Greece to miss deficit target imposed by lenders (BLOG)

ATHENS, Greece — Greece won't meet 2011-2012 deficit targets imposed by international lenders as part of the country's bailout, the Finance Ministry said Sunday.

The country's deficit this year is expected to reach 8.5 percent of gross domestic product, or €18.69 billion ($25.2 billion) — higher than the targeted €17.1 billion ($23.1 billion), which would have been 7.8 percent of GDP, the ministry said.

Greece has been reliant since May 2010 on regular payouts of loans from a €110 billion ($150 billion) bailout from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund. It was granted a second €109 billion package in July, but details of that deal remain to be worked out.

The Finance Ministry said the missed target was because of a deeper-than-expected recession, with the economy contracting by 5.5 percent instead of the 3.8 percent estimate made in May. It implied the deficit could even exceed this level by the end of the year unless all new austerity measures were implemented.

"The final estimate for a deficit equal to 8.5 percent of GDP can be achieved, if there is a proper response by the state authorities and the citizens themselves, on whose stance the country's financial ... and social future depends," the announcement said.

The announcement reflects the government's frustration with tax collection, which they blame on tax inspectors' lax performance, and its fear that citizens, angry at seeing their wages shrink and, at the same time, having to pay an increasing amount of one-off taxes, would refuse to pay.

There are already widespread calls not to pay a property surcharge, to be included in the next batch of state electricity company bills, despite the fact that delinquent payers are threatened with having their houses disconnected from the grid. The government hopes that revenue from the property levy will raise about €2 billion ($2.7 billion) in 2011 and a similar amount in 2012.

The 2012 budget is projected to reduce the deficit to €14.68 billion ($19.82 billion), or 6.8 percent of GDP, up from the 6.5 percent target agreed with Greece's lenders. Excluding serving Greece's debt, the budget is projected to have a primary surplus of €3.2 billion, or 1.5 percent of GDP, meaning that Greece's debt will stop growing, as a percentage of GDP.

The Cabinet also decided up to 28,000 public sector employees will be placed on "reserve" — that is, suspended with reduced pay, by the end of 2011.

The program falls short of the 30,000 reduction demanded by Greece's creditors and, with few exceptions, it is actually an early retirement program on full pensions. Those affected will be paid a fraction of their actual salary for a period of one to two years, but will be able, at the same time, to hold jobs in the private sector, if they can find them.

"The approved proposal is the result of lengthy and difficult negotiations with (the lenders) who insisted that placing employees on reserve should have been a step towards firing them and not an early retirement" program, government spokesman Elias Mossialos said.

The government expects savings of €300 million from the plan in 2012.

The cabinet committed itself to reducing civil service jobs by 150,000 within four years.

More than 100 inmates escape prison in Congo (BLOG)

KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — An official in Congo says more than 100 people escaped from a jail in the country's second prison break this month.

Kasai Occidental governor Hubert Kabasubabu Katulondji said Monday that 114 prisoners fled the prison in Tshikapa Sunday as an ill prisoner was being taken to the hospital.

He says police have captured 90 escaped convicts and that one inmate died.

However, Tshikapa resident Henri Tshibuyi says two people died. He says one prisoner was shot dead and another died after being wounded.

Prisoners at the facility had complained previously over a lack of food and water at the prison.

Nearly 970 prisoners escaped from a prison in the city of Lubumbashi earlier this month.

Japan finds radiation in rice, more tests planned (BLOG)

TOKYO (AP) — Japan is ordering more tests on rice growing near a crippled nuclear plant after finding elevated levels of radiation, government officials said Saturday.

A sample of unharvested rice contained 500 becquerels of cesium per kilogram, they said. Radioactive cesium was spewed from the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant after it was damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami on March 11.

Under Japanese regulations, rice with up to 500 becquerels of cesium per kilogram is considered safe for consumption.

Officials have tested rice from more than 400 spots in Fukushima prefecture. The highest level of cesium previously found was 136 becquerels per kilogram, prefectural official Kazuhiko Kanno said.

News of the elevated radiation level in rice from Nihonmatsu city, 55 kilometers (35 miles) west of the nuclear plant, set off alarm in the Japanese media.

The government has been testing vegetables and fish for radiation since the disaster, in which backup generators and cooling systems failed at the plant and the cores of three reactors melted.

Some nations have stopped importing some food products from Japan. Japanese consumers are nervous about radiation, but campaigns to buy from Fukushima have drawn support around the nation.

Woman decapitated in Mexico for web posting (BLOG)

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Police found a woman's decapitated body in a Mexican border city on Saturday, alongside a handwritten sign saying she was killed in retaliation for her postings on a social networking site.

The gruesome killing may be the third so far this month in which people in Nuevo Laredo were killed by a drug cartel for what they said on the internet.

Morelos Canseco, the interior secretary of northern Tamaulipas state, where Nuevo Laredo is located, identified the victim as Marisol Macias Castaneda, a newsroom manager for the Nuevo Laredo newspaper Primera Hora.

The newspaper has not confirmed that title, and an employee of the paper said Macias Castaneda held an administrative post, not a reporting job. The employee was not authorized to be quoted by name.

But it was apparently what the woman posted on the local social networking site, Nuevo Laredo en Vivo, or "Nuevo Laredo Live," rather than her role at the newspaper, that resulted in her killing.

The site prominently features tip hotlines for the Mexican army, navy and police, and includes a section for reporting the location of drug gang lookouts and drug sales points — possibly the information that angered the cartel.

The message found next to her body on the side of a main thoroughfare referred to the nickname the victim purportedly used on the site, "La Nena de Laredo," or "Laredo Girl." Her head was found placed on a large stone piling nearby.

"Nuevo Laredo en Vivo and social networking sites, I'm The Laredo Girl, and I'm here because of my reports, and yours," the message read. "For those who don't want to believe, this happened to me because of my actions, for believing in the army and the navy. Thank you for your attention, respectfully, Laredo Girl...ZZZZ."

The letter "Z'' refers to the hyper-violent Zetas drug cartel, which is believed to dominate the city across from Laredo, Texas.

It was unclear how the killers found out her real identity.

By late Saturday, the chat room at Nuevo Laredo en Vivo was abuzz with fellow posters who said they knew the victim from her online postings, and railing against the Zetas, a gang founded by military deserters who have become known for mass killings and gruesome executions.

They described her as a frequent poster, who used a laptop or cell phone to send reports.

"Girl why didn't she buy a gun given that she was posting reports about the RatZZZ ... why didn't she buy a gun?" wrote one chat participant under the nickname "Gol."

