baez. Written by: Ludwig van Beethoven . Written for: Some girl probably not named Elise. In fact, as far as most historians can tell, Beethoven didn't even know an Elise. Instead, the song was originally titled "Bagatelle in A minor" based on some handwritten notation a Beethoven researcher claimed to have seen on a now-lost copy of the sheet music. Further complicating things, Beethoven had hideous handwriting to the point that some scholars speculate the song was actually written "for Therese," as in Therese Malfatti, one of several women who turned down a marriage proposal from the notoriously lovesick maestro. 2. "Philadelphia Freedom" Written by: Elton John & Bernie Taupin . Written for: Billie Jean King, as a thank-you for a tracksuit she gave Elton. And what a tracksuit it must have been! The 1975 song remains one of the most popular disco hits ever, leaving thousands of Hustle enthusiasts wondering just what Billie Jean King had to do with Philadelphia, anyway. Turns out, the song was a reference to King's pro tennis team, The Philadelphia Freedoms. Prior to 1968, tennis players were all considered "amateurs" and weren't eligible to receive prize money. So, if you didn't have the wealth to support yourself, you couldn't play. Billie Jean King fought against those constraints, ultimately founding Professional World Team Tennis in 1974 and turning tennis into a paid league sport. 3. "Lola" Written by: The Kinks' Ray Davies . Written for: A transvestite. But the question is, which one? According to Rolling Stone, "Lola" was inspired by Candy Darling, a member of Andy Warhol's entourage, whom Ray Davies briefly (and cluelessly) dated. If that's the case, then "Lola" is just another notch on Darling's song belt she's also referred to in Lou Reed's "Walk on the Wild Side." ("Candy came from out on the Island/ In the backroom she was everybody's darlin'.") But, in the Kinks' official biography, Davies tells a different story. He says "Lola" was written after the band's manager spent a very drunken night dancing with a woman whose five o'clock shadow was apparently obvious to everyone but him. 4. "867-5309/Jenny" Written by: Jim Keller (of Tommy Tutone) and Alex Call . Written for: Unknown, as the songwriters apparently make up a different story about its inspiration every time they're asked. While the woman continues to remain a mystery, however, the phone number is all too real. In fact, it's been wreaking havoc ever since 1982 and the passage of time hasn't quelled of the number of crank calls. In 1999, Brown University freshman roommates Nina Clemente and Jahanaz Mirza found that out the hard way, when the school adopted an 867 exchange number for its on-campus phone system. Immediately, the girls' innocuous Room No. 5309 became a magnet for every drunk college kid with a 1980s fetish. Other unfortunate phone customers have fought back with creative and profitable solutions, like the holder of 212-867-5309, who put his phone number up for auction on eBay in 2004. Bids approached $100,000 before eBay pulled the item at the request of Verizon, the number's actual owner. 5. "Oh, Carol" Written by: Neil Sedaka . Written for: Carole King, naturally. Sedaka and King actually dated briefly in high school a romance Sedaka was able to successfully milk with "Oh, Carol," a then top-10 (if now somewhat forgettable) 1959 pop song. However, the real success of "Oh, Carol" came a few months later, when it inspired King to write a rebuttal entitled "Oh, Neil." At the time, King and her husband, Gerry Goffin, were fledgling songwriters in need of a hit tune. "Oh, Neil" wasn't that, but it did pay off. After Sedaka gave a tape of the song to his boss, King and Goffin landed jobs at the legendary Brill Building pop music factory, where the duo went on to write chart-toppers like "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" and "The Loco-Motion." 6. "It Ain't Me, Babe" Written by: Bob Dylan . Written for: Joan Baez, though it clearly wasn't the nicest gift Dylan could have given her. The two met in 1961, when Baez was an up-and-coming folk singer and Dylan was a nobody from Minnesota. Desperate to make his break in the music biz, Dylan worked like crazy to get Baez's attention. He eventually ended up going on tour with her, which is how he first became famous, and also how the two began dating. For a while, they seemed like the golden couple, but things soon went downhill. During a European concert tour together in early 1965, they had a huge fight and parted ways. That May, Dylan was holed up in a hotel after being hospitalized with a virus, and Baez, hoping to remain friends, decided to bring him flowers. Sadly, that's how she found out that her ex was already dating someone else. That someone else was Sara Lownds, whom Dylan married a mere six months later. 7. "Our House" Written by: Graham Nash (of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young) Written for: Joni Mitchell. In December 1968, Nash and Mitchell moved into a cozy little house in the Laurel Canyon section of Los Angeles. Though commonly left out of the hippy pantheon, Laurel Canyon was sort of a commune-home away from commune-home for San Francisco society not just CSN&Y, but also Jim Morrison, the Eagles, Frank Zappa, and more. "Our House" was directly inspired by a lazy Sunday in the Nash/Mitchell household. The couple went out to brunch, hit an antiques store, and then returned to find the house just a bit chilly, at which point Nash literally "lit a fire," while Mitchell "placed the flowers in the vase that she bought that day." No, really. The whole tableau seemed so ridiculously domestic to Nash that he immediately sat down and spent the rest of the day writing about it. E-mail to a friend . |
9e141ebc1c06d483bf85f4e5c8b3c7bc2d00ea2f | NEW: Majority Leader says a number of Dems are "revisiting their own positions"
Turkey is upset about World War I "genocide" resolution in Congress .
House resolution calls killing of Armenians "genocide"
Incirlik Air Base is key point for U.S. military supply of Iraq mission . | WASHINGTON Some Democrats appear to be wavering on a highly contentious House resolution labeling Turkey's treatment of Armenians in World War I as genocide. A KC-135 tanker lands at Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey in 2003. Turkey, a longtime U.S. ally and NATO partner, was incensed by the resolution calling the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks genocide and threatened to block access to Incirlik Air Base after the resolution passed a House committee vote. The base, in southern Turkey near Syria, is a major resupply center for U.S. operations in Iraq and elsewhere in the Mideast and Asia. The Pentagon is preparing to set up new supply routes for troops in Iraq if Turkey cuts off U.S. access to the strategically important Incirlik, military officials said Tuesday. Ankara acknowledges the killings of Armenians during World War I but vehemently objects to the "genocide" label. The House Foreign Affairs Committee last week adopted the nonbinding resolution. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would bring the measure to a vote of the full House sometime next month. But the Bush administration urged Congress to drop the issue, and some leading Democrats urged Pelosi not to bring it to the floor. Majority Leader Steny Hoyer signaled Tuesday that the vote might be put off. "I said I thought we would bring this up prior to us leaving here," said Hoyer of Maryland. "I have not changed on that, although I would be less than candid to say that there are a number of people who are revisiting their own positions. We will have to determine where everybody is." Democratic Rep. Ike Skelton, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, announced his opposition to the resolution last week. And Democratic Reps. Alcee Hastings of Florida and John Tanner of Tennessee, both members of the U.S. House delegation to NATO, urged Pelosi to reconsider in a letter released Tuesday. "More than half of the cargo flown into Iraq and Afghanistan comes through Incirlik Air Base, and this base would be a key component of any plans for redeployment of our troops in the future," they wrote. Lt. Gen. Carter Ham, the director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Pentagon planners are looking at "a broad range of options" to keep food, fuel and ammunition flowing to U.S. troops in Iraq if Turkey blocks Incirlik. "We're confident that we'll find ways to do that," Ham told reporters at the Pentagon. "There's likely to be some increased cost and some other implications for that, and obviously we'd prefer to maintain the access that we have." Defense Secretary Robert Gates echoed lawmakers' concerns last week. "About 70 percent of all air cargo going into Iraq goes through Turkey. ... About a third of the fuel that they consume goes through Turkey or comes from Turkey," Gates said. He also said that 95 percent of the Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protective vehicles, or MRAPs, being deployed in Iraq are flown through Turkey. The vehicles are built to withstand roadside bombs. See Incirlik's key location » . The U.S. military issued a "warning order" a few days ago to ensure that alternative air crews, planes, fuel and routes are lined up if Turkey stops or restricts U.S. access to Incirlik, a source said. Jordan and Kuwait are among the alternatives the United States is considering. Some fear pursuit of the resolution would also embolden the Turks to attack Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq which could further complicate Iraqi stability, U.S. officials said. Incirlik offers 10,000- and 9,000-foot runways and 57 hardened aircraft shelters, according Globalsecurity.org, a source of background information about military issues. Globalsecurity said Incirlik has become a hub for cargo shipments to Iraq, taking over for Rhein-Main Air Base in Germany because it is closer to Iraq, reducing the strain on troops and aircraft. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Barbara Starr and Deirdre Walsh contributed to this report. |
c9160e2f5ce386dabb10517e7a5c0933c01a9546 | Boy, 12, lost leg to car bombing in Iraq; cousin was killed by blast .
He is now heading to the United States to get a prosthetic leg .
Boy: "I want to ... meet this person that gave me my future back"
Charity director says helping the boy makes her "cry with joy" | BAGHDAD, Iraq Twelve-year-old Mohammed Rasoul, his right leg severed below the knee, maneuvers on crutches over the dirt and loose stones through the Falluja graveyard. Mohammed Rasoul sitting with his mother, Jinan Khalifa, eagerly awaits his trip to the United States. Row after row of headstones stand as the deadly reminder of the tragedy the city went through as insurgents battled for control of the city. Mohammed stops at his cousin's grave. "I feel an ache when I think of her. Every time I remember her, I cry," he told CNN at a visit to the grave a few months ago. As he spoke, he poured water on a tree he planted next to it. The headstone reads: "Martyr 643, the child Hajer Ismael Khalil, 13 October 2006." Clutching her photograph, Mohammed says, "My cousin died on the scene. I still remember her screams." The same explosion cost him his leg and his childhood. "A car came out of nowhere. My cousin was playing with her friend," he says. "I remember [the car] was green. It detonated." Watch Mohammed tell his story » . His mother, Jinan Khalifa, remembers that day all too well. She was in the kitchen when she heard a deafening explosion. "There was shattered glass from the windows falling all over us. I went outside and saw my son covered in blood from head to toe," she says. Her son endured 11 operations before doctors amputated his leg below the knee. Khalifa says her son put forward a tough face, but when he finally went back home the shock hit him. "That's where his personality started to change. He stopped laughing," she says. "It was tearing me up," Mohammed says "It was hard for me to watch others play. And I couldn't, I couldn't walk, it agitated me." CNN first broadcast his story in May where it caught the attention of an American charity, the Global Medical Relief Fund, which offered to help. "I cannot put my feelings into words," Khalifa says. "An entire book would not be enough. They gave my son his hope back. The America we knew was one that came, bombed, harmed. But when this organization came forward, we saw another face of America." The Global Medical Relief Fund, a small charity based in New York that helps children of war and natural disasters, has arranged for surgery and treatment at the Shriners Children Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Elissa Montanti, the founder and director of the organization, says she was inspired to act when she first heard of Mohammed's tragic story. "I said, 'Oh, please, let me help this boy.' " Mohammed will arrive in the United States on Thursday afternoon. He will be fitted for a prosthetic leg in coming weeks and examined to see if he needs additional surgery. Montanti said her organization has a list of other young Iraqi children in need of help. "The word needs to get out." Asked how it makes her feel to help Mohammed, she says, "It makes me cry with joy." Mohammed, too, is ecstatic. "I didn't think this act of human kindness would be presented to me," he says. "I didn't have hope in Iraq hope that I would ever get my hope back. I didn't have a future." He adds, "I want to go to America and meet this person that gave me my future back." When he comes back home, he wants to help rebuild Falluja, starting with his school, which was bombed during the 2004 Falluja offensive. "I will never leave school and, God willing, I will continue my education and become an architect and build all the schools," he says, standing on his crutches. But first, he says, he wants to walk to water the tree he planted next to his cousin's grave. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Wayne Drash contributed to this report from Atlanta. |
677375a4c69e81ab623af7c06a6b0a8d03d6350e | NEW: Chadian president wants journalists, flight crew released .
Red Cross, UNICEF, UNHCR interview children that charity tried to fly out of Chad .
Most are not from Sudan and have families, agencies say .
Six members of Zoe's Ark, 11 others under arrest in Chad . | ABECHE, Chad Most of the 103 children that a French charity attempted to take to France from Chad for adoption are neither Sudanese nor orphans, three international aid agencies reported on Thursday. Hundreds of women protest child trafficking and shout anti-French slogans Wednesday in Abeche, Chad. Six members of Zoe's Ark were arrested last week as they tried to put the children on a plane to France, where the charity said host families were waiting to take the children in. Three French journalists, a seven-member Spanish flight crew and one Belgian were also arrested. Representatives of the journalists and flight crew said they were unaware of problems with Zoe's Ark and thought they were on a humanitarian mission. Chadian President Idriss Deby hopes the journalists and the flight crew will be freed, his chief of staff, Mahamat Hissene, said Thursday. The president would legally be able to intervene in the case if it is transferred from a judge in the eastern city of Abeche, where the children were taken, to a judge in N'Djamena, the capital, Hissene said. The transfer will take place Monday, according to media reports. The International Red Cross Committee, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and UNICEF said most of the children were living with their families before Zoe's Ark took them. The charity said the children were Sudanese orphans that it was trying to rescue from a war-torn nation. The agencies said most of the children also probably come from Chadian villages along Chad's border with Sudan. The children have been living in an orphanage in Abeche while authorities and aid agencies try to determine their identities. Watch a report on whether the children are orphans » . Chadian authorities immediately accused the charity of kidnapping the children and concealing their identities. Chad's interior minister said Zoe's Ark dressed the children in bandages and fake intravenous drips to make them look like refugees who needed medical help. The charity workers and journalists have been charged with kidnapping and extortion and could face 20 years of hard labor if convicted. The Spaniards and Belgian are charged with complicity. The Spanish flight crew is innocent and should be released, a company executive said Thursday. "We thought we were doing a humanitarian transport," said Antoni Cajal, sales director of Spain's Gir Jet charter firm. "If an NGO [nongovernmental organization] has done something wrong, it's impossible for us to know." Spain's Foreign Ministry has publicly expressed its disagreement with the charges and has dispatched top diplomats to Chad to try to win the group's release. Over the weekend, the captain appealed urgently to be rescued, fearing the crew could be harmed or killed, Cajal said. But the four women and three men are in good condition in custody, Cajal said, based on his conversations with a Spanish consular official who came from Cameroon to Chad and has been able to visit them. The detention is the first problem of its kind for the company, which hopes government negotiations can resolve the issue, Cajal said. On its Web site, Zoe's Ark describes itself as a nonprofit organization based in Paris that sends teams of physicians, nurses, firefighters and other specialists to care for children in war zones and place them with families in France, who then apply for asylum on their behalf. The Red Cross, UNHCR and UNICEF said the 21 girls and 82 boys range in age from about 1 year to about 10, and they are healthy. The agencies said they have been interviewing the children individually to determine their backgrounds. "So far, the interviews carried out with the children some of whom could not provide any information due to their young age led to the preliminary conclusion that probably 85 come from Chadian villages near the cities of Adre and Tine along the Chadian-Sudanese border," the agencies said. "Ninety-one children said they had been living with their family, consisting of at least one adult they considered to be their parent," the agencies said, adding that interviews with the remaining 12 children were ongoing. The agencies called their investigation painstaking and challenging because of the number of children, their youth and the situation in the region. Other French charities earlier had questioned whether Zoe's Ark could legally arrange adoption of children from Darfur, and contacted French authorities, according to French newspapers and The Associated Press. French authorities have reacted angrily to the Zoe's Ark trip, calling the group's actions "illegal and irresponsible." The French Foreign Ministry has said the dispute will not affect France's participation in a European peacekeeping force due to be deployed along the border between Chad and Sudan. In response to the dispute in Chad, the Republic of Congo said late Wednesday it was suspending all international adoptions, The Associated Press reported. Reporters Without Borders said it will work for the release of the three journalists arrested in Chad. The organization said photographers Marc Garmirian of the Capa news agency and Jean-Daniel Guillou of the Synchro X agency were on assignment for their news organizations and were not part of the charity's efforts. The third journalist, Marie-Agnes Peleran of the TV station France 3 Miditerranee, was traveling with the group in a personal capacity, though she carried a camera from her station, Reporters Without Borders said. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Al Goodman contributed to this report. Copyright 2007 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report. |
9313988d26672c576f08e130c895edf20d8aa626 | NEW: Judge signs order to exhume the body of Drew Peterson's third wife .
