World News joined 0012

[Black Widow]

Detectives are interviewing Clark Rockefeller - the man accused of kidnapping his seven-year-old daughter - about a suspected double murder.

Two murder detectives from Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department are to fly to Boston to speak to Rockefeller about the crime.

Steve Whitmore, a spokesman for the LA County Sheriff Department confirmed Rockefeller was a "person of interest" in the case of Jonathan and Linda Sohus - a couple from San Marino, California who were reported missing in 1985.

Accoring to media reports a man named Christopher Chichester lived on the Sohus property at the time, but also disappeared and was never questioned by police.

Mr Whitmore said: "We want to find out if he (Rockefeller) is indeed Christopher Chichester.

"And if so, if there's anything he can tell us about the disappearance and possible homicide of the Sohuses."

In 1994, three plastic bags containing human remains, found by workers digging a swimming pool in San Marino, were linked to the Sohus case but never identified.

Rockefeller's attorney, Stephen Hrones, denied his client had any link to the California case and said Clark Rockefeller was his legal name.

Rockefeller - who is also known by several other aliases - appeared at Boston Municipal Court on Tuesday on charges related to the July 27 disappearance of his daughter, Reigh Boss.

Suffolk District Attorney Dan Conley said they have no record of him before 1993 and said Rockefeller has claimed he does not remember details ranging from where he is from, where his parents are and even whether he is from the US.

Assistant district attorney David Deakin said in court: "At this point, he provided essentially no biographical data about himself before 1993."

He added that after thousands of hours' work by the FBI, local and state officials and Homeland Security, authorities were still unsure of the details of Rockefeller's real identity.

Police say Rockefeller, 48, snatched his daughter from a Boston street on July 27 in an elaborately-planned kidnapping in which he hired two people to drive them to New York.

He was caught Saturday in Baltimore, where he had bought a home and boat.

Mr Deakin said 300 1oz gold coins and £6,000 in cash also were found in Rockefeller's apartment following his arrest.

In court on Tuesday charges of felony parental kidnapping, assault and battery and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon were read to Rockefeller.

His lawyer, Stephen Hrones, said his client maintained he did not kidnap his daughter.

His daughter Reigh, known to family and friends as "Snooks", was found in good condition in Baltimore and has been reunited with her mother, Sandra Boss.

A pre-trial hearing for Rockefeller is set for September 3 this year.


sky news

[OMEN]

Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf has cancelled his scheduled visit to China, a member of his entourage said, as opponents in the coalition government consulted over his possible impeachment.

"We have been told that the president's visit to China has been cancelled," said the official, who had been due to fly with Musharraf on Wednesday to attend opening ceremonies for the Beijing Olympics and meet with the Chinese leadership.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Sadiq confirmed the visit had been called off. The president's spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

Musharraf, a US ally who came to power as a general in a 1999 coup, has become overwhelmingly unpopular. His allies were defeated in an election in February that stripped him of parliamentary support.

Yet, he has resisted pressure to quit, and has insisted that he was willing to work with the new civilian government.

Asif Ali Zardari, the head of the ruling alliance, met his major coalition partner and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif in Islamabad on Tuesday to discuss issues that have bedeviled their four-month-old coalition government.

Sharif said before the talks he was looking for a decisive meeting with Zardari to discuss the contentious issues of Musharraf's impeachment and restoration of Supreme Court judges who were dismissed by the president last November during a brief period of emergency rule.

A spokesman for Zardari's Pakistan People's Party told reporters after Tuesday's meeting the two had reached a consensus on major issues and would meet again on Wednesday for more discussion.

Sharif, the prime minister Musharraf overthrew, wants wheels set in motion to impeach the embattled president, but Zardari has until now warded off a confrontation with Musharraf, who neither the army nor the United States wants to see humiliated.

Sharif withdrew his party's ministers from Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani's cabinet in May, but did not go as far as pulling out of the coalition completely.

The intense uncertainty has taken a toll on Pakistani markets, with the main Karachi Stock Exchange index hitting near 23-month lows earlier this week, while the rupee edged closer to all-time lows posted in early July.