Earlier this month, a man and a woman were found hanging dead from an overpass in Nuevo Laredo with a similar message threatening "this is what will happen" to internet users. However, it has not been clearly established whether the two had in fact ever posted any messages, or on what sites.

Residents of Mexican border cities often post under nicknames to report drug gang violence, because the posts allow a certain degree of anonymity.

Social media like local chat rooms and blogs, and networking sites like Twitter and Facebook, are often the only outlet for residents of violence-wracked cities to find out what areas to avoid because of ongoing drug cartel shootouts or attacks.

Local media outlets, whose journalists have been hit by killings, kidnappings and threats, are often too intimidated to report the violence.

Mexico's Human Rights Commission says eight journalists have been killed in Mexico this year and 74 since 2000. Other press groups cite lower numbers, and figures differ based on the definition of who is a journalist and whether the killings appeared to involve their professional work.

While helpful, social networking posts sometimes are inaccurate and can lead to chaotic situations in cities wracked by gang confrontations. In the Gulf coast state of Veracruz, just south of Tamaulipas, the state government dropped terrorism charges last week against two Twitter users for false posts that officials said caused panic and chaos in late August.

Typhoon hits Tokyo, grazes nuke crisis zone (BLOG)

(AP) TOKYO - A powerful typhoon slammed into Japan's east Wednesday, leaving six people dead or missing in south-central regions and halting trains in Tokyo before grazing a crippled nuclear plant in the tsunami-ravaged northeast.

Officials at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, where engineers are still struggling with small radiation leaks due to tsunami damage, expressed relief that the heavy rains and driving winds from Typhoon Roke caused no immediate problems there other than a broken security camera.

"The worst seems to be over," said Takeo Iwamoto, spokesman for plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., after the storm passed just west of the plant and then headed north.

More than 200,000 households in central Japan were without electricity late Wednesday.

Typhoon near Japan prompts evac warnings for 1M

Police and local media reported that at least six people were dead or missing in southern and central regions, mostly from being swept away by rivers swollen with rains

The storm, packing sustained winds of up to 90 mph, made landfall in early afternoon near the city of Hamamatsu, about 125 miles west of Tokyo. The fast-moving storm went past the capital in the evening and then headed into the Tohoku region devastated by the March 11 tsunami.

In Tokyo, where many rush hour commuter trains were suspended, thousands of commuters trying to rush home were stuck at stations across the sprawling city.

"The hotels in the vicinity are all booked up, so I'm waiting for the bullet train to restart," Hiromu Harada, a 60-year-old businessman, said dejectedly at Tokyo Station.

Fire department officials reported three people injured in Tokyo. In the trendy shopping district of Shibuya, winds knocked over a tree onto a sidewalk, but no one was hurt. Television footage showed pedestrians struggling to walk straight in powerful winds that made umbrellas useless.

The storm passed just west of the damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, where engineers are still working to stabilize the reactors after three of them melted down when the tsunami cut off power to the plant and its back-up generators.

Iwamoto said the cooling system for the reactors, crucial to keeping them under control, survived the typhoon. A closed-circuit camera that shows exteriors of the damaged reactor buildings abruptly stopped when the storm passed and plant workers were investigating the cause of the problem, he said.

Some construction work around the plant was canceled. Workers were trying to prevent pools of contaminated water in the plant from flooding and leaking outside the complex.

"The contaminated water levels have been rising and we are watching the situation very closely to make sure it stays there," Junchi Matsumoto, another power company spokesman, told reporters.

Heavy rains caused floods and road damage in dozens of locations in Nagoya and several other cities, the Aichi prefectural (state) government said. Parts of Japan's central city of Nagoya, about 170 miles west of Tokyo, were flooded near swollen rivers where rescue workers helped residents evacuate in rubber boats.

Police in nearby Gifu prefecture said a 9-year-old boy and an 84-year-old man were missing after apparently falling into swollen rivers.

More than 200 domestic flights were canceled and some bullet train services were suspended.

Toyota Motor Corp., Japan's No. 1 automaker, which is headquartered in Toyota city in Aichi, shut down its plants as a precaution.

Machinery maker Mitsubishi Heavy Industries told workers to stay home at its five plants and an office in the Nagoya area, company spokesman Hideo Ikuno said.

Nissan Motor Co. spokesman Chris Keeffe said workers at its Yokohama headquarters and nearby technical facilities were being told to go home early for safety reasons, and two plants were not operating.

A typhoon that slammed Japan earlier this month left about 90 people dead or missing.

U.S. hikers released from Iranian jail (BLOG)

Two Americans jailed in Iran as spies have been released from a Tehran prison after more than two years in custody, the Los Angeles Times has confirmed.

A convoy of vehicles with Swiss and Omani diplomats left Evin prison Wednesday with the two men inside and headed to Tehran's international airport, according to the Associated Press.

Josh Fattal of Pennsylvania and Shane Bauer, who grew up in Minnesota and lived in California's Bay Area, were freed after posting $500,000 bail each. They have insisted that they were hiking in Iraq -- not spying -- when they were seized by Iranian forces along the Iran-Iraq border in 2009. A third companion, Sarah Shourd of Los Angeles, also was arrested but was released in September 2010 on $500,000 bail.



latimes

Former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani assassinated (BLOG)

Burhanuddin Rabbani, who headed an Afghan government panel trying to launch negotiations with the Taliban, was killed by a suicide bomber in his home in Kabul, officials say. In New York, President Hamid Karzai declares: 'This will not deter us from continuing down the path we have started.'

Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan— Former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani was killed by a suicide bomber on Tuesday in his home in the capital, the latest in a series of high-profile assassinations to rock the country in recent months.

Rabbani was the head of a government panel set up last year to try to begin negotiations with the Taliban, and his death was seen as a serious blow to those still-nascent efforts.

The bomber, who apparently had explosives concealed in his turban, entered Rabbani's home in an upscale Kabul neighborhood on the pretext of visiting him, said Gen. Mohammed Zaher, the head of criminal investigation for the Kabul police.

The powerful blast injured at least two other people, Zaher said, possibly including at least one other member of the High Peace Council, as the reconciliation body was known.

The Associated Press reported that four of Rabbani's bodyguards were also killed, but that could not be immediately confirmed.

Rabbani's death came a short time before President Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai met in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, their first face-to-face session since the American leader announced plans to reduce the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan over the coming year.