Peterson has said he believed his fourth wife left him for another man .
Police: Case shifts from a missing persons search to a potential homicide .
Friends and family: Stacy Peterson expressed concerns about her husband . | BOLINGBROOK, Illinois The disappearance of a suburban Chicago police sergeant's wife is now being treated as a potential homicide, and her husband is a suspect, authorities said Friday. Stacy Peterson, 23, has been missing from her suburban Chicago home since October 28. In another development, a judge signed an order to exhume the body of Drew Peterson's third wife, who was found drowned in a bathtub in 2004, said Will County State Attorney James Glasgow. Peterson, 53, said he last spoke to 23-year-old Stacy Peterson his fourth wife the night of October 28. Drew Peterson initially told the media he believed his wife ran off with another man, but he hasn't repeated that accusation. CNN has been unable to contact Drew Peterson for comment. The couple have been married four years and have two children, who have been interviewed for the investigation, Glasgow said. Drew Peterson also has older children from a previous marriage. Investigators have twice searched the couple's home and vehicles, and removed several items, including computers, said Illinois State Police Capt. Carl Dobrich. Drew Peterson allowed a limited search on the night his wife was reported missing, but investigators were not allowed to look throughout the entire house and were given access to only one of the vehicles at that time, Dobrich said. "Early on, we looked at this as a missing persons case, but also believed strongly ... it was strongly starting to look at Drew Peterson as being a person of interest," Dobrich said. "I would say that right now, Drew Peterson has gone from being a person of interest to being a suspect." New information turned up during the investigation also raised questions about the death of Peterson's third wife, Kathleen Savio, which was ruled an accident by a coroner's jury, Glasgow said. "There are strong indications that it was a homicide," he said. "That's why we are doing the exhumation, because there are tests that need to be done that weren't done during the first autopsy." Watch why authorities want to exhume the body » . Glasgow cited abrasions on Savio's body and a gash on her head that could not be readily explained. "Our main thrust is to determine whether or not it was a homicide, and as we do that, we will see if there is any evidence that implicates anyone," he said. Glasgow, who was not state attorney at the time of Savio's death, said he reviewed the case file before deciding to reopen the case. "With 29 years of experience, there was no doubt in my mind it wasn't an accident," he said. "That was clear." In 2002, Savio was charged once with battery and once with domestic battery against her husband, but was found not guilty at trial, Glasgow said. Another time, she tried to bring domestic battery charges against Peterson, but no charges were ever filed. Savio's sister, Sue Doman, said Savio expressed fear of Drew Peterson. "She told me all the time, 'He's gonna kill me. It's gonna look like an accident,' " Doman said. Doman said she didn't believe her sister could have died in the way the investigation concluded. "I don't understand accidental drowning. You just don't drown in the bathtub, especially a small whirlpool. You just don't do that," she said. Meanwhile, friends and family of Stacy Peterson said she expressed concerns about her husband. A friend, Steve Cesare, has told CNN he received e-mail from her describing her relationship as abusive. The woman's aunt, Candace Aikin, of El Monte, California, said Stacy Peterson confided in her that there were problems during a visit to the Peterson home in suburban Chicago last month. "She said that she was afraid because he was following her around 24/7, even inside the house," Aikin said. "He was very obsessed and stalking her, even inside her house. She was very, very full of stress and just not happy in her marriage at all," Aikin said. E-mail to a friend . |
b73f50e29d5b2943eb315643bef8ee4e09f5605b | NEW: President Musharraf orders troops to take a television station's equipment .
Pakistani opposition leader Imran Khan says he's under house arrest .
President Musharraf says his actions are for the good of the country .
White House calls Musharraf's emergency declaration "disappointing" | ISLAMABAD, Pakistan Hours after declaring a state of emergency Saturday, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf ordered troops to take a television station's equipment and put a popular opposition leader under house arrest. President Pervez Musharraf explains his actions in a televised address Saturday. Musharraf also suspended the constitution and dismissed the Pakistan Supreme Court's chief justice for the second time. On Sunday, police arrested the Javed Hashmi, the acting president of ex-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's opposition party was arrested, along with 10 aides, The Associated Press reported. Hashimi was arrested when he stepped outside his house in the central city of Multan, AP reported. The country is at a critical and dangerous juncture threatened by rising tensions and spreading terrorism, Musharraf said in a televised address to the nation after declaring martial law. As Pakistani police patrolled the streets of the capital, Islamabad, Musharraf said his actions were "for the good of Pakistan." Watch Musharraf's speech » . There was quick condemnation from within and outside his country. The Supreme Court declared the state of emergency illegal, claiming Musharraf who also is Pakistan's military chief had no power to suspend the constitution, Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry said. Shortly afterward, government troops came to Chaudhry's office and told him the president had dismissed him from his job. Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar was quickly appointed to replace him, according to state television. It was the second time Chaudhry was removed from his post. His ousting by Musharraf in March prompted massive protests, and he was later reinstated. See a timeline of upheaval in Pakistan » . Musharraf complained in his speech that the media which he made independent have not been supportive, but have reported "negative" news. Early Sunday, two dozen policemen raided the offices of AAJ-TV in Islamabad, saying they had orders to take the station's equipment. The government also issued a directive warning the media that any criticism of the president or prime minister would be punishable by three years in jail and a fine of up to $70,000, said Talat Hussain, director of news and current affairs for AAJ. Watch a former Pakistani P.M. call the developments in his country 'disturbing' » . U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice who is in Turkey for a conference with Iraq and neighboring nations said The United States doesn't support any extra-constitutional measures taken by Musharraf. "The situation is just unfolding," Rice said. "But anything that takes Pakistan off the democratic path, off the path of civilian rule is a step backward, and it's highly regrettable." A senior Pakistani official said the emergency declaration will be "short-lived," and will be followed by an interim government. Martial law is only a way to restore law and order, he said. Mahmud Ali Durrani, Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, agreed. "I can assure you, he will move on the part of democracy that is promised ... and you will see that happen shortly." Musharraf was re-elected president in October, but the election is not yet legally official, because the Supreme Court is hearing constitutional challenges to Musharraf's eligibility filed by the opposition. Under the constitution, Musharraf couldn't run for another term while serving both as president and military leader. The court allowed the election to go ahead, however, saying it would decide the issue later. Some speculated that the declaration of emergency is tied to rumors the court was planning to rule against Musharraf. Musharraf has said repeatedly he will step down as military leader before the next term begins on November 15 and has promised to hold parliamentary elections by January 15. Meanwhile, popular opposition leader Imran Khan said early Sunday that police surrounded his house in Lahore, barged in and told him he was under house arrest. Musharraf also had Khan placed under house arrest during a government crackdown in March 2006. Asked about Musharraf's actions Saturday, Khan said, "We are going to oppose this in every way." "None of us accept ... this whole drama about emergency." Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto who arrived in Karachi Saturday from Dubai, where she had gone to visit her family described a "wave of disappointment" at Musharraf's actions. Watch crowds surround Bhutto upon her arrival » . Bhutto who returned to Pakistan last month after several years in exile wants to lift her Pakistan People's Party to victory in January's parliamentary election in the hope she can have a third term as prime minister. The nation's political atmosphere has been tense for months, with Pakistani leaders in August considering a state of emergency because of the growing security threats in the country's lawless tribal regions. But Musharraf, influenced in part by Rice, held off on the move. Watch a report on the volatile situation in Pakistan » . Musharraf, who led the 1999 coup as Pakistan's army chief, has seen his power erode since the failed effort to oust Chaudhry. His administration is also struggling to contain a surge in Islamic militancy. E-mail to a friend . Copyright 2007 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report. |
63831b842812b1a3d05b04904a10d160fe7ad2af | NEW: Accused pedophile Chester Arthur Stiles gets additional charges .
NEW: "I think he's a little out of it," his attorney says .
Suspect's ex-girlfriend: "I've had my share of nightmares"
Stiles, 37, arrested following a routine traffic stop . | With his hands and feet shackled and his face obscured by his long hair, Chester Arthur Stiles made his initial court appearance in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Wednesday morning on charges stemming from the videotaped rape of a 2-year-old girl. Chester Stiles appears Wednesday in a Las Vegas, Nevada, courtroom. Stiles, 37, was taken into custody Monday night after a Henderson, Nevada, police officer pulled over the white Buick Century he was driving. Prosecutors added a couple more charges before Wednesday's hearing, bringing the total to 23 felony counts, including a charge of lewdness with a minor, sexual assault and the use of a child in the production of pornography, according to a statement issued by the Clark County, Nevada, court. One of the lewdness charges stems from a 2004 incident, while the others are related to the videotape, the court said. Judge Deborah Lippis set November 19 as the date for the preliminary hearing. After the hearing, Stiles' court-appointed attorney said his client was overwhelmed by the public opinion in the case. "I think he's a little out of it," public defender Jeff Banks said. Jerry T. Donohue, the attorney for the girl's mother, told CNN that the child on the videotape was younger than 3 when the abuse occurred. The girl, who is now 7, was found last month after a nationwide search. The girl's mother said on "The Dr. Phil Show" Wednesday that she was "relieved" about Stiles' arrest, although it would have been "better if they found him dead." The woman said she will testify against Stiles if the case goes to court. She told Phil McGraw that her daughter remembers nothing about the videotaped assault and that she recently had a conversation with the girl about inappropriate touching. She said her daughter told her that if someone touched her inappropriately, the girl would scream and tell her mother. But, she told McGraw, "I don't trust anybody now." Although she is in a relationship with a man her daughter calls "Dad," she said, "I don't feel comfortable leaving her with him, nor with anybody else. ... I just cry and blame it on myself." Eight-and-a-half months pregnant, she said the incident has placed a lot of strain on her. Asked if she would rather not have known about the assault, she said, "Yes, I could have lived without knowing it." A former girlfriend of Stiles' said that, before the arrest, she lived in fear after going to police to identify the suspect after seeing enhanced photos from the videotape on the local news. "I've had my share of nightmares," Elaine Thomas told CNN's Nancy Grace. Thomas said she screamed when she recognized the photos on television and had no choice but to contact police about the man she had thought was a "weapons enthusiast" with only a minor criminal record. Watch Thomas say how she felt when she saw the photos » . "How could I not tell them who that man was? That little girl suffered unimaginable things, and I knew for a fact it was him," Thomas said. Another former girlfriend of Stiles', Tina Allen, said this month she thinks she is the reason Stiles came in contact with the girl and is "mortified" by the allegations against him. "He said he'd been in the Navy and, you know, I was looking for a strong guy to represent to my sons what I thought they needed to be," Allen said. Allen said she took Stiles to a crowded apartment where her son and daughter lived. Also living in the apartment were a family friend and her daughter, the alleged assault victim. Todd Allen, Tina Allen's son, said he recognized his old apartment from scenes in the video. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Ed Payne and Ted Rowlands contributed to this report. |
9f63d6256158d260c426a9336d19b760d9bc5a48 | Jordan opens school doors to all Iraqi children, regardless of refugee status .
Principal says her school is 20 percent Iraqi this year .
Education minister: Iraqi kids will be incorporated into "mainstream" life .
One student says he lost five family members in Iraq . | AMMAN, Jordan In the sunbathed schoolyard of the Shmisani Institute for Girls in Amman, Jordan, principal Sanaa Abu Harb makes an announcement over the speaker system. Iraqi students at the Shmisani school in Amman gather around a teacher. One in 5 students there is Iraqi. "All Iraqi girls come outside now. All Iraqi girls. Iraqi girls only!" she repeats several times, making sure the message is clear and waving away Jordanian pupils attracted by the commotion. Dozens of girls in green apron-like uniforms pour out into the courtyard and cluster on the top level of a stone staircase overlooking a concrete playground. Harb wants the CNN crew to see how many Iraqi refugee girls her school is accommodating. This school year, she says, 145 students are Iraqi roughly 20 percent of the students at this state-funded institution with another 40 Iraqi children on a waiting list. Watch Iraqi girls describe a long way from home » . The reason behind the jump in the number of Iraqis at the school is a new government policy: For the first time since the start of the Iraq war, Jordan is allowing all Iraqi children regardless of refugee status to enroll in state-funded schools. Simply, this means that even illegal refugees with no paperwork can send their kids to school with no questions asked. The move is cementing a massive population shift in the Middle East. More than 2.2 million Iraqis have fled the violence in their homeland, most of them seeking refuge in neighboring Jordan and Syria, according to humanitarian officials. Jordanian Minister of Education Khalid Touqan says he expects Jordan to accommodate 40,000 to 50,000 Iraqi students this year. That's more than double the number of Iraqi children enrolled in public school two years ago. Harb, on the front line of the phenomenon, says the influx is putting a strain on her school. Even with some U.N. and U.S. aid to Jordan, there's still not enough money. "We need more teachers here, more resources, more buildings, more chairs for all Iraqi students and our students," she says. In a nearby neighborhood, in the study room of the Ahmed Toukan School for Boys, a handful of Iraqi kids talk of their experience living far from home. Seated at a rectangular table covered with a red and white tablecloth, the boys tell stories of horror and displacement. Eighteen-year-old Qutaiba lost five immediate family members before moving to Jordan to try to live a normal life. Matter-of-factly and with a straight-ahead stare, he repeats the number: "Five members." Most of the boys and young men from Iraq have missed several years of school up to a four-year educational gap that will delay not only their high school graduation, but also their entry into the workforce. All say, though, that they feel lucky to have gotten out, even if the violence in their country means always having to be on the move, ready to live far from home and away from loved ones. "It's not strange for me to be in the middle of people I don't know," says eleventh grader Ziad Tarek Al Shamsi. "I had friends in Iraq when I was small, I left them. In America, I left them. I came here, I left them." He pauses: "But you have to miss your country." The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates up to 250,000 school-age Iraqi children are in Jordan. Many of them are enrolled in private institutions. But as families run out of money they had when they left Iraq, they turn to public schools. Even so, more than a month into the new academic year, fewer Iraqi families than first anticipated enrolled their kids in schools this year. According to the charity Save the Children, 21,000 Iraqi children have so far enrolled in Jordanian classrooms. As a result, the government extended the deadline for student applications and cut down on the required paperwork for Iraqi families. The lower registration numbers were attributed in part to illegal refugees' fears of being identified through their children's school records. Regardless of what the final number will be this year, the population shift in the Middle East is, according to UNHCR head Antonio Guterres, the largest urban refugee situation in the world. Iraqi families are changing the social fabric of Jordanian society. About 10 percent of Jordan's population is now made up of Iraqi refugees the estimates range from 500,000 to 750,000 of them. The schoolchildren are living examples of how the Iraq war may permanently change the Middle East. "Iraqi children will be incorporated and integrated within our mainstream line of education," says Touqan, the education minister. "We will not run a parallel system of education." E-mail to a friend . |
fb6516de631cade629b797e8f40f377523c4aa0e | President Bush nominated Mukasey to replace Alberto Gonzales .
