World News joined 5

[OMEN]

Japan will study the safety of cloned animals for food, after a report concluded there is no biological difference in the meat and milk of cloned and non-cloned cattle, officials said yesterday.

"The safety commission has been asked to deliberate on the matter," an Agriculture Ministry official said.

It was not immediately clear how long it would take for the Food Safety Commission, Japan's food safety watchdog which will be looking into the issue, to reach a conclusion.

"There is no prior case that we can compare it with," an official with the commission said. He said the safety of cloned cattle and also pigs would be studied.

Many Japanese consumers, notoriously sensitive to food safety, are likely to oppose moves to introduce meat or milk from cloned animals into the human food supply, however.

The farm ministry official said Japan has been breeding cloned cattle since 1998.

As of September last year, a cumulative total 535 cloned cattle had been bred in Japan, all for research purposes.

The United States is ahead of Japan as it has already made a final risk assessment.

The US Food and Drug Administration ruled in January that food from cloned cattle, hogs and goats and their offspring is as safe as other food, opening the door to bringing the meat and milk from cloned animals into the food supply chain.

US industry sources have said, however, it could take four or five years before clone-derived food becomes widely available to consumers.

Reuters

[JohnCenaFan28]

Finally! I've been wanting them to test cloned food for a long while now! Thanks for this read.

[OMEN]

Police in Western Australia are baffled by the mysterious disappearance of a family of three and their friend, who told family last July that they were going for a holiday to Brazil.

The missing person's unit has been investigating the case for several months but has so far drawn a complete blank, and is now appealing to the public for help.

Chantelle McDougall, 27, originally from Victoria, her English partner Simon Kadwell, 45, and their six-year-old daughter Leela had been living in a house 10km out of Nannup, in WA's south-west.

They lived in the town for about 18 months after moving down from Perth, while a friend, Antonio Popic, 40, was living in a caravan in the backyard.

Acting Sergeant Fiona Caporn said today Ms McDougall told her mother Cathy in July they were going away on holidays to Brazil.

They called their real estate agent to say they were leaving and he could have their furniture, packed up their belongings and on July 13 travelled to Busselton where they sold their car.

It was the last time they were seen.

"There's nothing to say where they are, their location and whereabouts are unknown," Sgt Caporn said.

She said the family largely kept to themselves, but there was no indication of foul play.

Police said the bank accounts of the three adults were untouched, and Centrelink, Medicare and immigration checks had revealed nothing.

Ms McDougall and her daughter were only reported missing in October when her parents called police, while Mr Popic's brother reported him missing in November.

"Chantelle's parents didn't report them missing for a while because they were under the belief they had gone on a holiday, but all our information at this stage states they are still in Australia," Sgt Caporn said.

Police say they have not yet identified Mr Kadwell's next of kin.

AAP

[JohnCenaFan28]

Interesting...thanks for the story, I'll want to read more of this.

[OMEN]

Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have accused potential White House opponent John McCain of favouring the wealthy and turning his back on struggling workers and middle-class families.

The Democratic presidential contenders, campaigning in Pennsylvania ahead of their April 22 showdown, took a break from attacking each other to portray the Arizona senator as uncertain and untested on economic issues.

In separate appearances but similar language, they said McCain would take his economic cues from President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

"John McCain admits he doesn't understand the economy - and unfortunately he's proving it in this campaign," Clinton told the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO union group.

"After seven disastrous years of George Bush and Dick Cheney, the stakes in this election couldn't be higher and the need to change course couldn't be more urgent. But John McCain is only offering more of the same," the New York senator said.

Obama, an Illinois senator, said all McCain offers "is four more years of the same George Bush policies that have gotten us into this pickle".

He noted McCain's support for extending Bush's tax cuts, which Obama said would help the wealthy, and his support for trade agreements that Obama said do not protect US workers.

"His response to the housing crisis amounts to little more than standing on the sidelines and watching millions of Americans lose their homes," Obama said in Wilkes-Barre.