"This will not deter us from continuing down the path we have started," said Karzai, seated beside Obama at a Manhattan hotel. Karzai planned to cut short his New York visit and return home.

Rabbani served as Afghan president in the early-to-mid 1990s, and was the head of government at the time of the Taliban takeover.

He was a Tajik, one of Afghanistan's largest ethnic groups. Although there was no immediate claim of responsibility from the Taliban or other insurgent groups, the killing is likely to heighten ethnic tensions. Most Taliban are Pashtuns, the country's largest ethnic group.

Afghanistan's political climate, always violent, has become much more so in recent months.

Karzai's younger half-brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, was assassinated by a close family associate in July. A close Karzai aide, Jan Mohammed Khan, was killed that same month, as was the mayor of the southern city of Kandahar, Ghulam Haidar Hamidi.




latimes

English-speaking boy emerges from German woods (BLOG)

BERLIN (AP) — Berlin police are investigating the story of an English-speaking teenager who appeared in the German capital last week saying he had lived the previous five years in the woods with his father, a spokesman said Friday.

Michael Maass said the approximately 17-year-old boy appeared Sept. 5 at Berlin's city hall and was then taken in by a youth emergency center.

The boy told authorities that after his mother had died in a car accident about five years ago, his father had taken him to live in the forest, Maass said. The two lived in a tent, and in earthen dugouts according to his story.

"He said that he had lived for the last five years wandering around with his father," Maass said. "We don't know where."

The boy — who says he doesn't remember where the family came from — claims he followed his compass north after his father recently died following a fall in the woods, hitting Berlin after walking two weeks, Maass said.

The boy told authorities he only remembered the name his father called him by — Ray, according to media reports — and not his last name, Maass said. He speaks fluent English and only a few words of German, Maass said. He did not have any information about what accent the boy has.

The boy appears to be in good health and police have issued a Europe-wide appeal to try and determine his identity. However, police said they were not immediately releasing any photos of the boy.

"The missing persons bureau is investigating," Maass said, noting that at the moment, they only had the boy's story to go on.

Argentine ex-leader acquitted of arms trafficking (BLOG)

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Former Argentine President Carlos Menem and 17 members of his government were acquitted Tuesday of charges that they violated international weapons embargoes on Ecuador and Croatia in the 1990s.

Menem, still a sitting senator at 81, had faced up to eight years in prison if convicted, but two of the three judges on his panel found him not guilty.

Menem denied trafficking in weapons during his 1989-1999 rule. He acknowledged signing three secret decrees between 1991 and 1995 to export weapons to Venezuela and Panama, but said he had no idea that tons of rifles and ammunition made in Argentina would end up in Ecuador and Croatia, countries subject to international embargoes at the time.

"My acts as president were limited to signing the decrees to export the arms to Venezuela and Panama," he testified during the trial. "From then on, all the documents escape the (control of) the president. I couldn't go to the Customs service to see what the destination of the arms was."

On his way into the courtroom Tuesday, Menem remarked on the pending verdict.

"You've got to have faith and hope," he said.

Menem's co-defendants also were found not guilty. They included his former brother-in-law and aide Emir Yoma; former Defense Minister Oscar Camilion; and former air force chief, Juan Paulik.

The arms trafficking became public in 1995 when the weapons showed up in Ecuador and Croatia's conflict zones, and the Argentine newspaper Clarin published an investigation. Despite the international scandal it generated, Menem was re-elected with 50 percent support.

The case then progressed slowly as Menem moved from sworn political enemy to dependable ally of the governments of the late Nestor Kirchner and his wife Cristina Fernandez. After the couple took over the presidential palace in 2003, Menem's absence during several key votes provided the ruling party with just the edge it needed for major initiatives.

Even if convicted, Menem would have served time only if the Senate voted to remove the immunity Argentine lawmakers enjoy.

Menem had been held under house arrest for six months in 2001, but at the time he faced only a conspiracy charge and Argentina's Supreme Court set him free. Arms trafficking was added later, but by then he enjoyed senatorial immunity. The trial began in 2008, and 383 witnesses eventually testified, many by videoconference from Ecuador, Peru and Europe.

Prosecutors had asked for eight years in prison, alleging that Menem must have known where the weapons went.

Hague court urged to investigate Pope over sex abuse (BLOG)

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Victims of sexual abuse by the clergy want the International Criminal Court to investigate Pope Benedict and three Vatican officials, accusing them of allowing the rape and abuse of children.

The New York-based rights group Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and another group, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), filed a complaint with the ICC alleging that Vatican officials committed crimes against humanity because they tolerated and enabled sex crimes.

But it seems unlikely that the ICC, the world's first permanent war crimes court, could take on such a case.

Many of the crimes occurred before 2002, when the ICC was set up, which puts them outside the court's remit, while the Vatican itself has not signed up to the court's jurisdiction.

"It will be very difficult to make an argument that the Church as an organized group committed a crime against humanity and it would be debatable whether that was based on a common plan," said Andre de Hoogh, a senior lecturer in international law at Groningen University.

The Catholic Church has been rocked by a series of sexual abuse scandals and allegations of cover-up in Europe and the United States in recent years.

But this is the first time the sexual abuse scandal has been brought to an international jurisdiction, marking a new approach by victims and rights groups.

Victim support groups, which usually target church officials with their lawsuits, have increasingly sought to implicate the Vatican in their legal action.

In its filing with the ICC on Tuesday, rights group CCR alleged that sex abuse crimes were "widespread and systematic."

"Crimes against tens of thousands of victims, most of them children, are being covered up by officials at the highest level of the Vatican. In this case, all roads really do lead to Rome," CCR lawyer Pam Spees said.

A Vatican spokesman said there would be no immediate comment.

"The Office of the Prosecutor has received the documents," spokeswoman Florence Olara said, adding the prosecutor's office "will analyze ... and make a decision in due course."

EVIDENCE

While the Vatican has not signed up to the ICC, countries such as Italy, the Netherlands and Germany have done so, which means that their citizens are subject to ICC jurisdiction.

Pope Benedict is German-born and because a pope retains his nationality when he also takes on Vatican nationality this could potentially expose him to ICC prosecution.

"It is a very slim avenue, but it's an avenue nonetheless," said Lorraine Smith at the International Bar Association, which monitors the ICC. "But there is still the issue of the timing of the offences."

Alongside a filing of more than 80 pages, CCR said it had lodged more than 20,000 pages of supporting material including reports, policy papers and evidence of crimes by Catholic clergy committed against children and vulnerable adults.