Mukasey is a former federal chief judge in New York .
Some Democratic senators opposed nominee due to views on waterboarding .
Human rights groups consider waterboarding a form of torture . | After weeks of controversy over Michael Mukasey's views on waterboarding, the Senate late Thursday approved the former judge's nomination for attorney general by a 53-40 vote. Waterboarding threatened to derail the approval of President Bush's nominee to lead the Justice Department. President Bush nominated Mukasey to replace longtime ally Alberto Gonzales, who resigned in September. The nomination had been considered at risk after a number of Democratic senators opposed Mukasey because of questions that arose from his views on the terror interrogation technique known as waterboarding and the president's power to order electronic surveillance. Mukasey, a former federal judge in New York, told senators he considers waterboarding "repugnant," but he could not categorically say whether the technique amounts to torture, which U.S. and international law bans. Waterboarding is a technique that involves restraining a suspect and pouring water on him to produce the sensation of drowning. Mukasey's confirmation was all but assured last week when two key Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee Sens. Dianne Feinstein of California and Chuck Schumer of New York said they would vote in favor of Mukasey despite the controversy. "The Department of Justice, once the crown jewel among government institutions, is adrift and rudderless," Schumer said Tuesday the same day the committee voted 11-8 to send Mukasey's nomination to the Senate floor. "It desperately needs a strong and independent leader at the helm to set it back on course and I believe Judge Mukasey is that person." Schumer said that in a meeting Friday the nominee said that Congress would be within its rights to pass a law that bans waterboarding across all government agencies and that the president "would have absolutely no legal authority to ignore" it. Schumer said he believed Mukasey would be more likely to find waterboarding illegal than an interim attorney general. "Indeed, his written answers to our notices have demonstrated more openness to ending the practices we abhor than either of this president's previous attorney general nominees have." But Mukasey's pledge to enforce such a law rang hollow with Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, the Judiciary Committee's chairman. "Some have sought to find comfort in Judge Mukasey's personal assurance that he would enforce a future, new law against waterboarding if this Congress were to pass one," Leahy said Tuesday. "Unsaid, of course, is the fact that any such prohibition would have to be enacted over the veto of this president." However, the committee's ranking Republican, Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, said he believed Mukasey would enforce a law banning waterboarding. "He could have said a lot of things which would have given me more assurances," Specter said earlier. "But he is intelligent; he's really learned in the law. He's strong, ethical, honest beyond any question. He's not an intimate of the president." A majority of Americans consider waterboarding a form of torture, but some of those say it's OK for the U.S. government to use the technique, according to a poll released Tuesday. Asked whether they think waterboarding is a form of torture, more than two-thirds of respondents, or 69 percent, said yes; 29 percent said no. Asked whether they think the U.S. government should be allowed to use the procedure to try to get information from suspected terrorists, 58 percent said no; 40 percent said yes. The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. telephone poll of 1,024 American adults was carried out over the weekend and had a sampling error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points. E-mail to a friend . |
8b0a818edcbbefb79dd40a19b08119f6848083db | Jordan opens school doors to all Iraqi children, regardless of refugee status .
Principal says her school is 20 percent Iraqi this year .
Education minister: Iraqi kids will be incorporated into "mainstream" life .
One student says he lost five family members in Iraq . | AMMAN, Jordan In the sunbathed schoolyard of the Shmisani Institute for Girls in Amman, Jordan, principal Sanaa Abu Harb makes an announcement over the speaker system. Iraqi students at the Shmisani school in Amman gather around a teacher. One in 5 students there is Iraqi. "All Iraqi girls come outside now. All Iraqi girls. Iraqi girls only!" she repeats several times, making sure the message is clear and waving away Jordanian pupils attracted by the commotion. Dozens of girls in green apron-like uniforms pour out into the courtyard and cluster on the top level of a stone staircase overlooking a concrete playground. Harb wants the CNN crew to see how many Iraqi refugee girls her school is accommodating. This school year, she says, 145 students are Iraqi roughly 20 percent of the students at this state-funded institution with another 40 Iraqi children on a waiting list. Watch Iraqi girls describe a long way from home » . The reason behind the jump in the number of Iraqis at the school is a new government policy: For the first time since the start of the Iraq war, Jordan is allowing all Iraqi children regardless of refugee status to enroll in state-funded schools. Simply, this means that even illegal refugees with no paperwork can send their kids to school with no questions asked. The move is cementing a massive population shift in the Middle East. More than 2.2 million Iraqis have fled the violence in their homeland, most of them seeking refuge in neighboring Jordan and Syria, according to humanitarian officials. Jordanian Minister of Education Khalid Touqan says he expects Jordan to accommodate 40,000 to 50,000 Iraqi students this year. That's more than double the number of Iraqi children enrolled in public school two years ago. Harb, on the front line of the phenomenon, says the influx is putting a strain on her school. Even with some U.N. and U.S. aid to Jordan, there's still not enough money. "We need more teachers here, more resources, more buildings, more chairs for all Iraqi students and our students," she says. In a nearby neighborhood, in the study room of the Ahmed Toukan School for Boys, a handful of Iraqi kids talk of their experience living far from home. Seated at a rectangular table covered with a red and white tablecloth, the boys tell stories of horror and displacement. Eighteen-year-old Qutaiba lost five immediate family members before moving to Jordan to try to live a normal life. Matter-of-factly and with a straight-ahead stare, he repeats the number: "Five members." Most of the boys and young men from Iraq have missed several years of school up to a four-year educational gap that will delay not only their high school graduation, but also their entry into the workforce. All say, though, that they feel lucky to have gotten out, even if the violence in their country means always having to be on the move, ready to live far from home and away from loved ones. "It's not strange for me to be in the middle of people I don't know," says eleventh grader Ziad Tarek Al Shamsi. "I had friends in Iraq when I was small, I left them. In America, I left them. I came here, I left them." He pauses: "But you have to miss your country." The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates up to 250,000 school-age Iraqi children are in Jordan. Many of them are enrolled in private institutions. But as families run out of money they had when they left Iraq, they turn to public schools. Even so, more than a month into the new academic year, fewer Iraqi families than first anticipated enrolled their kids in schools this year. According to the charity Save the Children, 21,000 Iraqi children have so far enrolled in Jordanian classrooms. As a result, the government extended the deadline for student applications and cut down on the required paperwork for Iraqi families. The lower registration numbers were attributed in part to illegal refugees' fears of being identified through their children's school records. Regardless of what the final number will be this year, the population shift in the Middle East is, according to UNHCR head Antonio Guterres, the largest urban refugee situation in the world. Iraqi families are changing the social fabric of Jordanian society. About 10 percent of Jordan's population is now made up of Iraqi refugees the estimates range from 500,000 to 750,000 of them. The schoolchildren are living examples of how the Iraq war may permanently change the Middle East. "Iraqi children will be incorporated and integrated within our mainstream line of education," says Touqan, the education minister. "We will not run a parallel system of education." E-mail to a friend . |
c44238ec87e7fc40ab7fe6e724cfcbf301e01216 | Authorities uncover a radical Islamic terror plot against the U.S. embassy in Baku .
The United States has reduced its embassy's operations .
Britain also shut its embassy in Baku to the public on Monday . | Authorities in Azerbaijan recently uncovered a radical Islamic terror plot against the U.S. Embassy in the capital, Baku, prompting the facility to close its doors to the public Monday, Azerbaijan and U.S. officials told CNN. The Bibi Heybat Mosque, just outside the capital Baku. As a precaution, Britain also shut its embassy in Baku to the public on Monday "following security concerns nearby," Britain's Foreign Office said. The terror plot was unraveled after a weekend raid outside Baku that netted several suspected members of the radical group, two U.S. officials who asked not to be identified and a spokesman for Azerbaijan's National Security Ministry told CNN. U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack stressed that the details "are still unfolding," and the threat "may or may not be" linked to the Saturday raid. "There were some specific and credible threat information concerning the embassy and plans by militants to in some way do harm to individuals in and around the U.S. Embassy there," McCormack said, noting that no specific individuals were targeted. Several days ago, an Azerbaijani army officer who had connections to a radical Islamic group seized four assault rifles, a machine gun and 20 hand grenades from his military unit and hid them in the outskirts of Baku, the ministry spokesman and U.S. officials said. Government security forces tracked down the group and arrested several members during a sweep on Saturday in the village of Mastaga, about 20 miles (32 km) northeast of Baku, the spokesman said. One suspected member of the militant group resisted arrest and was killed in the sweep, the spokesman said. Several others are still at large, he added. He said the terror plot also targeted Azerbaijani government buildings. The U.S. Embassy in Baku issued a warden message warning Americans in Azerbaijan to take precautions. "While there is no information at this time that other American or Western interests in Azerbaijan are being targeted, the U.S. Embassy encourages Americans to maintain a high level of vigilance and take appropriate steps to bolster their own personal security," it said. Azerbaijan is a former Soviet republic that borders the Caspian Sea, and lies just north of Iran. McCormack said U.S. authorities are working closely with their counterparts in Baku and will determine when normal embassy operations will resume. He said he expects the embassy to limit its operations on Tuesday, as well. E-mail to a friend . CNN's Igor Malakhov in Moscow, Zain Verjee in Washington and Roger Clark in London contributed to this report . |
5ebd041d89a2ba41b387c30293f0657eef746910 | Man posted photos on the Internet of himself sexually abusing underage boys .
Computer experts managed to undo digital masking to reveal the man .
Man abused 12 boys in Vietnam and Cambodia . | PARIS, France Interpol on Monday took the unprecendented step of making a global appeal for help to identify a man from digitally reconstructed photos taken from the Internet that it said showed him sexually abusing underage boys. This moving image shows how police used software to unscramble the image. (Source: Interpol) The man's face was disguised by digital alteration, but the images were capable of being restored, according to a bulletin from Interpol the international police agency based in Lyon, France. Interpol Secretary General Ronald K. Noble said the pictures have been on the the Internet for several years, but investigators have been unable to determine the man's identity or nationality. "We have tried all other means to identify and to bring him to justice, but we are now convinced that without the public's help this sexual predator could continue to rape and sexually abuse young children whose ages appear to range from six to early teens," Noble said. He said there is "very good reason to believe that he travels the world in order to sexually abuse and exploit vulnerable children." Interpol has determined the photos were taken in Vietnam and Cambodia. "The decision to make public this man's picture was not one which was taken lightly," said Kristin Kvigne, assistant director of Interpol's Trafficking in Human Beings Unit. The suspect's photo and more information can be seen online at Interpol's Web site. E-mail to a friend . |
62827a1a377491d88adcbac25ecf14a64b5f997b | Six of seven dead in fire were University of South Carolina students .
Official: Six treated at hospital and released were also USC students .
Mayor Debbie Smith said one of 13 at house is related to owner of house .
Victims' names not being released until families are notified . | Six of the seven college students killed in a massive house fire Sunday morning in Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina, attended the University of South Carolina, a university official said Sunday. "This is a very sad day for the University of South Carolina family," Dennis A. Pruitt, the vice president for student affairs, told reporters. The seventh fatality is believed to be a Clemson University student, he said. The six survivors who were treated and released from Brunswick Community Hospital are also USC students, he said. Pruitt said the bodies were being sent to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, for identification. Watch home video showing the house in flames » . "It is difficult to ascertain exactly who was in the house and who was not," Pruitt said, explaining that several area houses were filled with college students visiting for the weekend. Newspaper deliveryman Tim Burns was aghast when he first saw the inferno early Sunday morning. He tried to approach the door but the flames were too intense, he told the Associated Press. "When I was going up to the entryway, you could hear the windows above me explode," Burns said. "When I knew the flames had taken over, I don't think I've ever felt as helpless in my life." The USC students were affiliated with the Delta Delta Delta sorority and the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, Pruitt said, although he stressed that the weekend was not an official Greek function. "It just so happens, as on many university campuses, that certain sororities and certain fraternities hang around together," he said. One person described as "unaccounted for" was later confirmed dead, Ocean Isle Beach Mayor Debbie Smith told CNN. "We suffered a terrible tragedy at Ocean Isle this morning," Smith said in a news conference. "Nothing like this has ever happened at Ocean Isle Beach, and we hope it never will again." She said officials had not yet contacted all the victims' families, and that they were not yet releasing their names. The mayor said one of the 13 people in the house was related to the house's owner. Smith said the house was fully "engulfed" in flames around 7 a.m. when the fire department arrived on the scene, about five minutes after the fire department was notified. She said the house had working smoke detectors, AP reported. Officials are investigating the cause of the fire, Smith said. "We ran down the street to get away," Nick Cain told the AP. The University of North Carolina student was staying at a house about 100 feet away. Some of his friends had met several people staying at the house that burned down. "The ash and the smoke were coming down on us. We were just trying to get away," Cain told the AP. Ocean Isle Beach is a popular resort destination along the southern coast of North Carolina. The 7-mile-long island's year-round population is about 425, while the summer season population is about 25,000, according to the town's Web site. E-mail to a friend . |
d42463e1093a92ec4dbd20edd8f4bf3306f00f3f | Official: Streets bustling, workers returning, markets "back like gangbusters"
Troop surge, citizens groups, Mehdi Army cease-fire all help security situation .
Iranian weapons, fighters still posing problems in northeastern Baghdad .