Investors have harboured doubts over whether the civilian coalition government has the ability to handle widening trade and fiscal deficits and inflation at a three-decade high.

Reuters

[OMEN]

Four foreign protesters displaying a "Free Tibet" banner in the Chinese capital were held by police, state media reported, as the Olympic Games torch made its way through the city.

They were "displaying a pro-Tibet independence banner in English," said the brief report from the Xinhua news agency. It did not describe their nationality.

The three men and one woman gathered near the main Bird's Nest Stadium, where the Games will open, and two of the men climbed electricity poles to unfurl the banner, said Xinhua.

Police rushed to the scene after 12 minutes and took them away, the report said.

The Beijing Games torch relay was dogged by protests over Chinese rule in Tibet when it made its way through Paris, London and other cities earlier this year. On Wednesday, the torch began the final stage of its relay through Beijing, under tight security ahead of the Games opening on Friday.

China has accused followers of the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan Buddhist leader, of stirring riots and protests in Tibetan regions in March in a bid to upstage Olympic preparations. The Dalai Lama has denied the claim and said he does not oppose the Games.

But groups campaigning for an independent Tibet have said the Beijing Olympics should be an opportunity to voice criticism of Chinese policy.

Reuters

[OMEN]

Sri Lankan troops killed 42 Tamil Tiger guerrillas in two days of fighting in the north of the island, the military said, pressing on with an offensive against rebel strongholds.

Government jets also bombed a Sea Tiger base in the northern rebel held district of Mullaitivu, destroying two boats.

There was no comment from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam fighting for an independent homeland for minority Tamils. Independent confirmation of battlefield casualties is not possible, and analysts say both sides tend to exaggerate enemy losses while playing down their own.

"Troops attacked LTTE forward defence line in Muhamalai in seven directions this morning," said a spokesman at the Media Center for National Security. "Monitoring of rebel communications confirmed five LTTE terrorists were killed and 25 others were wounded in the confrontation."

On Tuesday, troops killed 37 rebels in fighting in the northern region. The army lost four soldiers.

Sri Lanka's government is pursuing a strategy to gradually retake the Tiger's northern stronghold and win the 25-year civil war that has killed more than 70,000 people.

Last week the government said troops had entered Kilinochchi district where the rebels' de facto capital by the same name is located.

Reuters

[Black Widow]

FILTHY hospital wards are crawling with rats, cockroaches, flies and maggots, it has been revealed.

Shock new figures show there were 20,000 separate infestations in just over two years.

Virtually every NHS trust in the country has been hit by the stomach-churning crisis.

And experts fear the legions of pests help spread infections in our hospitals — which are already battling superbugs such as MRSA and Clostridium difficile (C-diff).

Cases exposed in a bombshell dossier published today by the Conservatives include:


RATS in maternity units;


COCKROACHES found on sick kids’ wards and a urology unit;


MAGGOTS in patients’ slippers and mortuaries;


WARDS “over-run” by mice and ants.


The crisis is so bad that 70 per cent of trusts had to call in pest exterminators 50 OR MORE times between January 2006 and March 2008.

Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust alone recorded the most incidents.




Concerns

The sickening figures reveal two-thirds of trusts in England had problems with rats, biting insects and fleas.

Six out of 10 had suffered cockroach infestations.

Rat plague ... Cartoon

Rat plague ... Cartoon

Four out of five had reported mice and ants on the wards.

One in 20 had problems with maggots.

Drain flies infested operating theatres at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.

Fruit flies were found in a “sterile” room at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham.

And unidentified insects were discovered in operating theatres at Trafford NHS Trust, Greater Manchester.

The scale of the crisis — exposed by Freedom of Information requests — will raise fresh concerns about the state of our hospitals.

The Tories said the revelations would appal patients and their families.

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: “Labour have said over and over again that they will improve cleanliness in our hospitals but these figures clearly show that they are failing.

“It is difficult for health service estates to maintain a completely pest-free environment but the level and variety of these infestations is concerning.