SNAP members from Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and the United States travelled to The Hague to file the request.

It names Pope Benedict, former Secretary of State Cardinal Angelo Sodano, current Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone and Cardinal William Levada, the top doctrinal official.

Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn publicly accused Sodano last year of blocking a Church inquiry into his predecessor, Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer, who stepped down in 1995 after being accused of sexually abusing young student priests.

The ICC has investigated crimes including genocide, murder, conscription of child soldiers and rape, mostly in Africa. In June, it issued an arrest warrant for Libya's Muammar Gaddafi.

The prosecutor's office has received more than 9,000 requests for investigations, but has said almost half of them were "manifestly outside" its jurisdiction.

In June, Syrian human rights groups called on the court to investigate the killing of civilians in Syria, but the court lacks jurisdiction there because Syria is not an ICC member.

The Rome Statute that set up the court also stipulates that the ICC should be used as a court of last resort only if national proceedings are not taking place.

The prosecutor must first seek approval from ICC judges before formally opening an investigation.

Number of Americans in poverty hits record high (BLOG)

The number of Americans living in poverty rose to 46.2 million last year, nearly one in six people, according to the US Census Bureau's annual report.

The 2010 data shows the poverty rate at 15.1%, from 14.3% in 2009. The number of Americans without health insurance also rose slightly to 49.9 million.

The poverty rate was the highest since 1983, and tied with the level in 1993.

The number of Americans living below the poverty line has now risen for four years in a row.

The US definition of poverty is an annual income of $22,314 (£14,129), or less for a family of four, and $11,139 for a single person.More poor children

The Census Bureau data also showed that poverty among black and Hispanic people was much higher than for the overall US population last year - at 27.4% and 26.6% respectively.

Outside of the poverty line, the average annual US household income fell 2.3% in 2010 to $49,445 (£31,228).

Even younger Americans were also strongly affected. Twenty-two percent of those under 18 were living under the poverty line - up from from 20.7% in 2009.

Reacting to the data, the Children's Leadership Council, an advocacy group, said: "The rising numbers of children living in poverty is a direct result of the choices made by political leaders who put billionaires before kids. America's children should be our top priority."

Among regions, the South had the highest poverty rate at 16.9% and the highest percentage without health insurance, 19.1%.'Nobody hiring'

Mississippi had the highest share of poor people, at 22.7%, followed by Louisiana, the District of Columbia, Georgia, New Mexico and Arizona.

At the other end of the scale, New Hampshire had the lowest share, at 6.6%.

The slight rise in the number of people without health insurance - up by nearly one million - was mostly down to losses of employer-provided medical cover in the weakened economy.

Congress passed a health overhaul last year to deal with rising numbers of the uninsured, but the main provisions do not take effect until 2014.

The figures compound a stagnant US jobs report in August, when the unemployment rate was at 9.1% for the second straight month.

In Fort Washington, Maryland, mother-of-five Nekisha Brooks told of her struggle to find work since being laid off from her job at telecommunications firm AT&T several months ago.

Ms Brooks told the Associated Press news agency: "I've been putting in job applications every day and calling around, from housekeeping to customer service to admin or waitresses, but nobody seems to be hiring right now."

reuters

International alarm over euro zone crisis grows (BLOG)

BERLIN/ROME (Reuters) - International alarm over Europe's debt crisis reached new heights on Tuesday, with U.S. President Barack Obama pressing the bloc's big countries to show leadership as talk of a Greek default escalated and markets heaped pressure on Italy.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel sought to quash talk of an imminent Greek default or exit from the euro zone, but confusion over whether she would issue a joint statement on Greece with French President Sarkozy sent markets gyrating up and then down.

Confidence in the 17-nation currency area was further dented when Italy was forced to pay the highest interest rates since joining the euro in 1999 to sell 5-year bonds.

"I think there is a possibility, if the wrong steps are taken, that the system goes off the rails," Sergio Marchionne, the CEO of Italian carmaker Fiat, told reporters in Frankfurt when asked if the euro's survival was at risk.

Merkel said in a radio interview that Europe was doing everything in its power to avoid a Greek default and urged politicians in her own coalition to weigh their words carefully to avoid creating turmoil on financial markets.

Her economy minister said earlier this week that there should be no taboos in stabilizing the euro, including an orderly bankruptcy of Greece. And lawmakers from her coalition have said in recent days that Greece may have to leave the euro zone -- a move Citigroup's chief economist warned would lead to "financial and economic disaster."

"As soon as Greece has exited, we expect the markets will focus on the country or countries most likely to exit next from the euro area," Willem Buiter said in a note published on Tuesday.

Merkel, in an interview with RBB inforadio, said Europe would use all the tools at its disposal to prevent a Greek default and warned that an exit from the bloc would immediately lead to "domino effects."

"We face a completely new challenge, one that has no historic precedent," she said. "We want our currency to succeed. Germany is absolutely committed to this currency."

BERLIN-PARIS CONFUSION

Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy conferred by telephone on the crisis at the start of the week, and senior French sources told Reuters they planned to issue a joint statement on Greece, sending the euro and Greek bank stocks higher.

Less than an hour later, a spokesman for Sarkozy changed course and denied a statement was planned, sending markets into reverse. German officials told Reuters the government in Berlin had seen no need for a statement, as Merkel and Sarkozy are due to hold a call with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou on Wednesday.

The mixed signals reinforced the sense in the markets that European countries are unable to unite behind a common approach to the crisis.

Merkel faces intense pressure at home to resist new steps to shore up weak euro zone countries after agreeing to bailouts of Greece, Ireland and Portugal over the past 15 months.

But concern is growing abroad that Europe's piecemeal approach could backfire, with grave consequences for the global economy.

U.S. President Barack Obama told Spanish journalists in a group interview published on Tuesday that euro zone leaders needed to show markets they were taking responsibility for the debt crisis. Weakness in the global economy would persist so long as it is not resolved, he said.

In a measure of the alarm in Washington, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner will take the unprecedented step of attending a meeting of EU finance ministers in Poland on Friday. It will be his second trip to Europe in a week after he met his main EU counterparts at a G7 meeting last weekend.

Obama said that while Greece is the immediate concern, an even bigger problem is what may happen should markets keep attacking the larger economies of Spain and Italy.

"In the end the big countries in Europe, the leaders in Europe must meet and take a decision on how to coordinate monetary integration with more effective co-ordinated fiscal policy," the news agency EFE quoted him as saying.

Geithner is likely to urge euro zone finance ministers on Friday to speed up ratification of changes to their bailout fund and consider boosting its size, an EU source said.