Commander says more families will return when basic services fully restored . | WASHINGTON Attacks are down 75 percent in recent months in a perilous stretch of neighborhoods in northeastern Baghdad, prompting a U.S. military officer to proclaim Monday that security there is "dramatically improving." Concerned citizens have helped troops improve security in parts of Baghdad, a military official says. People line the streets, cars congest them, trash collectors and other city workers have returned, local leaders are holding community meetings again and "markets have come back like gangbusters," said Army Col. Don Farris, commander of 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division. He added that the largely Sunni al Qaeda in Iraq presence has been "crushed" since the beginning of May. However, there are still dangers, most notably the threats posed by Iranian-backed Shiite militants, Farris said. Speaking to Pentagon reporters via video link from Baghdad, Farris cited several factors he said contributed to the improving security situation. Among them is the "surge," the additional U.S. troops deployed earlier this year. Watch how old rivalries have been posing problems » . Also helping improve the security situation are the cease-fire by radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army and the development of a program that employs "concerned local citizens" to assist U.S. and Iraqi forces, Farris said. Some of those citizens are members of local Sunni "awakening councils," comprised of former militants often armed who create neighborhood watch groups to root out the insurgent elements in an area. Especially in the last six weeks, Farris said, civic and religious leaders have seen outsiders operating in the area and troops have made arrests, two Iranian operatives among them . "From my foxhole, in our sector, it is working," he said of the improving security in the area. "I can only speak to what I see in my sector and I am encouraged." Farris' sector which includes the Sunni-dominated district of Adhamiya and Sadr City, the Shiite slum where militants have demonstrated a strong presence has seen a "remarkable turnaround," he said. Many of the communities in his area have been wracked with sectarian warfare and terrorized by insurgents and death squads. Despite improvements in the security situation, Farris warned that "we still have a lot of work to do" because there doesn't appear to be any sign that Shiite extremists with links to Iran are halting their activities. Farris said troops also are still finding explosively formed penetrators, which are often delivered or manufactured by Iran. Nine such bombs were found in late October, he said. There are intelligence reports indicating weapons and money are still flowing into Sadr City, he said. There are also problems returning refugees and displaced people to their homes in the area, Farris said, because "essential services" like water and electricity are not yet up to snuff. Though a "trickle" of families has returned home and many are asking when they can return, Farris said he believes residents will return en masse only when basic services are in better shape. Paul Folmsbee, a State Department provincial reconstruction team leader, said at the same news conference that his personnel was handling development issues involving law, governance, economic development and essential services. Farris' Monday remarks echo a string of similar assertions made by U.S. and Iraqi military officials over recent weeks. The military officials say they are seeing signs of Sunni-Shiite reconciliation. At a press conference earlier Monday in Baghdad, Brig. Gen. Ed Cardon, deputy commander for support of Multi-National Division-Center, discussed a "definite period of progress" in his region on the southern Baghdad outskirts. E-mail to a friend . |
4b0eda92463958cce8c6b2537db39088e1254552 | NEW: White truck seen on Santiago Canyon Road near time fire started .
Charges filed against man who allegedly set small fire and walked off .
Catalino Pineda one of five arrested in arson investigations this week .
Arson investigations continue across multiple California counties . | Officials are searching for the driver of a white truck seen on Santiago Canyon Road on Sunday, near the time the Santiago fire started, Orange County authorities said Friday. Chief Chip Prather holds a photo of a white truck similar to the one seen on Santiago Canyon Road. "These people are not suspects at this time," Orange County Fire Authority Chief Chip Prather said. "They are persons of interest who were seen near the fire in a vehicle like this." The vehicle is a white, 1998 to 2004 Ford F150 pickup with chrome tubular running boards. Prather said the information came from a lead called into the investigation's tip line. A $250,000 reward has been offered for information leading to the arrest of the person or persons responsible for the blaze. Watch how residents feel about arsonist » . The Santiago fire, now 27,000 acres and still burning, was deliberately set, officials said Thursday. Several mandatory evacuations remain in place for the Santiago fire, which has destroyed 14 homes and various other structures. Late Friday afternoon, the blaze moved into Silverado Canyon, authorities said. Sheriff's deputies were evacuating residents in the fire's path. Watch the Santiago flames rage » . Authorities also suspect arson in the Rosa fire in San Diego County, which burned more than 400 acres before being fully contained. There was no information on the investigation. Elsewhere, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office filed arson charges Friday against a 41-year-old Sun Valley man who witnesses said set a fire in the West Hills neighborhood and walked away. Catalino Pineda is one of five people who have been arrested in arson investigations this week, but none of them has been linked to the major wildfires raging across Southern California. Pineda was arrested Wednesday after witnesses said they saw him lighting a fire on a hillside, police said. The fire was quickly extinguished. The witnesses followed Pineda to a nearby restaurant and called police, who arrested him. Pineda was expected to be arraigned in Van Nuys Superior Court Friday, Deputy District Attorney Steven Frankland said. He is charged with one count of arson of a structure or forest. Pineda is being held on $75,000 bail and faces up to six years in prison if convicted. In San Bernardino, east of Los Angeles, John Rund, of Hesperia, was arrested Wednesday on arson charges after a witness reported seeing him in brush near the starting point of a fire Tuesday, the sheriff's department said. That fire was quickly put out by passers-by. Investigators are trying to determine if Rund, 48, may have ties to other wildfires. He is being held on $750,000 bail. The San Bernardino County District Attorney's Office on Thursday filed arson charges against Anthony Riperti, 47, of Redlands. A statement from the office did not say when or where Riperti is accused of setting a fire. He is being held on $250,000 bail. In San Diego County, the sheriff's department this week arrested an adult and a juvenile allegedly seen by an anonymous tipster starting a fire in Vista in the northern part of the county. In a written statement, the sheriff's department identified the adult as Gorgonio Nava. The Vista fire Department extinguished the blaze before it grew out of control, the statement said. Investigators have determined that the Grass Valley fire in San Bernardino County was not caused by arson, and a preliminary investigation into the cause of the 11,675-acre Slide fire seems to indicate arson was not a factor, sheriff's spokeswoman Cindy Beaver said. More than 1,600 homes have been destroyed in the past week by Southern California wildfires. E-mail to a friend . |
e117408ad19cc69e15b1e21b9ae54f10c07223ce | John Lewis Partnership began as a shop on London's Oxford street in 1864 .
All 67,100 employees are partners in the organization and own shares . | The partnership started as a single shop on Oxford Street in London, opened in 1864 by John Lewis. Today the partnership is an organization with bases throughout the UK, with supermarkets and department stores, employing approximately 67,100 people. All 67,100 permanent staff are Partners who own 26 John Lewis department stores, 183 Waitrose supermarkets, an online and catalogue business, John Lewis Direct a direct services company - Greenbee, three production units and a farm. Every Partner receives the same scale of bonus, based on a fixed percentage of their annual wage. The bonus for 2006 was 18% equivalent to 9 weeks pay, which was rolled out for every employee. Chairman Sir Stuart Hampson retired at the end of March 2007, his successor is Charlie Mayfield. Hampson's salary for January 26, 2006 to January 26, 2007 was $1.66 million which included the partnership bonus of $250,000. John Lewis' consolidated revenue for the last financial year was $11.4 billion. E-mail to a friend . |
6c3d2feed04c75063d182103f0585c45da9aaa1b | Stiles described as "survivalist type" who carries a weapon .
Mother has cooperated with police, sheriff says .
Girl on tape, now 7, found safe with family .
Tape shows man sexually abusing the girl 4 years ago . | A girl who was shown on a videotape being sexually assaulted in Las Vegas has been found and is safe, officials in Nye County, Nevada, said Friday. Chester Arthur Stiles, 37, is being sought as a suspect, police say. "We have found the child, Madison. She's safe. The detectives say she is in good condition," Nye County Sheriff Tony De Meo said. The girl, now 7, was shown in a sex video made four years ago, Detective David Boruchowitz said at a news conference Friday night. She was found Friday with family in Las Vegas after thousands of tips poured in, thanks to an appeal by police to the news media to show the girl's picture. CNN and other news organizations did so until the child was found, when De Meo asked them to stop showing the picture. "The mother has cooperated with us," De Meo said. "We believe that the mother was not aware of anything that went on with this young girl," he said. "It was very sad for her to find this out." A former Las Vegas animal trainer, Chester Arthur Stiles, 37, a resident of Pahrump, Nevada, has been identified as a suspect and is being sought in the case, De Meo said. Pahrump is about 60 miles west of Las Vegas. Watch what's known about Stiles » . Stiles was a distant friend of the girl's family, De Meo said. Someone close to Stiles has told investigators that Stiles is a "survivalist type" and always carries a weapon, Nye County District Attorney Bob Beckett said. De Meo addressed Stiles directly: "Turn yourself in to your local law enforcement agency," he said. "Understand this: Law enforcement not only has a long arm, but a long memory. You will not be forgotten by members of this agency or any other law enforcement agency." The FBI is also seeking Stiles on state charges of sexual assault and lewdness with a minor under the age of 14 in a separate matter, De Meo said. Police, who had called Stiles a person of interest, began calling him a suspect late Friday. There appeared to be physical similarities between Stiles and the man in the videotape, De Meo said. "Nothing that I have seen in my career comes close to what this girl has gone through. Whoever this person is is a predator that, as far as I'm concerned, belongs in custody and, if successfully prosecuted, in jail for as long as the law allows," De Meo said earlier. Detectives said the child showed little emotion during the rapes, indicating she may have been brutalized before. Nevadan Darren Tuck recently gave police the videotape, saying he found it in the desert, De Meo said. Police said the tape was in his possession at least since May before he handed it over to authorities. He is being sought on a parole violation for failure to pay child support, but police who want to question him further have been unable to locate him. Tuck, who also allegedly showed the tape to others before giving it to police, faces a possible 10-years-to-life sentence for exhibiting pornography and another one to six years for possession of child pornography, De Meo said. Harry Kuehn, Tuck's attorney, said this week on CNN's "Nancy Grace" that Tuck was "racked by indecision" about what to do with the tape once he realized what it was. Asked why, Kuehn said, "He's explained that to us, and at this point, we're not going to share that, because it goes to the defense of the matter." "You have to consider what kind of concerns my client had; He's previously dealt with the sheriff's office in Nye County; it was previously unsatisfactory," the attorney said. E-mail to a friend . |
4fa1c0bd7f86368d7ae7730d95ff7e73dc9172da | Frank Lloyd Wright wanted store magnate to sleep on porch .
Salvador Dalí's stated ambitions were bigger than Napoleon's .
Ayn Rand: Laughing at yourself same as "spitting in your own face" | (Mental Floss) They say a lot of artistic expression is motivated by self-loathing. But not for these folks! Long before the Material Girl ordered papa to stop preaching, these six puffed-up virtuosos knew darn well how to strike a pose. Alfred Hitchcock didn't leave people in suspense about how he felt about actors. Here's to the creative types who managed to raise egotism to an art form. Alfred Hitchcock . Hitchcock was, without question, one of the towering geniuses of cinema. And, like many greats, he wasn't exactly the best collaborator. Hitchcock was particularly trying for screenwriters, who felt he never properly credited them for their work. But he was notoriously hard on actors. He was once quoted as saying, "Actors are cattle" a quip that stirred up a huge outcry (actors can be so touchy). In response, he issued this correction: "I have been misquoted. What I really said is, 'Actors should be treated as cattle.'" Although it began accidentally (when he was short an actor for the film "The Lodger"), Hitchcock soon made it his egotistical trademark to appear in his own films, amassing a total of 37 cameos throughout his career. Ayn Rand . The egotist's egotist, author Ayn Rand (born Alissa Zinovievna Rosenbaum) is the patron saint of Thinking You're Better Than Everybody Else. Her most famous novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, are massive dramatizations of Objectivism, her self-spun Oscar-the-Grouch philosophy for success. Objectivism champions ego and accomplishment, shuns all religion as folly, and condemns any form of charity or altruism as counterproductive to society. Rand's novels often focus on protagonists (invariably men) who are shunned by others because of their genius, but then persevere over the foolishness of morons to prove said genius and emerge triumphant. Not surprisingly, she saw humility as a weakness and regarded laughing at yourself as "spitting in your own face." So, just how much did Rand believe in her own philosophy? Let's just say a lot. With signature modesty, she ranked herself as the philosophical equal of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas. Orson Welles . When you create a cinematic masterpiece such as "Citizen Kane" at the ripe old age of 25, you're bound to get a big head. But Welles was convinced of his own importance much earlier than that. In fact, "Citizen Kane" might have been sparked by nothing more than a bruised ego. After all, it's said he devised the film as a withering exposé of newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst because Hearst slighted Welles at a dinner party. Of course, after the unparalleled success of "Citizen Kane," Welles's arrogant side didn't get any less subtle. Do yourself a favor: Track down a recording of Welles' outtakes for a TV commercial for frozen peas. You'll hear everything you need to know about the filmmaker's oversized ego. A classic quote goes: "In the depths of your ignorance, what is it you want?" Frank Lloyd Wright . As the brains behind the Robie House, Fallingwater, Taliesin West, the Guggenheim, and countless other design benchmarks, Frank Lloyd Wright is arguably the genius of 20th-century architecture. And, boy, did he know it! Wright was notorious for believing he was superior to mere mortals. In fact, the architectural egomaniac frequently acted as though the rules even those of geography and climate did not apply to him. But when you're Wright, you're right. In 1935, department store magnate Stanley Marcus (of Neiman-Marcus fame) commissioned the architect to design his Dallas home, but the project quickly went sour. Wright's avant-garde floor plan included "sleeping porches" that required his client to sleep outdoors year-round. In addition, Marcus' small bedroom "cubicles" came equipped with almost no closet space. When Stanley respectfully explained that temperatures during summer nights in Dallas often exceed 80 degrees and a high-fashion tastemaker might need bigger closets, Wright threw a series of tantrums. Fortunately for the voyeur in us all, said tantrums usually took place in letter form. Preserved and occasionally displayed at the Dallas Museum of Art, they make for delicious reading. Salvador Dalí . "Every morning when I awake, the greatest of joys is mine: that of being Salvador Dalí." Yup, he actually said that. Everything about the legendary Surrealist painter (he of the melting clocks) from his whacked-out paintings to his curled-up mustache was designed to shock, destroy convention, cause scandal, and stir controversy. Criticized for choosing to live under General Franco's fascist government in Spain, Dalí defended his position by stating that he didn't care about others so long as he could be king. Not exactly a man of the people. If he wasn't getting enough attention, he was known to walk the streets of New York City clanging a hand bell. Of course, this is also the guy who once said, "The thought of not being recognized [is] unbearable." Need another telling quote? "At the age of 6 years, I wanted to be a chef. At the age of 7, I wanted to be Napoleon. My ambitions have continued to grow at the same rate ever since." Apparently, so did his ego. Al Jolson . Plenty of performers this side of Gallagher have been labeled "the world's greatest entertainer." But Al Jolson really, really believed it. The vaudeville singer, actor, dancer, and comedian was born Asa Yoelson in Seredzius, Lithuania, in what was then part of Imperial Russia. As a performer, he was known for hijacking the action in the middle of shows, ad-libbing, or just stopping to talk to the audience. During a 1911 performance of the critically hated "Paris is a Paradise for Coons" (title not edited for political correctness), Jolson stopped and asked the audience if they'd rather hear him sing than see the rest of the play. The crowd roared with applause, and Jolson ditched the whole program and took over. From that moment on, no one else could share the stage with him. Unlike some of the egomaniacs on this list, however, Jolson can be forgiven somewhat for his arrogance. According to most contemporary accounts, he actually was the greatest in the world. But, despite the enormity of his contributions to stage and screen, Jolson's legacy has become a political hot potato because of his use of stage blackface (considered highly offensive now, but pretty common at the time). E-mail to a friend . For more mental_floss articles, visit mentalfloss.com . Entire contents of this article copyright, Mental Floss LLC. All rights reserved. |
282f1910bd57e50d4401c695ebe75b817de68548 | Brazilian Kaka is named European player of the year .