The winner of the Democratic nominating battle between Clinton and Obama will face McCain in November's election, and in recent days both candidates have toned down their attacks on each other to focus more directly on McCain.

They have criticised the former Navy fighter pilot and prisoner of war in Vietnam for saying he does not know as much about the economy as he does about national security and military issues.

McCain, on a week-long tour highlighting his military service and life story, visited his former high school outside Washington, DC, on Tuesday.

He said he will soon offer a plan with specifics to help homeowners who are having trouble paying their mortgages because of adjustable-rate loans.

"Senator Clinton's attacks on John McCain are a desperate attempt to change the focus away from the divisive battle within the Democratic Party," said Republican National Committee spokesman Alex Conant.

He challenged Clinton to explain how she will pay for her new spending proposals.

Clinton proposed a plan on Tuesday to create 3 million jobs through increased investments over 10 years in the US infrastructure, and proposed a $US10 billion ($NZ12.88 billion) emergency fund for critical repairs to bridges and highways.

"People ask me, `What are the issues in this campaign? I say, jobs, jobs jobs and jobs'," Clinton said at a rally in Wilkes-Barre.

On Wednesday, Clinton planned to announce "insourcing" initiatives that would produce $US7 billion a year in expanded tax credits and incentives to encourage companies to create and invest jobs in the United States, her campaign said.

Her proposals would eliminate incentives and close tax loopholes for companies that outsource jobs and use the savings to help create US-based jobs, the campaign said.

Part of the plan would be a $US5 billion tax credit for communities hard hit by global competition and trade, it said.

Clinton and Obama were in Pennsylvania on Tuesday ahead of the next contest when 158 pledged delegates will be at stake.

Some Democrats are concerned the prolonged campaign will hurt the eventual winner in the match-up with McCain.

But Clinton, who trails Obama in pledged delegates won in state-by-state contests, has rejected calls to step aside.

Neither candidate is likely to have the 2024 delegates needed to win the nomination after the contests end in early June, leaving the decision up to nearly 800 superdelegates - elected officials and party insiders who are free to back any candidate.

US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the campaign should continue through the end of voting, and repeated her view that superdelegates should not be perceived to overturn the will of the voters.

"I think the election has to run its course," Pelosi said on ABC's Good Morning America.

"I do think that it is important for us to get behind one candidate a long time before we go to the Democratic National Convention if we hope to win in November," she said.

Obama also played down worries the long campaign would hurt the eventual Democratic nominee.

"I think this contest has been good for the Democratic Party. We've brought in all kinds of new people into the process. And I think that bodes well for November," he said on NBC's Today show.

Reuters

[JohnCenaFan28]

Thanks for the news.

[OMEN]

The victim didn't know why police had wanted her to come and see them. She certainly didn't know what they wanted to show her. She was aghast to find out.

Australian police played her video footage of herself and a man called John Xydias. She lay on a bed, apparently drugged.

The video showed Xydias undressing her and re-dressing her in his own female underwear.

Then he carefully repositioned her unconscious body and his video camera to best advantage for what was to come next: he raped her in every possible way.

If she began to stir, he would quickly move off the bed, cover her and turn off the light.

According to a prosecution summary tendered to the Melbourne Magistrates Court yesterday, the film showed Xydias assaulting her "time after time".

Watching the videos with police, the woman was distraught.

She felt so sick and was crying so hard she had to call a halt to the viewing.

She told police that she firmly believed Xydias had rendered her unconscious.

Six other women also endured the ordeal of watching themselves being raped and intimately assaulted while they were unconscious.

Four of the other alleged victims Xydias filmed have yet to be identified and two were conscious when he attacked them.

Police describe Xydias as one of Victoria's worst sex offenders. Yesterday he was committed to stand trial on 225 sex-related charges, including 69 of rape, related to 13 victims aged from about 20 to 45.