ITALY YIELDS SOAR

Markets have already priced in the near certainty of a Greek debt default. Credit default swap prices suggest a 90 percent probability of default in the next five years, according to CDS pricing data provider Markit.

International inspectors are due to return to Athens on Monday to review deficit-cutting steps before deciding on the next tranche of aid.

Greece has said it only has a few weeks' cash and needs the 8 billion euro tranche in October to pay salaries and pensions.

Pressure on Italy mounted on Tuesday at a bond auction that showed the limits of European Central Bank efforts to hold down Rome's borrowing costs by buying government bonds in return for austerity measures to cut its budget deficit.

The five-year bond yield hit a euro lifetime high of 5.60 percent despite ECB purchases in the secondary market that led to the resignation of the central bank's German chief economist, Juergen Stark, last Friday.

"Markets want to see decisive action and they want to see someone in control of the situation," said Marc Ostwald, an analyst at Monument Securities in London.

"Nothing that we've had, be it at a domestic level in Italy, be it at a pan-euro zone level, or above all from Germany, indicates that anyone really is getting to grips with presenting euro zone policy with one voice," he said.

A Financial Times report that Rome had asked China to buy "significant" quantities of its bonds in recent talks provided little support.

A Treasury spokesman said Italian Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti met Chinese officials last week including the head of its sovereign wealth fund. But an Italian ministerial source told Reuters that the talks had centered on possible Chinese investments in Italy's industrial sector, not its bonds.

Chinese leaders have repeatedly offered verbal support to Greece, Portugal and Spain but encouraging words have not so far been matched by spectacular action.

Obama's comments suggested that Washington is trying to nudge European governments toward closer fiscal union or a bigger bailout fund to recapitalize teetering banks but European politics, especially in Germany, make that difficult.

The German Constitutional Court last week appeared to rule out issuing common euro zone bonds unless Berlin amended its Basic Law and the EU adopted a new treaty.

Merkel suggested the way forward should involve sharper punishment for states that violate the bloc's budget discipline rules, which have been repeatedly breached in the last decade, including by central euro zone powers Germany and France.

"Until now, for example, if countries violate the Stability and Growth Pact they cannot be taken before the European Court of Justice," she said.

Dutch propose to change transgender rules (BLOG)

AMSTERDAM (AP) — The Netherlands intends to change a law that puts restrictions on transgender people who try to register their new gender on official documents, the government said Tuesday, the same day Human Rights Watch issued a report critical of the statute.

Justice Ministry spokesman Wiebe Alkema said authorities have been working for months on scrapping the requirement for transgender people to undergo surgery and sterilization before registering their new gender.

Junior Justice and Security Minister Fred Teeven will send the draft legislation to legal advisers on Wednesday before presenting it to the Cabinet. Lawmakers will ultimately have to vote on any change.

"The problem is solved," Alkema said.

In its report, Human Rights Watch said the requirement for surgery and sterilization before new gender can be officially recognized is upsetting for transgender people who have not yet had the surgery.

"Their documents do not match their deeply felt gender identity," said Boris Dittrich, a former Dutch lawmaker who is now advocacy director in the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program at Human Rights Watch.

"This leads to frequent public humiliation, vulnerability to discrimination, and great difficulty finding or holding a job."

Dittrich told The Associated Press that Dutch authorities had been pledging to change the law for some two and a half years, but kept postponing action.

He added that it could still take years for the legislation to be studied by legal advisers, the Cabinet and then voted on by lawmakers.

"It is good news, but I still have to see it before I believe it," he said of the new legislation.

Dittrich is due to meet Teeven on Thursday to present him with the report.




AP

Spain killer bull named 'Mouse' wins fame, infamy (BLOG)

SUECA, Spain — With more than 3,000 fans cheering, a hulking, black-and-white fighting bull named "Mouse" chased one daredevil runner after another, trying to flip them airborne and skewer them as he did a month ago in a fatal goring that enshrined his reputation as Spain's most feared and famous beast.

Mouse was greeted in the southeastern farm town of Sueca like a rock star: Everyone stood up at 2 a.m. Sunday in the bull ring's grandstands as he charged across the sand after loudspeakers introduced him with the eerie strains of the soundtrack to "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly," the 1960s spaghetti western starring a young Clint Eastwood.

The 550-kilogram (1,213-pound) bull didn't claim any more victims this time, but tried his hardest to gore runners. And he captured intense media coverage in what could be his last appearance before retirement amid the controversy he has generated about Spain's summertime tradition of bull versus human runs, a pastime that plays out in rings, narrow streets and plazas across the nation.

After running with Mouse, a breathless Julian Herroja said the bull is so dangerous that "if you make a mistake, he won't. You'll be a victim for sure."

More than 30 journalists were on hand to cover the event in Sueca, population 28,000, near the beach destination of Valencia. Though Mouse will make one more appearance before the end of his season this year, he will run around the ring without runners.

Mouse's owner now fends off as many as 60 cell phone calls daily from reporters. Facebook pages dedicated to him include comments from some people praising him for taking revenge against humans in a country where slews of bulls are slain every year in bullfights by matadors.

But Gregorio de Jesus is angry that Mouse has been nicknamed "Killer Bull," saying he gets blame for doing what comes naturally: Defending himself against perceived threats.

"We go to entertain people so they'll have fun, but unfortunately they are fighting bulls, and there is always a percentage of risk," said de Jesus, 42, a former bull fighter who raises 70 specially bred bulls and 300 cows.

The hype about Mouse has grown so much in Spain that de Jesus is forced to deny reports that the 11-year-old Mouse has killed as many as five runners during his career. But in addition to the 29-year-old victim Aug. 14 in the town of Xativa, he killed a 56-year-old man in 2006 and has seriously injured five more people over the years.

Mouse got his name because no one ever expected him to turn into such a raging bull, de Jesus said. As a calf, he was tormented by several youths who broke into his pen and exhausted him almost to death. Then he was nearly fatally gored by another bull at de Jesus' ranch.

Critics and bull run aficionados alike agree that security is lax at many small town bull runs, meaning almost anyone can participate — even if they're drunk, have taken drugs or aren't physically fit enough to sprint away from enraged bulls. Sueca's mayor beefed up security Sunday, and the extra contingent of police took away some suspected drunks during Mouse's run.

After the bull's last deadly goring, Valencia's regional government announced plans to study how police can be given more authority to detain runners who shouldn't be in the ring, while stressing that the overall number of bull run injuries in the region where they run dropped to 486 in 2010 from 676 in 2008.