The AC Milan player is chosen ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo of Manchester Utd .
Argentine Lionel Messi of Barcelona finishes third . | PARIS, France AC Milan's Brazilian midfielder Kaka has been named European player of the year, lifting France Football's Ballon d'Or award. Kaka has already claimed all of the game's major prizes. His success comes two years after his fellow countryman, Barcelona's Ronaldinho, claimed the award . The 25-year-old Kaka was a major factor in AC Milan's triumphant Champions League campaign. The runner-up was Manchester United's Portuguese winger Cristiano Ronaldo with Barcelona's Argentinian midfielder Lionel Messi finishing third. "This is very special for me - it culminates an astonishing year for me," Kaka said. "It's the top prize around and the only way to win something like this is to play for a team like AC Milan. It's great to be part of a team that wins." At 25 years old, he has already won all the game's major prizes, individually and collectively. He was part of Brazil's 2002 World Cup winning squad, although he was limited to just 19 minutes as a substitute against Costa Rica. He was top scorer in last season's Champions League, helping Milan to avenge their loss to Liverpool in the 2005 final. He won the Italian domestic title in his first season at Milan having joined from Brazilians Sao Paulo for$ 8.5 million, a sum that Milan president Silvio Berlusconi then described as peanuts. E-mail to a friend . |
af2d712599be471d1ba0b91fa18c347220ca595d | BUPA was founded in 1947 in response to plans to establish the NHS .
The company's biggest base is in the UK but has customers in three continents .
BUPA care homes cater for a number of conditions, including Parkinson's . | BUPA is an international health and care company with bases on three continents and more than eight million customers. BUPA began as The British United Provident Association in 1947 to preserve freedom of choice in health care. It believed that with a National Health Service being introduced a year later, there would still be a need for a complimentary service enabling people from all walks of life to afford the benefits of choice in where, when and by whom they were treated. Led by the growing public demand for health care and a lack of quality private accommodation BUPA initiated the Nuffield Homes Charitable Trust - later renamed Nuffield Hospitals. BUPA's biggest and original business is health insurance in the UK, both for individuals and corporations that want to look after the health of their employees. More than half of the UK's top companies are BUPA customers. The company's UK care homes offer specialist care to residents who include the elderly, the mentally ill, young people with physical or learning disabilities and people with conditions such as Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases. BUPA is a leading healthcare company in the UK, Spain, Australia, Ireland, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malta and Saudi Arabia. BUPA International supplies health cover to expatriates in over 180 countries. Sanitas, the BUPA business in Spain, has one million insured customers who have access to a network of 18,000 medical professionals and 450 medical centres. E-mail to a friend . |
e3dd06d326c8d53722bdc5c8428e29c68a60d0d5 | "Heartbroken" house owner's daughter among six survivors hospitalized .
One survivor jumped out of a third-story window into a canal to escape .
University of South Carolina mourns deaths of six students . | The owner of a North Carolina beach house where seven college students died in a weekend fire said Monday that his family's "lives were just changed forever" by the tragedy. Chip Auman said his 18-year-old daughter survived the fire but was hospitalized and in stable condition because of complications from smoke inhalation. "The thought of losing a child is unimaginable to me, and as a father my heart goes out to the families that lost a loved one in this situation," he said. Auman said the situation was "hard to fathom." "There's just no words to describe what we've been going through," he said, asking for prayers for survivors and the families of those who died. "We're numb, we're confused, we're heartbroken." Two college campuses mourned Monday. Six University of South Carolina students and a Clemson University student died in the fire early Sunday morning in Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina. Six other South Carolina students were able to get out of the house in time. The six were treated and released from nearby Brunswick Community Hospital, but Auman's daughter was hospitalized again in Hartsville, South Carolina. Authorities from the state Bureau of Investigation and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are leading the investigation into the cause of the fire. Ocean Isle Beach Mayor Debbie Smith said the house was "engulfed" in flames when the fire department arrived on the scene, about five minutes after being notified. The flames shot into the sky and ultimately left little more than portions of the framing. Fire officials do not believe foul play was involved. Watch a neighbor's video, fears of fast-burning fire » . Dennis A. Pruitt, the vice president for student affairs for the University of South Carolina, said investigators have said it would be Tuesday or Wednesday before the identities of the victims are confirmed publicly. It could be as much as a month until investigators know the cause of the fire, Pruitt said. The university did not cancel classes on Monday, but Pruitt said arrangements had been made for those who need to go home or stay out of class at the 28,000-student campus. Pruitt said meetings had been held Sunday with members of Delta Delta Delta sorority and Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity. The South Carolina students were affiliated with those houses, he said, although he stressed that the weekend was not an official Greek function. He also said counselors and ministers were available to help students deal with the loss of their classmates. The university president, Dr. Andrew Sorenson, contacted the families of those who died in the fire to express the condolences and support of the university community. Jay Laura, student president of the USC chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, said the campus would pull together after the tragedy. "If any place can come together to help in the healing process and the aftermath of an event like this, it is South Carolina," Laura said at a Monday afternoon press conference. Fire survivor Tripp Wylie, a 20-year-old South Carolina sophomore, said he jumped out of a third-story window into a canal to escape the flames and was unable to get back in to help his friends. "I could see a buddy of mine off to the left who had gotten out. He was just yelling at me to jump and stuff," Wylie told CNN affiliate WYFF. "The smoke was pouring out, couldn't really breathe, so I had to make a quick decision. [I] just kind of leaned out the window and luckily I jumped far enough to make it into the canal." Neighbors flocked to see the fire as firefighters battled and ultimately got the blaze under control. See the scenes of devastation » . George Smith, who lives across the street from the house, said he heard sirens between 6:30 and 7 a.m. and went outside to see "the whole sky lit up." "The whole house was completely engulfed in flames, up to about 20 feet," he said. "I have never seen [a fire] move so fast." George Smith said the house's occupants were "partying in there yesterday and into the night." After about 10:30 p.m. Saturday they quieted down, he said. Linda Sing said she was walking her dog when she saw the fiery destruction. She noted that firefighters had saved an adjacent house by spraying it down with water. "We knew there were people in there, but we hoped and prayed they'd gotten out," Sing said. "This is the worst thing I've ever seen. We've had hurricanes, but this is worse." Ocean Isle Beach is a popular resort destination along North Carolina's southern coast. The year-round population of the 7-mile-long island is about 425, but it swells to about 25,000 during the summer season, according to the town's Web site. E-mail to a friend . |
2b08ee205946dc0bb6ffe0db654cbbba1199eb28 | A Mauro Camoranesi goal earns Juventus a 1-1 draw with leaders Inter Milan .
Argentine striker Julio Cruz had given injury-hit Inter the lead in the first half .
The result maintains Inter's unbeaten record and moves them two points clear . | ROME, Italy Mauro Camoranesi scored with 13 minutes left to earn Juventus a 1-1 home draw with Serie A leaders Inter Milan on Sunday. Julio Cruz is mobbed by team-mates after giving Inter the lead in their 1-1 draw at Juventus. Camoranesi picked up a headed knock-down from substitute Vincenzo Iaquinta before seeing his shot deflect off defender Walter Samuel to leave goalkeeper Julio Cesar helpless. Inter took a first-half lead when Argentine striker Julio Cruz broke Juve's offside trap and latched onto Brazilian midfielder Cesar's through ball before firing past Gianluigi Buffon. The result means Inter retain their unbeaten record this season, despite injury problems that saw the likes of Patrick Vieira, Francesco Toldo, Marco Materazzi and Dejan Stankovic ruled out. The defending champions are now two points clear of Fiorentina at the top of the table, with Roma a point further behind and Juventus in fourth place. Earlier in the day, Roma missed out on the chance to close the gap on Inter when a late collapse saw them throw away a two-goal lead to draw 2-2 at Empoli. First half goals from French winger Ludovic Giuly and Matteo Brighi had put the visiting Romans in charge and for more than an hour they looked set to cruise to victory. But with 23 minutes remaining Ighli Vannucchi reduced the deficit and Sebastian Giovinco snatched an injury time equaliser to deny Luciano Spaletti's injury-depleted team. Siena snatched a share of the spoils from Parma in a 2-2 draw as Daniele Galloppa scored in the last minute while Napoli needed an injury time goal from striker Ezequiel Lavezzi to deny rock-bottom Reggina their first win of the season, forcing them to settle for a 1-1 draw in the south. E-mail to a friend . |
20528eb48341b50c0083fcf5a9d114b39040e5c1 | David Trezeguet omitted from France squad to play Morocco and the Ukraine .
The Juventus striker last played for his country in the 1-0 defeat by Scotland .
He was dropped for the wins against Lithuania and the Faroe Islands . | LONDON, England France coach Raymond Domenech has again omitted striker David Trezeguet from his squad for this month's friendly against Morocco and the Euro 2008 qualifier against the Ukraine. Happier times: David Trezeguet celebrates after scoring for Juventus against Torino. Trezeguet has scored scored 10 goals in 11 Serie A matches for Juventus this season including two hat-tricks but has failed to win his way back into the 24-man party. The 29-year-old, who last played for France in the 1-0 home defeat by Scotland in September, was furious after being dropped for the games against Lithuania and the Faroe Islands. He played no part as Domenech's team overtook the Scots at the top of Group B with comfortable victories last month. The coach said: "David is having a great start to the season with Juventus, but he's in competition for a place. If we qualify, the Euro 2008 will be in eight months. A lot of things can happen in between. "I hope David will help Juventus win the Italian league title and that he will be at the Euro 2008 with us, and that he will find his form again for France." Domenech has again included young Lyon forward Hatem Ben Arfa, who made his debut as a substitute against the Faroes and scored the final goal in a 6-0 victory. Ben Arfa is joined in the squad by club-mate Karim Benzema, while Bolton's Nicholas Anelka is also among the forwards named despite still recovering from an injury. Captain Patrick Vieira is ruled out due to injury, but the Inter Milan midfielder will join up with the squad anyway. "A player of Patrick's dimension is going to be missed, but we just have to accept it and get on with it. Pat should be coming to see us because he's a leader, and he's the captain," Domenech added. France face the Moroccans on November 16 and then travel to the Ukraine on November 21. Domenech's team will qualify for the finals if Italy beat Scotland at Hampden on November 17. If the Glasgow game ends in a draw, France will need at least a point in Kiev to book their ticket. France squad: Goalkeepers: M Landreau (Paris St Germain), S Frey , U Rame . Defenders: E Abidal (Barcelona, P Evra (Manchester United), W Gallas , B Sagna , L Thuram , S Squillaci , F Clerc . Midfielders: A Diarra , L Diarra , M Flamini , C Makelele , J Rothen , J Toulalan , S Nasri . Strikers: N Anelka , H Ben Arfa , K Benzema , S Govou , T Henry , F Malouda , F Ribery (Bayern Munich). E-mail to a friend . |
412630c97420afb50e5278d3406e0cf4b08d0b77 | Documents say after suicide attempt, Jeffs repeatedly banged head on cell wall .
Transcripts say Jeffs confessed to "immorality," said he is not "the prophet"
Jeffs' attorneys say he has recanted statements .
Jeffs due to be sentenced November 20 on accomplice to rape charge . | Polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs tried to hang himself earlier this year while he was in jail awaiting trial, according to court documents unsealed by a Utah judge on Tuesday. Sect leader Warren Jeffs arrives in court to hear the verdict against him September 25 in St. George, Utah. Jeffs, the leader and so-called prophet of the 10,000-member Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, is now awaiting sentencing after being convicted on two counts of being an accomplice to rape. The documents, released by Fifth District Judge James Shumate at the request of the media, also indicate that Jeffs confessed to "immorality" with a "sister" and a daughter more than 30 years ago. Among the documents is a competency report on Jeffs completed in April, in which social worker Eric Nielsen wrote that throughout the month of January, Jeffs refused food and drink and developed ulcers on his knees from kneeling in prayer for hours. On January 28, the report said, he attempted to hang himself in his cell. In the days following the suicide attempt, while he was on suicide watch, Jeffs on separate occasions threw himself against the wall and banged his head on the wall. Jail transcripts show that Jeffs' suicide attempt came three days after a visit with his brother, Nephi, in which he said, "I am not the prophet. I never was the prophet, and I have been deceived by the powers of evil ... I ask for everyone's forgiveness." Jeffs also told his brother: "Farewell forever." The day before that, Jeffs told a follower in a phone conversation that he was "covered with immorality with a sister and a daughter when I was younger." In the FLDS, members call adult women "sister," and Jeffs' meaning was unclear. Jeffs' defense attorneys, who argued against the release of the documents, said in a motion opposing the unsealing of the statements that Jeffs recanted them the following month. Defense attorneys claim Jeffs' medical condition influenced his state of mind when the statements were made. They presented Shumate with a letter from another Jeffs attorney, arguing that the statements' release could influence an Arizona jury when Jeffs stands trial in that state. Jeffs, 51, was convicted in September of being an accomplice to rape. He was accused of using his religious influence over his followers to coerce a 14-year-old girl into marriage to her 19-year-old cousin. He faces a sentence of up to life in prison when he is sentenced November 20. The FLDS which is not affiliated with the mainstream Mormon church is based in the side-by-side border towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Arizona. Jeffs, a former school headmaster, is the son of the sect's previous president and "prophet," Rulon Jeffs, who died in 2002. Jeffs was on the FBI's 10 most wanted fugitives list when he was arrested in August 2006 outside Las Vegas, Nevada. Critics say that inside the FLDS, marriages are arranged for girls as young as 13, and competition for brides may be reduced by exiling male teens and young men. If male followers are excommunicated, critics claim, wives and children can be reassigned. During Jeffs' trial, defense attorneys claimed authorities were persecuting Jeffs because of his religious beliefs, including practicing polygamy as the way to heaven. If Jeffs disavowed being the prophet of the FLDS, it could cause upheaval within the secretive sect. However, two of his followers who spoke to CNN although FLDS members usually do not talk to reporters said they do not believe he made the statements. "He is a perfectly priestly man," said a woman who identified herself as Cathy. "He is a man of God, and we will always love him. Once a prophet, always a prophet." Her husband, Patrick, told CNN, "It's hogwash. I don't believe it ... I will always consider him my prophet." E-mail to a friend . CNN's Gary Tuchman contributed to this report. |
3aa0ef8cac31a60076c43a9484792b59372edb64 | Sheikh Mohammed bin Isa Al Khalifa steers Bahrain's economic growth .
Says Bahrain's strength is its "human capital" in the finance sector .