Hygiene

“We need greater transparency in NHS infection control, and publishing data like this is one way we can drive up overall hygiene standards.”

Advertisement

Hospital bosses last night insisted that they were doing everything they could to control rats, cockroaches and maggots.

The Conservatives contacted all 171 trusts in England about problems with pest control.

A total of 127 — or 74 per cent — responded.

A spokesman for pest experts Rentokil said: “Most buildings attract pests in some form or another and hospitals are no different.

“Large buildings, with many people coming and going, that can be good environments for pests. Hospitals do require ongoing pest prevention and not just pest control. People come in and out of schools and workers in offices go home at the end of the day, but hospitals look after people who can be immobile for a period of time “As such, pest prevention has been and will continue to be top of the mind for hospitals.”


the sun

[JohnCenaFan28]

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[JohnCenaFan28]

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[JohnCenaFan28]

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[JohnCenaFan28]

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[JohnCenaFan28]

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[JohnCenaFan28]

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[JohnCenaFan28]

A US military jury at Guantanamo Bay has convicted Osama Bin Laden's former driver of supporting terrorism.



The verdict on Salim Hamdan is the first to be delivered in a full war crimes trial at the US prison in Cuba.

The jury found Hamdan guilty of five of eight charges of supporting terrorism but acquitted him of two separate, more serious, charges of conspiracy.

A sentencing hearing is now under way. Hamdan, a Yemeni aged about 40, faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.

The White House said the trial was fair and looked forward to more tribunals.

The defence team has said it plans to appeal, while rights groups have condemned the trial as unjust.

'Vital role'

Hamdan, who was captured in Afghanistan in November 2001, was initially impassive when the verdict began to be read out. But the BBC's Kim Ghattas, at the trial, said he later appeared to break down in tears.

Our correspondent says the defence team's appeal could go as far as the Supreme Court.

One of the defence lawyers, Michael Berrigan, said: "Is material support a war crime? The defence believes it is not. That issue will go forward on appeal."

The jury of six military officers had deliberated for about eight hours over three days in the first US war crimes trial since World War II.

The prosecution had said Hamdan played a "vital role" in the conspiracy behind the 9/11 attacks. But defence lawyers said he was a low-level employee.

The BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington says US President George W Bush will hope to use the conclusion of the first full trial as evidence that the Guantanamo Bay system does actually work.

In its first response, the White House said Hamdan had received a "fair trial".

Spokesman Tony Fratto said: "The Military Commission system is a fair and appropriate legal process... We look forward to other cases moving forward to trial."

However, defence lawyers had said they feared a guilty verdict was inevitable and that the system was geared to convict.

Rights group Amnesty International said the trial was "fundamentally flawed" and called for all the remaining military tribunals to be halted and for proceedings to be moved to civilian courts.

'Guilt by association'

Hamdan had admitted working for Bin Laden in Afghanistan from 1997 to 2001 for $200 (£99) a month, but said he worked for wages, not to make war on the US.

The defence said the case was "guilt by association".

But the prosecution said Hamdan was an "uncontrollably enthusiastic warrior" for al-Qaeda.

Prosecutor John Murphy had said: "He has wounded, and the people he has worked with have wounded, the world."

About 270 suspects remain in detention in Guantanamo Bay.

Among the dozens of other inmates due to be tried there in the coming months are men accused of plotting the 9/11 attacks.

BBC News

[JohnCenaFan28]

The International Committee of the Red Cross has voiced grave concern over what it says is Colombia's apparent "deliberate misuse" of its symbol.



The ICRC said it had seen video footage that suggested the emblem was used deliberately in July's military mission to free 15 hostages from rebel hands.

The government has apologised to the ICRC but also condemned the leak of the military video to Colombian TV.

Intentional misuse of the symbol would be a breach of the Geneva Conventions.

The Geneva-based ICRC says the footage shown on Colombian TV on Monday indicates that the emblem was being used before the operation to free the hostages from Farc guerrillas had even begun, indicating intentional misuse.