Hector Benet, an insurance agent for the bull run industry, said the number of deaths each year in the region averages four, with dozens of serious injuries annually. While bulls in the runs aren't killed or bloodied like their counterparts in bullfights, animal rights groups say the events are a form of animal torture, with bulls terrified by the hundreds of people who taunt the animals by yelling at them, poking them with long sticks and tossing sand from the plaza at them.

"Mouse is the proof that the bull runs are barbaric and medieval," said Leonardo Anselmi of PROU, the animal rights group whose signature-collecting campaign led to a bullfighting ban in Catalonia, which neighbors Valencia. "It's excessive and cruel violence. The culprits are the politicians who allow the bull runs."

But after Catalonia banned bullfighting, politicians there put in protections for other bull-related traditions, including "correbous" — when metal rods with flaming balls of wax or fireworks are attached to bulls' horns before they are let loose to run around bull rings or plazas and chase people.

It's all part of Spain's centuries-old fascination with bulls, with animals used in public as a test of bravery and part of the national identity. Spaniards also run with bulls in northern Pamplona every year, spear them to death from horseback in a town called Tordesillas and cordon off town squares to let children dodge feisty calves bred to become top-fighter bulls.

Sueca's mayor, Salvador Campillo, was torn on whether to let Mouse perform in his small city after this year's fatal goring by the bull. In the end, he decided to go ahead because he's a bull run fan.

"Raton is a bull that gives a great show, he never stops," Campillo said with a smile.

The town's annual end of summer party also features an international paella cooking competition in place since 1961. The contest attracted chefs this year from top restaurants from Spain and France, plus one from Chicago.

Campillo said de Jesus told him that the Sueca event would be Mouse's last real run before retirement, but de Jesus insisted he won't decide until next year whether Mouse will be put to pasture to breed "some little Mouses" with a chance of inheriting the bull's agility, aggression, intelligence and speed.

Mouse's eventual retirement will probably prove lucrative for his owner, Campillo said, because cow owners who want mating privileges with the bull may have to pay as much as euro3,000 ($4,145) for each use of his services.

Overcrowded Ship Sinks In Deep Sea, Hundreds Killed (BLOG)

STONE TOWN, Tanzania -- More than 240 people were killed when a crowded ferry sank off Tanzania's coast and some 600 have been rescued, officials said Sunday, figures that indicate the boat was filled beyond capacity.


Assistant police commissioner Mussa Ali Mussa, the head of police in Zanzibar, said Sunday that at least 240 people died when the ferry sank early Saturday. His comments were broadcast by state-owned channel TBC.


Relatives had claimed 192 bodies and 28 more were awaiting identification on Sunday, said Mohammed Aboud Mohammed, the minister for state in the vice president's office on the island of Zanzibar. He said around 600 people had been rescued so far and that the government was still looking for the vessel's captain.


"The government is holding the chief engineer for questioning in order to gather details," said Mohammed. "The captain of the ferry is still missing and the government doesn't know precisely the owner of the ferry."


Survivors said the M.V. Spice Islanders, which sank near the tourist destination of Zanzibar, was well beyond its official capacity of 600 passengers. Many residents angrily asked why the boat had been allowed to leave port so overloaded.


The bodies were taken to a sports field, where imams said prayers and the bodies were washed and wrapped in white according to Islamic custom. The government is paying for all funeral costs, Mohammed said.


Weeping families walked among them looking for their loved ones, falling into each others' arms if they recognized a relative or neighbor. Most of the corpses were wrapped in cloth with a photo of the face placed on the front. Some of the ship's passengers were mutilated when cargo fell on top of them when the boat began to list.


Among those still searching for news was Omar Saied, who arrived from Tanzania's commercial capital of Dar es Salaam to search for his nephew and niece, on their way to a wedding on the island of Pemba.


"I'm looking for my missing family," he said. "So far our hope has been in vain."




International charity Save the Children said it launched an emergency response for injured and traumatized children.


The charity described the "incredible bravery" of young survivors, including one 6-year-old with a lifejacket who saved his 18-month-old brother by holding on to him in the sea for four hours until they were rescued.


It said another set of brothers – aged 7 and 9 – clung to a floating freezer to stay alive.


The charity said they had been given clothes, food and clean water and that 79 out of 129 children it has cared for have been reunited with their families. The rest are in the hospital, Save the Children said.


"Children arrived at our center freezing, dehydrated and suffering from shock," said Mubarak Maman, the charity's team leader in Zanzibar. "Many had spent hours alone in the dark sea clinging onto floating luggage to stop themselves from drowning, and had lost their parents and siblings in the chaos. Others had been seriously injured or were vomiting from the sea water."


He said it was essential that the charity was there to provide crucial care and comfort, and to register the children so "none were lost in the panic."


The ferry left Dar Es Salaam loaded with building materials, mattresses and passengers, survivors said. It stopped at the island of Zanzibar and then continued on to Pemba, a top diving destination. But it began to list in the early hours of Saturday, and eventually sank in an area of deep sea and strong currents.


Most survivors drifted ashore clinging to foam mattresses or wooden planks from the ferry. Some were plucked from the water by a flotilla of pleasure craft, wooden fishing dhows and yachts which set off from the beach Saturday to search for survivors.


The number of total passengers is still unclear and officials expect the death toll to rise.


The island of Zanzibar, a top tourist destination, is observing three days of mourning. Flags are flying at half-mast and radio and television stations are playing readings of the Quran instead of music.

huffingtonpost

Supercomputer predicts revolution (BLOG)

Feeding a supercomputer with news stories could help predict major world events, according to US research.

A study, based on millions of articles, charted deteriorating national sentiment ahead of the recent revolutions in Libya and Egypt.

While the analysis was carried out retrospectively, scientists say the same processes could be used to anticipate upcoming conflict.

The system also picked up early clues about Osama Bin Laden's location.

Kalev Leetaru, from the University of Illinois' Institute for Computing in the Humanities, Arts and Social Science, presented his findings in the journal First Monday.Mood and location

The study's information was taken from a range of sources including the US government-run Open Source Centre and BBC Monitoring, both of which monitor local media output around the world.

News outlets which published online versions were also analysed, as was the New York Times' archive, going back to 1945.

In total, Mr Leetaru gathered more than 100 million articles.

Reports were analysed for two main types of information: mood - whether the article represented good news or bad news, and location - where events were happening and the location of other participants in the story.