Calls on world to unite to resolve nuclear dispute with Iran . | This week MME speaks to the man charged with boosting growth in the Kingdom of Bahrain: Sheikh Mohammed bin Isa Al Khalifa. Sheikh Mohammed is concerned the nuclear dispute with Iran is deterring potential investors . As chief executive of the Economic Development Board, one of Sheikh Mohammed's main tasks is to ensure Bahrain stays ahead of its competitors. The government's pushing ahead with economic reforms to reduce the Kingdom's dependence on oil. But with crude prices near $100 a barrel, John Defterios asked whether the appetite for change had diminished. SM: The reforms are being done for aspirational reasons rather than necessity, so we are trying to enter the post-oil area because we want to. And therefore, because of this aspirational aspect, trying to get to as opposed to people pushing us somewhere we don't want to go. JD: How do you redefine Bahrain's role? Traditionally it's been a financial center, but you have Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Dubai even Abu Dhabi emerging in financial services. How you redefine it to sustain a lead? SM: The rising tide lifts a lot of places and as the region is booming and growing, financial services are growing throughout the region. Bahrain's strengths have been and will continue to be its human capital, the people that have led the financial sector and the long standing regulations that have been established in Bahrain. JD: Strategically and a geopolitical question here: the Crown Prince came out and declared what Iran's intentions really are in his view for a nuclear policy, and called for greater diplomacy right ahead of a visit by the President of Iran to the country. What's the motivation here? SM: We feel that the distraction caused by the Iranian nuclear issue is holding investment back in the region as a whole, and increasing the security threat of the region. Nobody is debating the right to peaceful nuclear power, but we all have that need and we all need a peaceful resolution to this. JD: Historically, Iran has even made claims against Bahrain, what do you do now moving forward now? Do you bring Russia, China, the United States and the European Union closer together, in terms of where we should be going in the future? SM: We've resolved our historical issue with Iran, and we are well beyond that, but going forward... This is such a important issue affecting security worldwide, that we feel it is important and at a level high enough that we need all powers involved because it does affect everybody. JD: Can the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) become much tighter as an organization to have a voice in that process; as opposed to speaking from the sidelines and hoping that the major powers move forward? SM: Absolutely, I mean, the GCC is speaking with a unified voice. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia came out with a proposal for providing nuclear fuel from an independent authority; this was completely backed from the GCC. We are all moving forward and are willing to play a beneficial role to resolve this issue. Meet the Sheikh: . Sheikh Mohammed bin Isa Al Khalifa is chief executive of the Economic Development Board, the organization responsible for stimulating and supporting growth of the Bahraini economy. He was appointed in June 2005, following 10 years working directly for His Highness Sheikh Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Crown Prince, Commander-in-Chief of the Bahrain Defense Force and Chairman of the Economic Development Board. From 1995 to 1999, he was director of the Crown Prince's office. In 1999, he was appointed head of the court and also deputy head of the Crown Prince's International Scholarship Program. During this time, Sheikh Mohammed was heavily involved with the Crown Prince's initiatives to liberalize the telecommunications sector and with labor market and economic reforms. A keen motor sports enthusiast, Sheikh Mohammed was deputy board chairman of the Bahrain International Circuit and is a former vice president of the Bahrain Motor Club, now known as the Bahrain Motor Federation. Sheikh Mohammed, who is married with two sons and one daughter, was born on April 14, 1969. In 1992, he received a bachelor's degree in economic theory from the American University, Washington DC. Two years later, he received a post-graduate diploma in business studies from the London School of Economics. (source: Bahrain Economic Development Board) E-mail to a friend . |
c3acabb0c18cc7615eb3796406500fba1b148d3d | Bush says most of Congress "acting like a teenager with a new credit card"
Bill would have funded agencies, but also a prison museum, sailing school .
House panel chairman: Bush's veto "not responsible and not credible"
Democrats to schedule override vote, but Bush GOP allies confident about veto . | NEW ALBANY, Indiana President Bush vetoed a $600 billion spending bill Tuesday, accusing Democratic leaders of wasting money and plotting tax increases, then took his budget fight with Congress on the road. Congress should cut spending "and send me a responsible measure that I can sign into law," President Bush said. "The majority was elected on a pledge of fiscal responsibility, but so far, it's acting like a teenager with a new credit card," he said in a speech in New Albany, Indiana. The bill which Bush said was laden with $10 billion in "pork" would have funded the departments of Labor, Education, and Health and Human Services. It also would have funded projects such as a prison museum, a sailing school and a program to teach Portuguese. "Congress needs to cut out that pork, reduce the spending and send me a responsible measure that I can sign into law," the president said. Watch a report on the veto » . While polls show Bush's popularity remains at near-record lows, Congress ranks even lower as a whole. The president has taken numerous opportunities to mock the spending habits of the Democratic leadership and force confrontations over the appropriations bills needed to fund the government for the 2008 budget year, which began October 1. The bill Bush vetoed Tuesday includes about $150 billion to run those departments and more than $450 billion in mandatory spending on Medicare and Medicaid, the federal health care programs for the elderly and poor, according to the House Appropriations Committee. The committee's chairman, Rep. David Obey, called Bush's veto "not responsible and not credible." "This is a bipartisan bill supported by over 50 Republicans," Obey, D-Wisconsin, said in a statement issued after the veto. "There has been virtually no criticism of its contents. It is clear the only reason the president vetoed this bill is pure politics." Bush said Democrats are supporting $22 billion in additional spending beyond his budget proposals this year and $205 billion over five years money he said would ultimately be raised by tax increases. "When the bill for all that spending comes due, Congress is going to turn to the working people, to the small-business owners and the entrepreneurs," he said. Tuesday's veto is the fifth cast since Democrats took control of Congress in 2006. Congress has overridden one of those, voting last week to authorize $23 billion in water projects nationwide over the president's objections. Democrats will schedule another override vote this week, an aide to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said. But Antonia Ferrier, spokeswoman for House Republican Whip Roy Blunt, said Bush's GOP allies are confident they will be able to sustain the veto. Bush signed a $470 billion Pentagon spending bill that covers the Defense Department's normal operations, but Democrats split $50 billion in spending for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan off into a "bridge fund" to which they plan to attach demands for Bush to withdraw U.S. combat troops. The measure sets up another confrontation with the White House. Bush also demanded Congress reform the alternative minimum tax a measure originally aimed at preventing the wealthy from evading taxes, but one that increasingly affects middle-class earners without raising additional revenue. He said a plan proposed by Rep. Charles Rangel, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, to eliminate the tax was unacceptable. "Preventing a tax increase in one area should not be an excuse for raising taxes in other areas," he said. "Congress should eliminate the tax increases in the bill and send the AMT relief to my desk as soon as possible." The elimination of the tax would cause an estimated $800 billion to be lost over 10 years. To replace that, Rangel's bill would add a 4 percent surtax on individual incomes over $100,000, after deductions, and close corporate tax loopholes. The bill also would cut rates for many individual and corporate taxpayers. Republicans have already started calling it "the mother of all tax increases." "With all the other pressures on our economy, raising taxes is one of the most unwise things Congress could possibly do," Bush said. Bush acknowledged the difficulties Americans face from high fuel prices, a "challenged" housing market and "uncertainty" in financial markets stemming from the collapse of the subprime mortgage market "but as we have seen in recent years, this economy is resilient, and that's important for the American people to understand." E-mail to a friend . CNN's Deirdre Walsh contributed to this report. |
1c1acc74329fe61636f900df9dbcef5ed695e5c9 | France lock Sebastien Chabal cited for a dangerous tackle on Simon Shaw .
Chabal faces disciplinary hearing on Monday after incident against England .
Sale forward will miss the third and fourth-place play-off is he is suspended . | PARIS, France France lock Sebastien Chabal has been cited for a dangerous tackle on England's Simon Shaw during Saturday's World Cup semifinal in Paris. Simon Shaw offloads despite being tackled by Raphael Ibanez, left, and Sebastien Chabal. The Sale Sharks forward will face a disciplinary hearing on Monday after his tackle on opposite second-rower Shaw was noted by citing commissioner Dennis Wheelahan. Chabal started the match on the substitutes' bench, but was brought on in the 26th minute to replace the injured Fabien Pelous during hosts France's 14-9 defeat. If he is suspended, then Chabal will miss Friday's third and fourth-place play-off match at the Parc des Princes. Meanwhile, France coach Bernard Laporte said that the defeat was tougher to take than England's 24-7 win in the 2003 semifinals. "In 2003, they were better then us. In fact they were better than everyone," said Laporte, who is leaving his role to take up the post of junior sports minister in the French government. "They were like the New Zealand of this tournament - the favorite, except they went all the way. This time it's harder because yesterday it was 50-50." Meanwhile, England seeking to become the first nation to defend the World Cup title revealed that star kicker Jonny Wilkinson again had problems with the match balls during the semifinal. The fly-half, who voiced his concerns after struggling with the boot against Australia, rejected a ball before kicking a vital three-pointer against France. "We didn't say it last week but a non-match ball got onto the field in Marseille which Jonny kicked," director of rugby Rob Andrew said. "He didn't think about it while he was kicking it. "The match balls are marked, numbered one to six. Last night they had 'World Cup semi-final England vs France' written on them. On match night, Jonny was vigilant when kicking for goal that they were actually match balls he was kicking. "The practice balls lose pressure and shape. The whole issue last week, the organizers accepted all six match balls should be used by both sides on the Thursday before game." E-mail to a friend . |
764d9ce99a1e3f79d95fbc4b68adbce14e7f8bcd | YouTube questions address taxes, the Bible, abortion, gun control .
Giuliani, Romney, Huckabee spar over immigration .
McCain challenges Paul over suggestion to bring troops home from Iraq .
Nearly 5,000 videos for the GOP debate; 2,000 more than Democratic debate . | ST. PETERSBURG, Florida The acrimony from the Republican campaign trail carried over quickly into the CNN/YouTube GOP presidential debate Wednesday. The debate marked the first time the candidates had faced off on the same stage in over a month. With five weeks to go until the first contest of the 2008 nominating season, the Republican candidates engaged in a free-for-all, trying to differentiate their views on immigration, the Iraq war, abortion, gun control and even whether they believed every word in the Bible was true. Unlike previous debates in which the candidates focused most of their attacks on Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, Wednesday night's attacks were launched at each other. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney traded jabs over illegal immigration, something they have been arguing about on the trail for the past month. Romney attacked Giuliani's record, saying that as mayor, he promoted illegal immigration. And Giuliani shot back, accusing Romney of having a "sanctuary mansion" at his own home. Watch the debate format produce raw moments » . "In his case, there were six sanctuary cities. He did nothing about them. There was a sanctuary mansion at his own home, illegal immigrants were being employed," Giuliani said. Romney denied Giuliani's allegation, and the two raised their voices as they tried to talk over each other. In his quest to appeal to the hard-line immigration wing of the party, Romney also turned some of his fire on the same topic toward former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who has been rising in the polls. Rep. Tom Tancredo, who has anchored his candidacy on securing the borders and cracking down on illegal immigration, seemed delighted with the give and take, saying the other candidates were trying to "out-Tancredo" him. Huckabee drew one of the night's largest cheers when he said that one of the agencies he would abolish to control federal spending was the Internal Revenue Service. "Most people in this country are more afraid of an audit than they are of a mugging, and there's a reason why," he said. Sen. John McCain, freshly back from a visit to Iraq over Thanksgiving and the most hawkish of the candidates, and Rep. Ron Paul, the most anti-war of the candidates, tangled on two occasions over the Iraq war. Did YouTubers get their questions answered? » . Asked which government programs they would cut, Paul said bringing the troops home from Iraq would save "a trillion dollars." McCain said: "It's that kind of isolationism that caused World War II," which drew some hoots from the crowd. Watch McCain, Paul spar on Iraq » . Paul replied: "The real question you have to ask is why do I get the most money from active duty officers and military personnel?" A retired brigadier general, Keith Kerr, who is gay, asked candidates if they thought U.S. military personnel were professional enough to work with gay and lesbian troops. CNN later learned that a June media release from the campaign of Democratic front-runner Clinton listed Kerr as a member of its steering committee for gay and lesbian supporters. Watch Kerr deny that the Clinton campaign influenced his question » . David Bohrman, CNN senior vice president and executive producer of the debate, said, "We regret this incident. CNN would not have used the general's question had we known that he was connected to any presidential candidate." Political Ticker . Kerr told CNN after the debate that he has not worked for the Clinton campaign and was representing no one other than himself. Kerr also said he is a member of the Log Cabin Republicans, a national gay and lesbian Republican grass-roots organization. Prior to the debate, CNN had verified Kerr's military background and that he had not contributed money to any presidential candidate. In a section of the debate about gun ownership rights, three of the GOP presidential hopefuls said they do not own guns: McCain, Giuliani and Romney. Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson quipped, "I own a couple of guns but I'm not going to tell you what they are or where they are." Watch the candidates address gun control » . The debate turned personal when a viewer, holding the Bible, asked: "Do you believe every word of this book? And I mean specifically, this book that I am holding in my hand." Huckabee, a Baptist minister, said, "Sure, I believe the Bible is exactly what it is." Giuliani said he believes the Bible, but not "literally true in every respect." After that, Romney stammered a bit when moderator Anderson Cooper asked him if he believed every word. Watch the candidates get personal about the Bible » . "Yeah, the Bible is the word of God. ... I might interpret the word differently than you interpret the word, but I read the Bible and I believe the Bible is the word of God," Romney said. When asked about abortion, Romney said he was wrong in favoring a woman's right to choose his position when he was elected governor of Massachusetts. "If people in this country are looking for someone who's never made a mistake on a policy issue and is not willing to admit they're ever wrong, they're going to have to find somebody else. On abortion, I was wrong," he said. His remarks came in response to the 30-second video produced for the debate by Thompson's campaign, which included a clip of Romney expressing support for Roe vs. Wade during a 1994 debate against Sen. Ted Kennedy. When asked what women and doctors should be charged with if abortion was to become illegal, Paul said it was not an issue for the president or the federal government. "We don't need a federal abortion police, that's the last thing we need," Paul said. He added that the issue should be left to the states and courts and not federal authorities. On the issues of taxes, Thompson said he'd "never met a tax he liked." "I've got a tax-cut bill on the table. But I don't do pledges to anybody but the American people," he said. His response was met by a "Go, Fred, go!" from a member of the audience. On the issue of trade with China, Rep. Duncan Hunter said China is "cheating on trade ... and it's in the interest of the United States to stop China's cheating. Buy American this Christmas season that might keep your neighbor from losing his job." The candidates fielded video questions submitted by the public via the YouTube Web site, just as Democratic White House candidates did in July. The debate was the first time the GOP candidates had faced off on the same stage in over a month. CNN's political team viewed nearly 5,000 videos for the GOP debate about 2,000 more than they saw for the Democrats' debate. E-mail to a friend . |
f16446db34e2861f0450dfa34d8cdda541ab7b19 | More than 1,000 freed detainees reportedly keep pledge not to rejoin insurgency .
U.S. general tries to reassure Sunnis that detainees face no abuse .
More than 80 percent of detainees are Sunnis .