One woman was kept unconscious at his holiday home in Dromana and raped repeatedly over three days.

Xydias did not formally enter a plea yesterday but lawyer Remy Van de Wiel, QC, said he would plead guilty "to an appropriate presentment".

Xydias smiled dreamily as he entered court. Dressed in a pale blue denim shirt, his honey-blond hair tied back in a scraggly ponytail, he nodded his head rhythmically at various points in the proceedings. When he stood, he clasped his hands in front of his chubby stomach.

According to the prosecution summary of charges Xydias, 44, a Glen Iris chef, first came to the attention of police in March 2006. They were tipped off about a DVD that had once been in his possession that contained footage of "numerous women".

Police linked the footage to a hidden camera in the wall of a change room that was set up for cabaret singers and dancers at the bouzouki club Kinisi Live in Richmond's Church Street.

Police obtained warrants and raided Xydias' family home in Glen Iris and a holiday home in Dromana. They found many tapes, female underwear, photographs of female genitals, cameras and a video camera and tripod.

Thirteen video tapes and four video camera tapes were found to contain explicit footage of Xydias raping unconscious women.

The prosecution summary says Xydias had both legal and illegal supplies of the sedative Rohypnol (known as a date-rape drug).

It is suggested he used alcohol and cannabis and laced victims' coffee or other drinks with Rohypnol to render them unconscious.

One woman reported that he had an appetite for pornography.

Xydias met one of his victims through a phone dating service and others socially, including two through his friend Harry William Barkas, 45, of South Yarra.

Barkas was arrested on August 23 last year and is facing 77 charges including rape and abduction relating to attacks on 30 alleged victims. He is due to appear at the Melbourne Magistrates Court for a committal mention on May 2.

Xydias was arrested two months earlier, on June 15, and interviewed by the sexual crimes squad.

According to the prosecution summary, he appeared co-operative but provided few names of his victims and gave some incorrect names.

He acknowledged his presence in the videos and the sexual acts but said he was having consensual sex with conscious women and claimed some of the women had filmed him (a claim the victims denied).

The summary says: "The defendant stated that when he was sexually involved with a conscious victim, the free agreement carried on through their loss of consciousness.

"This is despite the fact that numerous victims have never been consensually sexually involved with the defendant.

"The defendant failed to admit he rendered the victims unconscious through the use of drugs or other substances, basically blaming the victim for her loss of consciousness."

He did not show any remorse and did not apologise for his actions: "It was clear the defendant was attempting to avoid prosecution for his actions with absurd explanations."

Xydias was remanded to appear in the County Court on April 29

.

Reuters

[JohnCenaFan28]

Thanks for the story.

[OMEN]

Flights to Canada and the United States were targets in an alleged plot to blow up airliners over the Atlantic Ocean, British prosecutors said Wednesday in London.

Canadian officials say some of the targeted flights included Air Canada flights to Montreal and Toronto.

Prosecutors allege eight British men planned to carry small bombs — made with liquid explosives — in plastic drink containers on board the planes in 2006.

All eight are accused of conspiracy to murder and of planning acts of violence likely to endanger the safety of an aircraft. Both charges carry maximum sentences of life imprisonment.

The trial is set to begin Thursday in London.

Judge David Calvert-Smith told about 100 prospective jurors during a selection hearing on Wednesday that the trial would be long and complex.

"This case concerns an allegation that in 2006 a number of men planned to create bombs which some of their number would take on board passenger aircraft flying from London Heathrow to various destinations in Canada and the U.S.A.," Calvert-Smith said.

The suspects were arrested last August in a two-day operation that led to the cancellations of hundreds of flights in and out of Britain.

Ahmed Abdullah Ali, Assad Sarwar, Tanvir Hussain, Umar Islam, Arafat Waheed Khan, Ibrahim Savant, Waheed Zaman, and Mohammed Gulzar are the eight charged.

CBC

[JohnCenaFan28]

Thanks for the story.