Mood detection, or "automated sentiment mining" searched for words such as "terrible", "horrific" or "nice".

Location, or "geocoding" took mentions of specific places, such as "Cairo" and converted them in to coordinates that could be plotted on a map.

Analysis of story elements was used to create an interconnected web of 100 trillion relationships.Predicting trouble

Data was fed into an SGI Altix supercomputer, known as Nautilus, based at the University of Tennessee.

The machine's 1024 Intel Nehalem cores have a total processing power of 8.2 teraflops (trillion floating point operations per second).

Based on specific queries, Nautilus generated graphs for different countries which experienced the "Arab Spring".

In each case, the aggregated results of thousands of news stories showed a notable dip in sentiment ahead of time - both inside the country, and as reported from outside.

For Egypt, the tone of media coverage in the month before President Hosni Mubarak's resignation had fallen to a low only seen twice before in the preceding 30 years.

Previous dips coincided with the 1991 US aerial bombardment of Iraqi troops in Kuwait and the 2003 US invasion of Iraq.

Mr Leetaru said that his system appeared to generate better intelligence than the US government was working with at the time.

"The mere fact that the US President stood in support of Mubarak suggests very strongly that that even the highest level analysis suggested that Mubarak was going to stay there," he told BBC News.

"That is likely because you have these area experts who have been studying Egypt for 30 years, and in 30 years nothing has happened to Mubarak.

The Egypt graph, said Mr Leetaru, suggested that something unprecedented was happening this time.

"If you look at this tonal curve it would tell you the world is darkening so fast and so strongly against him that it doesn't seem possible he could survive."

Similar drops were seen ahead of the revolution in Libya and the Balkans conflicts of the 1990s.

Saudi Arabia, which has thus far resisted a popular uprising, had experienced fluctuations, but not to the same extent as some other states where leaders were eventually overthrown.Mapping Bin Laden

In his report, Mr Leetaru suggests that analysis of global media reports about Osama Bin Laden would have yielded important clues about his location.

While many believed the al-Qaeda leader to be hiding in Afghanistan, geographic information extracted from media reports consistently identified him with Northern Pakistan.

Only one report mentioned the town of Abbottabad prior to Bin Laden's discovery by US forces in April 2011.

However, the geo-analysis narrowed him down to within 200km, said Mr Leetaru.Real time analysis

The computer event analysis model appears to give forewarning of major events, based on deteriorating sentiment.

However, in the case of this study, its analysis is applied to things that have already happened.

According to Kalev Leetaru, such a system could easily be adapted to work in real time, giving an element of foresight.

"That's the next stage," said Mr Leetaru, who is already working on developing the technology.

"It looks like a stock ticker in many regards and you know what direction it has been heading the last few minutes and you want to know where it is heading in the next few.

"It is very similar to what economic forecasting algorithms do."

Mr Leetaru said he also hoped to improve the resolution of analysis, especially in relation to geographic location.

"The next iteration is going to city level and beyond and looking at individual groups and how they interact.

"I liken it to weather forecasting. It's never perfect, but we do better than random guessing."

bbc

Russian crash probe: Engines running til the end (BLOG)

MOSCOW (AP) — All three engines on a Russian jet that slammed into a riverbank were operating up until the moment of the crash and the plane's stabilizer and flaps were in a proper position for takeoff, Russian experts said Friday.

Still, the Moscow-based Interstate Aviation Committee, which is conducting the crash probe, had no conclusions yet about the cause of the crash that killed 43 people, mostly members of a top Russian ice hockey team.

The comments came as aviation experts examined flight data recorders from the crashed plane and began safety checks Friday on Yak-42 jets nationwide.

The chartered Yak-42 jet crashed Wednesday into the sides of the Volga River on a sunny, clear day moments after taking off near Yaroslavl, a city 150 miles (240 kilometers) northeast of Moscow.

It was one of the worst aviation disasters ever in sports, shocking Russia and the world of hockey, for among the dead were 36 players, coaches and staff of the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl hockey team. The team had been heading to Minsk, Belarus, to play its opening game of the Kontinental Hockey League season.

Two men survived the crash — player Alexander Galimov and crew member Alexander Sizov — but they were in critical condition Friday, both in medicated comas after being transferred to Moscow for treatment. Hospital officials said Galimov had burns over 90 percent of his body.

The Interstate Aviation Committee said magnetic tapes holding the flight information in the data recorders were wet, but its experts have begun deciphering those segments that have dried out, learning about the engines. The committee didn't specify, however, whether the engines were giving the full thrust.

The Tunoshna airport's runway is three times longer than required for that type of plane but the plane still failed to accelerate sufficiently before takeoff, Russian Deputy Transport Minister Valery Okulov said.

Authorities were also checking fuel supplies at the Tunoshna airport, suspecting that low quality fuel could have caused the crash. The airport has been allowed to resume operations but planes were barred from using local fuel.

Yaroslavl Gov. Sergei Vakhrukov, however, insisted that the fuel couldn't have been the cause, since another plane using the same fuel had flown without any problems.

The crashed jet was built in 1993 and one of its three engines was replaced a month ago, transportation officials said.

Aviation authorities also launched safety checks on all the approximately 60 Yak-42 jets currently in service in Russia, which was expected to lead to disruptions in service. An Associated Press reporter was among the passengers ordered to disembark Friday from a Yak-42 jet bound on an internal flight from Moscow.

Of the six Yak-42s checked so far, three have been grounded, Rostransnadzor transport safety watchdog said. It said their owners will have to fix unspecified flaws before resuming their flights.

In Yaroslavl, where there has been an outpouring of public grief over the deaths of the hockey players, a memorial service was to be held Saturday at the team's arena. Several squads from the Kontinental Hockey League were traveling to Yaroslavl to take part.

Thousands of fans have already come to the Yaroslavl arena to pay their respects, laying mounds of red roses and carnations outside its walls.

President Dmitry Medvedev has called for sweeping reforms to Russia's aviation industry, including replacing aging Russian jets with Western planes.

Experts blame Russia's poor aviation safety record on an aging fleet, weak government controls, poor pilot training and a cost-cutting mentality.

Gadhafi 'on the run,' US defense chief reports (BLOG)

TRIPOLI/AGADEZ, Niger — Libya leader Moammar Gadhafi is on the run, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Tuesday, adding however that he didn't know the ousted leader's location.

"I wish I knew,'' Panetta said when asked about Gadhafi's whereabouts. "I don't have any information as to exactly where he's located ... the best information we have is that he's on the run.''