U.S. airstrike kills 13 suspected terrorists west of Baghdad . | BAGHDAD, Iraq None of the 1,000-plus Iraqi detainees freed in recent weeks have broken a pledge not to return to the insurgency, according to the Marine general who oversees the U.S. detention centers in Iraq. A U.S. military panel reviews a detainee's case at Camp Cropper near Baghdad. Speaking in Arabic, Maj. Gen. Doug Stone on Wednesday reassured Iraqis about how the 25,000 detainees mostly Sunnis are treated after being taken into custody on suspicion of involvement in the insurgency. Stone described the detention system as "open and transparent," saying it makes the detainees better citizens and helps break the cycle of violence and poverty in the country. Stone said detainees get free medical care equal to what he gets as a general, food and water made to Islamic standards, educational opportunities, jobs skills and contact with families. The U.S. detention centers at Camp Bucca near the southern port city of Basra and in Camp Cropper near Baghdad are political sore points for Sunnis, who make up 83 percent of the detainees held. The main Sunni political coalition the Iraqi Accord Front cited the centers as one reason for quitting the government during the summer. Last month, the U.S.-led coalition launched Operation Lion's Paw in which between 50 and 70 detainees would be released daily during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan after taking a pledge not to rejoin the insurgency against the Shiite-led government. "This pledge is an Iraqi pledge, a pledge before an Iraqi judge, frequently with a family member present," Stone said. "I am pleased to tell you that in the more 1,000 that have gone through this program and taken the pledge, not one has returned to threaten Iraqi or coalition forces." Stone said the releases would continue at the same pace beyond Ramadan. Stone's description seems a far cry from the Abu Ghraib prison operated by the U.S. military in the first years after the invasion. That prison was closed down and razed in the wake of an international scandal over prisoner abuse. "There are no secrets that go on in detention," Stone said. "Our facilities are open to inspection by any agency that we in the federal government believe is credible. These agencies are welcomed because they are windows for the world." See what life's like inside Camp Cropper's walls » . By the time of their release, "detainees grow in terms of working in an inter-sectarian environment," he said. Each detainee has a chance to take classes up to a sixth-grade level, and high school classes are being planned, Stone said. About one-third or 8,000 are in school, with 7,000 having passed the fifth-grade level, he said. The 860 detainees who are 17 or younger are all in school, Stone said. The average stay for a detainee is 300 days, but some have been detained for two years or longer, he said. A review board interviews detainees to decide if they are a threat to security, he said. If they are deemed not to be, they are offered freedom in exchange for taking the pledge. Only 280 detainees are foreigners, mostly from Syria, Egypt, Iran, Sudan and Saudi Arabia, he said. Other developments . |
04b39ee42fdc4284e402fbf7cdc7b825748f38b5 | Argentina beat Bolivia 3-0 in South American qualifier for 2010 World Cup .
Juan Roman Riquelme nets twice as Argentina win third successive match .
Ecuador coach Luis Fernando Suarez quits after 5-1 loss against Paraguay . | BUENOS AIRES, Argentina Juan Roman Riquelme scored twice as Argentina beat Bolivia 3-0 to notch a third successive victory in the South American qualifiers for the 2010 World Cup on Saturday. Juan Roman Riquelme celebrates after scoring his first goal in Argentina's win against Bolivia. The midfielder followed up his brace of spectacular free-kicks in the opening 2-0 victory against Chile to help put his country five points clear of second-placed Brazil, who play Peru in Lima on Sunday. Riquelme again shrugged off his lack of club action with Villarreal, where he has fallen out with the Spanish side's management, to net twice in the second spell after Sergio Aguero gave the home side a first-half lead. The 19-year-old scored his first goal at international level five minutes before the interval after starting in a three-man attack with Carlos Tevez and Lionel Messi. He headed home after Martin Demichelis nodded a cross from Manchester United striker Tevez back across goal. Riquelme added the second 11 minutes after the break with a dipping free-kick which beat Carlos Arias from 25 yards, having been superbly denied by the keeper's one-handed effort shortly beforehand. And he finished off the scoring in the 73rd minute with a cool sidefoot finish after being set up by Messi to cap off a match in which captain Javier Zanetti made a record-breaking 116th appearance for Argentina. Argentina next travel to Colombia on Tuesday, when winless Bolivia have an away clash with Venezuela. In other South American qualifiers, Colombia beat Venezuela 1-0, and Paraguay routed Ecuador 5-1. Ecuador coach Luis Fernando Suarez, a Colombian, quit after his team's loss saying: "I have taken the irrevocable decision to resign." E-mail to a friend . |
5bdab1456ce6156a7378edaa4fa92a718cbf2568 | South African reggae legend Lucky Dube killed in attempted hijacking .
Dube, 43, killed Thursday in Johannesburg after hijacker tried to steal his car .
Death casts shadow over South Africa's preparations for rugby World Cup final . | JOHANNESBURG, South Africa Reggae legend Lucky Dube, one of South Africa's most famous musicians, was killed in an attempted car-jacking as he dropped his children off at a relative's house, his record label said Friday. Reggae star Lucky Dube was much loved by his fellow South Africans. Dube, 43, was killed in Johannesburg around 8 p.m. local time Thursday after someone tried to steal his car, Gallo Record Company said in a statement. Police said he was shot. The statement said Dube attempted to escape but died almost instantly from his wounds. Dube was much loved by his fellow South Africans, and his death cast a shadow over festivities ahead of South Africa's highly-anticipated appearance in the rugby World Cup final with England this weekend. News of his death was the headline in many Friday newspapers, knocking the World Cup off the front pages for the first time in days. Callers to talk radio stations suggested the Springboks wear black armbands in remembrance of Dube when they take to the field Saturday in Paris. Gallo Records called the death "senseless and random," and it was not clear whether Dube's attackers knew who he was. South Africa is one of the most dangerous societies in the world. Figures from the South African Police Service show that from April 2006 to March 2007, more than 19,000 South Africans were murdered, more than 52,600 people were raped, and nearly 13,600 people were carjacked. "It's very sad," said Mark Sutherland, London bureau chief for Billboard Magazine. "He's a big loss to the South African music business. (He was) one of their most successful artists and certainly one of their leading reggae artists." Sutherland said Dube was an extremely respected musician who toured extensively around the world. Dube had just returned from a tour of the United States that stretched from California to New York. His record company said Dube leaves "a great void" in the music industry after a 25-year career. Dube recorded 22 albums in Zulu, English and Afrikaans. Born outside Johannesburg in 1964, Dube was named "Lucky" by his mother because he was the first child to be born after several failed pregnancies. Dube started singing in 1982, joining a band playing Mbaqanga, or traditional Zulu music. It was only later that he began recording reggae tracks as a solo singer, but the genre was to dominate and define the remainder of his career. Ivor Haarburger, the chief exectutive of Gallo Music Group, said he was deeply saddened by the loss. "Lucky was not just an extraordinary artist, he was a personal friend," Haarburger said. "It's so sad to lose such a great friend and so tragically." Dube is survived by his wife, Zanele, and his seven children: Bongi, Nonkululeko, Thokozani, Laura, Siyanda, Philani and three-month old Melokuhle. E-mail to a friend . CNN correspondent Robin Curnow contributed to this report. |
fbc2d5f3f088eda2b8128ebb12a042850f6e4f3d | Vince McMahon: WWE has one of best drug-testing programs .
Wrestling boss tells CNN that individuals bear responsibility for actions .
Critics say WWE penalties for drug use are not harsh enough .
Wrestlers still can get drugs if they have prescriptions from doctors . | The late Chris Benoit idolized the Dynamite Kid, who was half of a professional wrestling team famous in the 1980s for spectacular high-flying, acrobatic moves. Chris Benoit strangled his wife and suffocated his son before hanging himself in June. The Dynamite Kid and his partner, Davey Boy Smith, were known as the British Bulldogs. They were quick, agile and muscular, and in 1986 they won the World Wrestling Federation tag team championship. Young Benoit dreamed of wrestling like the Dynamite Kid, whose real name is Tom Billington. At the beginning of his career, Benoit adopted the Dynamite nickname and copied his idol's signature moves. In June, Benoit murdered his wife and young son before hanging himself. Investigators found testosterone, painkillers and anti-anxiety drugs in Chris Benoit's body, Georgia's chief medical examiner said a month later. When asked about Benoit's double murder-suicide, Billington told CNN, "It can make you aggressive, the steroids. But personally I wouldn't, you know, kill no bleeding kid, or wife either." Billington now lives in a public housing apartment outside Manchester, England. He has lost the use of his legs. A pin sticks out from one of his toes. Billington blames his wrestling life for doing this to him wrestling and the fact that he ignored doctors who told him to stop the punishment to his body. And from the steroids, he said. Billington told CNN that the steroids came from doctors, from friends, even from steroids meant for horses. He took them all, took a terrible pounding in the ring, and like his partner (who died at age 39 in 2002), began taking extensive amounts of painkillers. Benoit's death has refocused a media spotlight on the organization for which he wrestled, now known as World Wrestling Entertainment, and the man who has ruled wrestling for years, Chairman of the Board Vince McMahon. McMahon, appearing with Linda McMahon, his wife and WWE CEO, told CNN: "Nothing from the WWE, under any set of circumstances had anything to do with Chris Benoit murdering his family. How did we know Chris Benoit would turn into a monster." Read a full transcript of the McMahons interview . Vince McMahon defended the organization, saying its drug-testing policy was not just for show. "Our policy stacks up just as well as anyone else's in sport, although again emphasizing we are entertainment, and no one in entertainment, no one has this kind of wellness policy," McMahon said. Critics say McMahon pushes his stars and non-stars, works them too many nights per year and has encouraged the large physiques prevalent in modern wrestling. They say McMahon only looks at his employees as commodities, pawns in a huge business. His businesses are quite successful. About 16 million people a week tune into WWE TV shows. Two of their cable programs "Raw" and "Friday Night Smackdown" are weekly ratings giants. Pay-per-view specials generate an average of $100 million per year. When asked about the high number of former wrestlers who had died before they turned 50 years old, Vince McMahon said each person in the WWE bore responsibility for their own lives especially outside the arena. "If someone passes through our organization, it is not our responsibility for someone's personal activities," he said. He also said there isn't "any organization in the world, be it entertainment or be it sport, that can tell you that they are totally drug-free." Watch as a WWE wrestler says the perception of steroid use is wrong » . The McMahons said the WWE is taking steps toward improving its oversight of its athletes. Since the newest WWE drug screening program began in February 2006, more than 30 of the organization's wrestlers have been suspended, including two since CNN's interview with the McMahons. David Black who helped the NFL develop its drug program and now runs tests for the WWE says twice that number have tested positive and been given a warning. But Dr. Gary Wadler, a world-renowned expert in the study of drugs and athletes, says the WWE is not doing enough. "It certainly falls far, far short of where it needs to be," he said. "And there is a gold standard, and I measure all these sporting and entertainment activities against this gold standard. And [the WWE is] miles apart." Wadler, a longtime critic of McMahon, was referring to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in Colorado Springs, Colorado. U.S. athletes training for the Olympics are randomly tested and, if caught just once, face a two-year suspension from competition. If caught a second time, they can be banned for life. Black's programs test wrestlers four times a year. The first is a "baseline" test, according to the WWE. Black then tests for "nonmedical" uses, meaning that if an athlete has a prescription, he is cleared. "It's just a loophole that in my mind guts the entire program," said Travis Tygart, who heads the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. McMahon denies that his wrestlers are pushed to use steroids. He says the average wrestler is lighter than in recent years. Watch one of the new WWE stars talk about being "straight edge" » . "There's an expression in our business, that here is where you make your money. It's your face, it's what you do with it," he said. "It's your personality, it's what you do with it. It's your delivery, your elocution. It's storyline, it's things, all those things that are theatrical as well as athletic in the ring." E-mail to a friend . CNN's Drew Griffin contributed to this report. |
6f0d219aba6227e0a69e71e7fca4b85ae761101d | Justa Grata Honoria plotted to kill her emperor of Roman Empire .
When first plot failed, she offered to marry Attila the Hun .
He failed to annihilate Rome, or marry her .
She then suffered the fate she dreaded . | (Mental Floss) Everyone goes through a rebellious phase. And, if you're lucky, you'll be able to look back on those years and laugh. If you're less lucky, you spent those years on a reality show, so for the rest of time, millions of strangers can look back on them and laugh instead. In modern times, cats frolic among the ruins of ancient Rome. But, hey, it could be worse. You could be responsible for the fall of Western Civilization, just like Justa Grata Honoria, the Roman princess whose wild ways and naked ambition set off a chain reaction that culminated in the destruction of the Roman Empire. Barely regal . Smart, conniving, and ruthless, Honoria possessed all the attributes befitting a Roman emperor, except for that pesky Y chromosome. As a young girl, she watched as her dimwitted six-year-old brother, Valentinian III, was crowned emperor of the Western Roman Empire, while she was set aside to await a suitable marriage. Hardly content to lead a quiet and chaste life, Honoria rebelled with aplomb, sleeping her way through the royal court while still in her teens. Although her after-hours habits caused quite the scandal, they failed to satiate her need for attention and power, so Honoria set her eyes on the throne. Employing her ample charms, she seduced her brother's royal chamberlain, Eugenius, and together, they plotted to murder Valentinian and seize power. But, alas, their scheme was soon exposed. Eugenius was executed, and Honoria was sent to a convent in Constantinople. Life as a nun was a fate worse than death for Honoria, but even that couldn't quell her ambition. She spent her years at the nunnery plotting one escape attempt after another. Finally, out of sheer desperation, she turned to sources outside the empire. Her savior would have to be powerful enough to defy Valentinian and risk open war with Rome. Only one man fit that description: Attila, king of the Huns. Attila the hubby . Honoria got the barbarian's attention with a mutually beneficial proposal: If Attila would rescue her, she would marry him, and he would get half of the Western Empire as her dowry. Of course, Honoria was in no position to rightfully offer any portion of the Roman Empire. But she was betting that after marrying her, Attila would conquer the whole Empire, and she'd become queen to boot. Attila had secretly been planning a move against Rome for years, and Honoria's letter gave him the perfect opportunity to strike. Wasting no time, he told Valentinian that he planned to marry Honoria, and demanded the dowry he'd been promised. Naturally, Valentinian refused, and Attila used his status as a "wronged husband" to invade Roman territory in 451 C.E. The Hun armies quickly swept through the Empire, destroying everything in their path, and eventually they arrived in Rome. Like all the other cities before it, Rome would also have been annihilated were it not for the famine and disease that devastated the Huns during the invasion. Rome survived Attila's assault with the unlikely help of another nomadic enemy tribe, the Visigoths, but the Western Empire never recovered. Within a generation, the armies of the Goths, Franks, and Huns had overrun the area. The Princess bride . Ultimately, Honoria became neither Roman empress nor a Hun queen. Attila never rescued her, and she was eventually sent back to Rome and left to her brother's justice. Not wanting to cause a scandal by having her executed, and unwilling to send her back into exile where she could scheme again, Valentinian settled on a suitable third option. After years of struggle, Honoria finally suffered the fate she had been dreading all along: She was married off to an elderly Roman senator, and the rest of her life went unrecorded by history. E-mail to a friend . For more mental_floss articles, visit mentalfloss.com . Entire contents of this article copyright, Mental Floss LLC. All rights reserved. |
696d5716c42ab1096cdb464da3cfcf702626a62a | No end "until it reaches the ocean or the winds turn around," official says .
Nearly 350,000 homes in San Diego County evacuated; 70 people injured .