"If authenticated, these images would clearly establish an improper use of the Red Cross emblem, which we deplore," said ICRC deputy director of operations Dominik Stillhart.

Mr Stillhart said they were seeking further clarification from the Colombian government.

'Nervous soldier'

Rescuers tricked rebels into releasing French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and the other hostages by posing as international aid workers.

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe subsequently acknowledged that a Red Cross symbol was worn by a member of the military taking part in the 2 July rescue mission.

Mr Uribe said he had apologised to the Red Cross for the error, which he said had been made by a nervous soldier acting against orders.

Speaking on Tuesday, after the video was shown on Colombian TV, Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos apologised again to the ICRC.

"The emblem...was used from the beginning of the operation. We are very sorry that this has happened. But the government, the president and (armed forces chief) General Padilla said the truth that we knew at the time," Mr Santos said.

But Mr Santos also condemned the leak of the video, saying those responsible had been identified and would be punished.

"This video contains material that was leaked by members of the security forces, from our army. This leak was a product of disloyalty, possibly corruption or even treason because it puts at risk the lives of people who are dedicated to defending the fatherland," he said.

Neutrality

The Colombian government has said the rescue was the result of long preparation, eavesdropping on rebel communications and deception of guerrillas on the ground, allowing the hostages to be liberated without loss of life.

Officials also stressed how the mission had been carried out without loss of life.

Falsely portraying military personnel as Red Cross workers is against the Geneva Conventions because it could put humanitarian workers at risk when carrying out missions in war zones.

It also undermines the neutrality of the Red Cross.

At the end of July, Farc guerrillas handed eight people they had kidnapped the week before to ICRC representatives, suggesting the rebels have not lost faith in the humanitarian organisation, correspondents say.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) have been fighting the Colombian state for more than four decades and are believed to still hold several hundred hostages.

BBC News

[OMEN]

Nine firemen are believed dead after a helicopter transporting them to a northern California wildfire crashed, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman said.

FAA spokesman Ian Gregor said on a recorded telephone message that another four aboard the helicopter were critically burned in the crash on Tuesday evening approximately 35 miles (56 km) northwest of Redding in remote terrain.

The helicopter, with a two-person crew and carrying 11 firefighters, crashed under unknown circumstances, Gregor said.

FAA and National Transportation Safety Board investigators are on the way to the scene of the crash, Gregor added.

Reuters

[OMEN]

REST IN PEACE: The body of writer and former Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn lies in state at the Academy of Science in Moscow.
Clutching a bunch of blood red roses, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin joined hundreds of elderly Russians laying flowers at the foot of Soviet dissident writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn's open coffin.

Solzhenitsyn, a Nobel laureate who won international fame by showing the world the horror of Soviet labour camps through his books, died of heart failure on Sunday aged 89.

Four Russian soldiers stood to attention at each corner of his coffin in the Russian Academy of Sciences, the hallmark of an official lying-in-state. A large portrait of Solzhenitsyn and a Russian flag completed the backdrop.

Outside the mammoth white building overlooking the River Moskva, a steady trickle of mainly elderly Russians shrugged off heavy rain to mourn their hero.

Solzhenitsyn's widow Natalia and his sons looked on as mourners brought small bouquets of white or red flowers to lay before his coffin.

"Solzhenitsyn was one of the most important people in the history of Russia; he wrote exactly what he thought and needed to be remembered," said maths professor Alexander Romanov, 60.

"It's a shame that not all young people understand how important he is."

At around 1 p.m. Putin, a former agent of the KGB security service that led the persecution campaign against Solzhenitsyn, strode into the hall flanked by burly security guards.

He laid flowers at the foot of the coffin, quickly looked at Solzhenitsyn's white, waxy face, crossed himself and turned towards the family.

Putin then spoke to Solzhenitsyn's widow for about five minutes before walking off.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev plans to attend the funeral on Wednesday.

Solzhenitsyn attracted international attention after the publication in 1962 of "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich", which chronicled the life of a labour camp prisoner.

CRITICAL OF MODERN RUSSIA

Josef Stalin's forced collectivisation of farmers and purges in the 1930s, followed by fierce repression after World War Two, killed millions of people in the Soviet Union.