Flames have charred 700,000 acres, more than 1,000 homes .
Not "enough fire engines in the state of California," Ventura County official says . | SAN DIEGO, California Firefighters in Southern California are facing wind-whipped walls of flame from 15 wildfires that have scorched more than 400,000 acres and forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes. Firefighters battle the Witch fire Tuesday in the Del Dios area of Escondido, California. The blazes have killed one person and injured at least 70 more. Firefighters were aided by resources from Mexico, the state and federal governments and even inmates from California's prisons. San Diego Fire Department Battalion Chief Bruce Cartelli described scenes of "utter devastation" with hundreds of homes lost and "many hundreds" of others damaged. "It's probably the worst significant event in my career of 36 years," he said. "It will not end ... until it reaches the ocean or the winds turn around," Cartelli said. Meteorologists suggested that Santa Ana winds, which have fueled the wildfires with some gusts approaching 100 mph, could die down Wednesday afternoon. "We are still facing some very serious fires," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said after an aerial tour of the affected area. "The weather has made it very difficult for the air assets to get up and fight the fires. ... If the weather cooperates, maybe we can turn the tide tomorrow." Officials have evacuated nearly 350,000 homes in San Diego County alone, where the worst of the fires are blazing. Using U.S. Census Bureau numbers from the 2000 census, that could mean as many as 950,000 were affected by the fires. Watch evacuees shaken, firefighters battling » . In San Diego County, at least half a million residents had been ordered to find refuge in shelters, schools and stadiums as fires pushed into new areas. Among the evacuees as more than 4,000 military personnel from several bases in the area. With the winds pushing them across the area, the fires spread quickly, forcing some residents to flee in the middle of the night. "My wife woke me up like 12 o'clock, screaming and yelling that the flames were coming down," said Johnny Villanueva of Spring Valley, who fled with his wife and daughter to San Diego's Qualcomm Stadium, which is serving as a shelter to more than 12,000 evacuees. "We just loaded up the car really quick and came down here ... slept in our vehicles." His wife, Elizabeth, added, "I saw on the mountain on fire, and said, 'Oh my God, my family. ... Let's go." With Qualcomm Stadium being used by the evacuees, the San Diego Chargers planned to practice at the Arizona Cardinals' stadium in Glendale for next weekend's game. Lake Arrowhead resident Michelle Dresser, who owns a business and was chased from her home by a wildfire last year, said she was waiting until the last minute to leave. She spent the night in her store, partly to help customers and neighbors. "It is crazy. We are surrounded by fire on both sides," she said. Asked by CNN where she would go, she replied, "I have to find someplace to accept two dogs, two cats and a turtle." Watch people staying with pets at refuge » . Animals are allowed in Qualcomm Stadium, a nearby field and Del Mar Fairgrounds and Racetrack. President Bush is scheduled to visit the area on Thursday, the White House said. Chertoff arrived in San Diego Tuesday afternoon for a "first-hand look" at the devastation. "I wanted to see for myself, first of all, how the shelter situation is in San Diego, what the fires look like up close," Chertoff told CNN. The secretary said that the federal response to the wildfires is "phenomenally better" than the response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, "because we have been preparing and planning and training together for the last 2 ½ years." "Unlike in Katrina ... we have now built the process ... and we've rehearsed it, so when we take the field, the team already knows what we need to do," he said. See photos of the fires » . And the scene at Qualcomm Stadium on Tuesday did seem to live up to Chertoff's expectations as volunteers cheerily handed out chairs, food and water. Thirty-four firefighters have been injured, authorities said. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he was "heartbroken" after touring the Lake Arrowhead area, where the Grass Valley and Slide fires have burned 5,000 acres and destroyed more than 200 homes. "This is a tragedy, what is happening in California," he told reporters. The combination of dry terrain, searing heat and hammering winds had created "the perfect storm for fire," the governor said. Schwarzenegger said about 7,000 firefighters were battling the blazes, including 2,300 inmates from California's Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders said the mayor of Tijuana, Mexico, had sent four fire engines and their crews to help out, and the governor of Baja California had offered help. Chertoff said cots, blankets, water and other supplies have been moved where they are needed, and more are coming. The Federal Emergency Management Agency delivered 25,000 cots to Qualcomm early Tuesday. At least 150 National Guard members are assigned to provide security at the stadium. See where the fires are burning » . Of San Diego County's 10 major fires, the Witch fire in the north, which has grown to 200,000 acres, is the priority because of its significant threat to structures, said Ron Lane, the county's director of emergency services. The Harris fire had burned more than 70,000 acres by mid-morning. In northern Los Angeles County, the Ranch, Buckweed, and Magic fires have charred more than 93,000 acres and fire officials fear they could merge. "We want to keep these fires as small as we can," said Capt. Barry Parker of the Ventura County Fire Department. The 54,500-acre Ranch fire was only two miles away from the 1,200-acre Magic fire. The blazes are straddling the L.A.-Ventura County line. Asked if he had enough resources, Parker said, "We truly don't." "We're using a limited amount of resources to go in and fight these fires," he said. "We've got about 600 people on the Ranch fire; we normally would have about 1,500. "So we have to be absolutely surgical in how we plan and how we tactically use our fire equipment because we just simply don't have enough fire engines in the state of California to battle these blazes." In San Diego County, a utility spokesman said a 500,000-volt transmission line was damaged when the Harris fire expanded, and it will be out of service until at least Wednesday. Other transmission lines have been destroyed. Sanders said Mexico's Federal Electrical Commission was providing power to the area's grid to help make up for the losses. California also received extensive offers of manpower and equipment from the military. A total of 550 Marines were ready for deployment from Camp Pendleton, north of San Diego, and 67 Defense Department employees 12 firefighting teams already were engaged. Eleven Defense Department helicopters equipped with water buckets and more than 17,000 National Guardsmen were available, along with six C-130 aircraft able to drop water and flame retardant on the flames. But aerial attacks on the fires have been limited by the fierce Santa Ana winds. The Red Cross and other groups also were in the wings. They and some other groups were waiting for the flames to die down before bringing in their volunteers. The Red Cross has set up 11 shelters in the area and housed 3,000 people Monday night. More were expected Tuesday. A firefighter at Rancho Bernardo in San Diego County showed distress. "Every one of us out here feels like these homes are our own. We know what it's like to see people's faces when they've lost everything. It's devastating to see so much of this all at once." E-mail to a friend . CNN's Thelma Gutierrez and Dan Simon contributed to this report. |
316f0f847800fdb547f7496f6095075cd610c7e4 | MME speaks with Sallie Krawcheck, boss of Citi Global Wealth Management .
Ranked by Fortune magazine as World's 12th Most Powerful Woman in 2007 .
Manages client assets worth $1.8 trillion, formerly bank's CFO .
Tells MME: "we're very bullish" on economic potential of the Middle East . | If you thought it was difficult managing your own money in 2007, consider the pressure of the task when you're dealing with $1.8 trillion of client assets. Sallie Krawcheck has made Fortune's list of the World's Most Powerful Women every year since 2002 . That's what Sallie Krawcheck does as Chairman and Chief Executive of Citi Global Wealth Management. She joined the banking industry as a research analyst, but quickly rose through the ranks, gaining a reputation for honesty and integrity along the way. Dubbed the "Mrs Clean" of Wall Street, Ms Krawcheck was credited with restoring investors' faith in analyst reports while head of retail brokerage firm Smith Barney. She joined Citigroup in 2002, and spent some time as Chief Financial Officer before taking up her current role in March 2007. Sallie Krawcheck has been a regular entrant on Fortune's list of the World's Most Powerful Women in Business in 2007, she made number 12. John Defterios caught up with Ms Krawcheck in Dubai. He asked her for her views on the movement of capital outside the G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States). Sallie Krawcheck : I think what's happening right now, it's fascinating because in the United States and in developed Europe we're having a liquidity crunch someone might argue a liquidity crisis. And in fact, we are awash with liquidity in the Middle East and in Asia as well, so there's really a bifurcation that's occurring in the world. And if you think about, oil doesn't even have to stay at the 90-plus dollar level it is; even at levels in the 70's, 60's, 50's, 40's, a tremendous amount of liquidity is being generated in these markets which is really being put back into the market. Yes, the investments are going up globally, but the governments here really are investing back in the infrastructure and the economies of this region. And so over time, you're really going to see... I think continue to see... a shift in economic activity on a relative basis from the more developed economies here to the Middle East as well as to Asia. John Defterios : It's coming almost as a perfect storm; we have a sub prime crisis, a 20 percent fall in the dollar in the last two years. In this window of time, is there a danger that the financial capitals build outside of Wall Street and it undermines its role? : I think there is no doubt that New York is losing its status as a financial capital of the world. If you think about some years ago, if you think about the internet bubble for example, where it was New York and California wasn't it? And you look at a whole range of reasons for it, and the sub prime crisis perhaps, the decline of the dollar perhaps. But you have overlapping regulators in the United States, you have very high taxes in the United States, you have a very litigious environment in the United States, and you have the emerging markets coming up, so capital is being raised outside of the United States. These things, some of which are negative for the United States, some of which are positive for the other regions, is accelerating a shift that was underway from New York, to London, to Hong Kong, to Singapore, and potentially to Dubai as well. : Some of the wealth funds are now on the radar of both Wall Street and Capitol Hill in Washington. You can't have your cake and eat it too. You can't say I want some of that liquidity but I only want part of that liquidity. What is the result of that do you think? Can you over-regulate the sovereign funds? : Oh, I think you can over-regulate the sovereign funds. I think the same question can be asked of the private equity funds and the hedge funds as well; where in a lot of countries the regulators have been struggling with the issue of 'here are very important drivers of global markets and global liquidity'. And the concern is if, gee these are going to be important going forward, we want to have these involved in our economy and our markets, but if we regulate this alone that money will skitter away to another market to a market outside the United States or Europe for example. : It's fascinating because if you look at Qatar or Egypt or Shanghai, the stock markets have almost had like a one way path; there's been some correction here in the Middle East. But what are we likely to see here, stair steps up the ladder with some corrections along the way, or an implosion because of the rapid gains? : I think you've got to separate the idea of what's going on in the real economies and what's going on in the market places. They move together, but sometimes they separate, they diverge, and they can diverge for a long period of time. If you look at economic growth potential of the Middle East, of Asia, of Latin America, we feel very bullish about this. And I was making the point earlier today, China has been growing at 11 or 12 percent, not for one year or two years, but literally for 30 years. For 30 years it's been growing at that kind of rate and really can continue as far as the eye can see. So, say the same thing for the Middle East, the growth even at a lower oil price can be significant, but can be high single digit or double digit for some foreseeable period going forward. : Is Wall Street, or for that matter, London or any other financial center ready for a woman for example in your case, 1.4 trillion dollars of assets... : 1.8 Thank you... : ...to run one of the major money center banks of the world? I'm sure you're feeling this pressure even though you're young by international standards. Are we ready for a woman to take over a money center bank? : Well it looks like the United States may be ready for a woman to take over as President. So I think if we're ready to potentially have a woman run the country, I think we are getting ready as a country, to potentially have a woman run a money center bank. Now, you know, the board wouldn't ask and I wouldn't accept, but if you look across Wall Street, there are a few women who are putting themselves in positions to be successors the next time there are CEO's who move along, and I think it's a very exciting development for the industry and for the country. Have your say. Email us at mme@cnn.com, or send an i-report. E-mail to a friend . |
81651fc015f2db10f24327d11b1a3748a19466f9 | British teacher in Sudan found guilty of insulting religion .
Gillian Gibbons, 54, arrested after her class named teddy bear "Mohammed"
Gibbons was not convicted of two other charges brought against her .
UK consular staff, Gibbons' defense team initially refused access to the court . | KHARTOUM, Sudan A Sudanese court found a British teacher guilty of insulting religion and sentenced her to 15 days in prison Thursday for allowing a teddy bear to be named "Mohammed," British authorities and her lawyer reported. An undated amateur photo of Gillian Gibbons, who has been found guilty of insulting religion. Gillian Gibbons also faces deportation from Sudan after her prison term, her lawyer told CNN. He said that he was "very disappointed" with the verdict and that Gibbons planned to appeal. Gibbons was not convicted of two other charges brought against her inciting hatred and showing contempt for religious beliefs, her lawyer said. Gibbons, 54, was arrested Sunday after she asked her class of 7-year-olds in Khartoum to name the stuffed animal as part of a school project, the British Foreign Office said. She had faced charges under Article 125 of Sudan's constitution, the law relating to insulting religion and inciting hatred. Although there is no ban in the Quran on images of Allah or the Prophet Mohammed, Islam's founder, likenesses are considered highly offensive by Muslims. Watch latest developments in the case. » . Appearing somber and dazed, Gibbons arrived at the central courthouse in Khartoum for her closed hearing early Thursday. A staff member from the British Embassy in Khartoum and defense lawyers attended the hearing with her. The courthouse was heavily guarded by police, who kept journalists and, for a while, even one of her attorneys away. Gibbons could have faced a sentence of 40 lashes, a fine, or a jail term of up to a year, according to the Foreign Office, which expressed Britain's dissatisfaction with the verdict. "We are extremely disappointed that the charges against Gillian Gibbons were not dismissed," Foreign Secretary David Miliband said in a statement issued shortly after the verdict was announced. "As I said this morning, our clear view is that this is an innocent misunderstanding by a dedicated teacher. Our priority now is to ensure Ms. Gibbons' welfare, and we will continue to provide consular assistance to her. I have called in the Sudanese ambassador, Omer Siddig, this evening to explain the decision and discuss next steps." Watch a report on reactions to the verdict » . The Foreign Office said Gibbons would be given credit for the four days since her arrest, meaning that the she has 11 days remaining on her sentence. Earlier, Miliband had met with Siddig, who was summoned to the Foreign Office in London. "I explained to him that we were very concerned by the case. We believe that this was an innocent misunderstanding," Miliband said in a statement released Thursday after the meeting. "The Sudanese ambassador undertook to ensure our concerns were relayed to Khartoum at the highest level. He also said he would reflect back to Khartoum the real respect for the Islamic religion in this country," the statement added. On the first floor of the courthouse, around 25 police linked arms and forced journalists and British officials away from the court entrance. Police detained some journalists, and confiscated a camera belonging to a freelance CNN cameraman. Four vans filled with riot police were waiting outside the courthouse, but there were no signs of street disturbances or protests. Staff from Gibbons' school, including Robert Boulos, the head of Unity High School, were present. The staff members refused to comment on their colleague's predicament. On Wednesday, Boulos said he was "horrified" when he found out that the complaint about the naming of the bear came from a member of his own staff not from a parent, as originally thought. Defense counsel later confirmed that the complaint came from Sarah Khawad, a secretary at the school. Gibbons has been working at the school popular with wealthy Sudanese and expatriates since August, after leaving her position as deputy head teacher at a primary school in Liverpool, England, this summer, Boulos said. He said Gibbons asked the children to pick their favorite name for the new class mascot, which she was using to aid lessons about animals and their habitats. E-mail to a friend . Journalist Andrew Heavens contributed to this report. Copyright 2007 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report. |
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