Solzhenitsyn won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970 and later wrote "The Gulag Archipelago", a chronicle of his own and thousands of other prison camp experiences.

The Soviet Union stripped him of his citizenship in 1974 and he moved to the United States until the fall of Communism.

Since his return, Russian leaders have treated Solzhenitsyn with great deference, though he became increasingly critical of corruption in modern Russia, which has grown rich over the last decade due to high energy and commodity prices.

His influenced waned as he grew older, and for most young Russians Solzhenitsyn had already become a historical figure.

"The young know he wrote important books about the camps and that he received the Nobel prize, but that's all we really know. He's more important for the older generations," said football trainer Alexander Selemenev, 27, on his way to work.

He said he respected Solzhenitsyn because he was not afraid to tell the truth. "But recently in politics, for Russia, it's not clear what he has done," he said.

Russia's main television channels ran lengthy reports on their news programmes and documentaries on Solzhenitsyn's life.

But not all media reports remembered Solzhenitsyn kindly. The Communist party newspaper Pravda called him a radical critic who produced one-sided accounts of Stalin's rule.

"He became one of the main battering rams in destroying both the state and nation ... that is why he is being applauded so rapturously by both Russian President Medvedev and U.S. President Bush!" it wrote in a commentary.

Reuters

[JohnCenaFan28]

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Thanks for the news.

[JohnCenaFan28]

A serious oil supply crisis is looming, which could push prices above $200 a barrel, a think tank has warned.



A "supply crunch" will affect the world market within the next five to 10 years, the Chatham House report said.

While there is plenty of oil in the ground, companies and governments were failing to invest enough to ensure production, it added.

Only a collapse in demand can stave off the looming crisis, report author Professor Paul Stevens said.

"In reality, the only possibility of avoiding such a crunch appears to be if a major recession reduces demand - and even then such an outcome may only postpone the problem," he said in The Coming Oil Supply Crunch.

Lack of funding

Prof Stevens warned that investment in new oil supplies has been inadequate as oil firms prefer to return profits to shareholders rather than reinvest it.

Furthermore, oil producing cartel Opec has failed to meet plans to expand its capacity since 2005.

He also argued that a "resurgence of resource nationalism" means that governments are "starving" their national oil companies of investment by excluding international oil firms from helping to develop capacity.

"While the forecast is controversial and extremely bullish, even allowing for some increase in capacity over the next few years, a supply crunch appears likely around 2013," he added.

"The implication is that it will quickly translate into a price spike although there is a question over how strategic stocks might be used to alleviate this."

Unpopular measures

However, Prof Stevens does conclude that only "extreme policy measures could achieve a speedy response" in boosting supplies and lowering oil prices - a move that is likely to be "politically unpopular".

Other, longer-term moves suggested by the report include offering support to help oil-exporters to manage "resource curse" - where an abundance of natural resources can damage a country's economy - and allowing Opec to join the International Energy Authority's emergency sharing scheme.

The report comes just days after oil prices slipped from peaks near $150 a barrel.

BBC News

[JohnCenaFan28]

At least 21 people have been killed by a car bomb in northern Iraq.



About 70 people were also injured when the bomb exploded in a vegetable market in Tal Afar, 420km (260 miles) north-west of Baghdad.

The town, near Mosul, is in a region where al-Qaeda in Iraq is said to have regrouped since being forced from Baghdad by a US and Iraqi offensive.

The vehicle was parked when it exploded by the market, which was crowded with shoppers on the Muslim day of rest.

In March 2006, Tal Afar was hailed as a model Iraqi town by US President George W Bush, but almost exactly a year later it was the target of one of the deadliest attacks in Iraq's insurgency, when more than 150 people were killed in a truck bombing.

In recent months there have been military operations in the area, says the BBC's Crispin Thorold in Baghdad.

But this attack demonstrates once again that Sunni Muslim insurgents still have the ability to bring death to Iraq's streets, our correspondent adds.

BBC News

[Black Widow]

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