The Pentagon has said previously it had no reason to believe Gadhafi had left Libya. Asked whether that assessment had changed, Panetta said only: "I don't have any information as to his location.''

Panetta spoke after forces loyal to Gadhafi crossed in several armed convoys from Libya into neighboring Niger.

The toppled Libyan leader's own security chief was at the head of one of the columns, officials said Tuesday.
Customs official Harouna Ide told The Associated Press that Mansour Dao, Gadhafi's security chief, was at the head of the first convoy as it arrived in Niger's capital Niamey.

He said other Libyan convoys were south of Agadez in central Niger, a desert country bordering Libya and where Gadhafi has the support of many Tuareg tribal fighters.

It wasn't clear if Gadhafi family members were in the convoys, but al-Arabiya television quoted Niger's Foreign Minister Bazoum Mohamed as saying Gadhafi himself was not present.

The customs official said there were a dozen vehicles in Dao's convoy, and that among passengers were about 12 Gadhafi officials, Niger's Tuareg rebel leader Rissa ag Boula and other Tuaregs from Niger who had gone to Libya to fight for Gadhafi.

Abdoulaye Harouna, owner of the Agadez Info newspaper, said he saw one of the groups arrive in his town Monday in several dozen pickup trucks.

He said they headed for the capital, Niamey, a drive of some 600 miles. The capital is in Niger's southwestern corner near the nation of Burkina Faso, where Gadhafi has been offered asylum.

Harouna said he saw Boula in the convoy. Boula is a native of Niger who led a failed war of independence on behalf of ethnic Tuareg nomads a decade ago before seeking refuge in Libya.

Convoy carrying gold, cash
Officials from Libya's interim ruling National Transitional Council said Tuesday that one convoy was carrying gold and cash.

"Late last night, 10 vehicles carrying gold, euros and dollars crossed from Jufra into Niger with the help of Tuaregs from the Niger tribe," Fathis Baja, head of the NTC committee for political and international affairs, told Reuters.

NTC spokesman Abdel Hafiz Ghoga said it was carrying money taken from a branch of the Central Bank of Libya in Gadhafi's birthplace Sirte, one of the few towns still in his supporters' hands.

The government of Burkina Faso said late last month they would recognize the Libyan rebels' National Transitional Council. Foreign minister Djibril Bassolet also said the landlocked West African nation would welcome Gadhafi "if he wishes it."

A top security official in Burkina Faso said government officials had not been advised about any convoy headed for Burkina Faso. The official asked not to be named because he's not authorized to speak to journalists.

Both Niger and Burkina Faso are signatories to the International Criminal Court, which issued an arrest warrant for the Libyan leader, his son and the country's intelligence chief. But both nations also belong to the African Union, which during a July summit called on member countries to disregard the warrant.

Western officials said they did not have any information on the convoy. Harouna says the pro-Gadhafi troops accompanying Boula were well-armed.


French Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said the ministry did not know who was in the vehicles.

"We have no more information than you do," he told a reporter. "We are monitoring the movement of these vehicles, and we will see."

Gadhafi financed Tuareg revolt?
Gadhafi's regime is believed to have financed the Tuareg rebellion in the north of Niger. African nations where Tuaregs represent a significant slice of the population, like Niger, have been among the last to recognize the rebels that ousted Gadhafi.

Gadhafi remains especially popular in towns like Agadez, a Sahara Desert market town where a majority of the population is Tuareg. There, the ex-ruler is remembered for his largesse and for his assistance to the Tuareg minority during their fight for autonomy.

Harouna said the pro-Gadhafi soldiers accompanying Boula were coming from the direction of Arlit.

The desert that stretches north of Arlit borders both Libya and Algeria. Some members of Gadhafi's family, including his wife, his daughter and two of his sons, recently sought refuge in Algeria.


Gadhafi, who ruled Libya for more than 40 years, has been on the run since losing control of his capital, Tripoli, last month.

The rebels say at least two of his sons had been in the town of Bani Walid, one of the last remaining pro-Gadhafi strongholds, in recent days. Moussa Ibrahim, Gadhafi's spokesman and one of his key aides, was still believed to be in the town, rebel officials said.

Thousands of rebel fighters have surrounded the town as their leaders tried to negotiate a surrender deal.

Most of Libya has welcomed the uprising that swept Gadhafi from power, though rebel forces backed by NATO airstrikes have yet to capture loyalist bastions like Bani Walid, Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte and the isolated southern town of Sabha.

The rebels have extended to Saturday a deadline for the surrender of Sirte and other loyalist areas, though some rebel officials have said they could attack Bani Walid sooner because it has so many prominent loyalists.

Blacks in Libya Face Danger From Rebels (BLOG)

This is a dangerous time to be a black African in Libya.

Throughout the conflict that began in February, rebel forces have been rounding up suspected mercenaries whom, they say, have been hired from neighboring countries like Chad and Niger to fight for Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

But Libya has a black population of its own, and many black migrant workers were trapped in the country when the conflict began. And it seems that plenty of the black Africans captured as mercenaries were never actually involved in the fight.

On Monday, the chairman of the African Union, Jean Ping, said that Libya’s Transitional National Council “seems to confuse black people with mercenaries,” as my colleagues Kareem Fahim and Neil MacFarquharreported. (There are documented cases of mercenaries from elsewhere, including an ethnic Croatian named Mario who was interviewed in Time magazine last week.)

Amnesty International issued a statement on Tuesday saying that people suspected of fighting for Colonel Qaddafi, “in particular black Libyans and sub-Saharan Africans, are at high risk of abuse” by rebel forces. The statement said that Amnesty representatives were told on recent visits to detention centers in al-Zawiya and Tripoli that one-third to half of the detainees there were from sub-Saharan Africa.

Alex Thomson, a reporter for Channel 4 News in Britain, recounted a frightening scene he witnessed in Tripoli, where men captured by the rebels insisted they were not mercenaries. Those men, he said, appeared to be in serious danger — and they also appeared to be telling the truth.


“Please,” they begged us, “please don’t go. Don’t leave us. They will kill us.”

Another just asked me: “Will they shoot us? Please tell me Sir. Will they shoot us?”

Herded into a corner, a gunman started slapping them. We asked him to stop.

“They are with Gaddafi. We know this. They had guns.”

“Show me the guns,” I said.

No guns arrived. Some of the men crossed themselves, sweating, praying. One began weeping softly.

Mr. Thomson said the men eventually led the rebels to “their women” who were hiding in the bush nearby. Satisfied that they would not have brought their wives to fight in the war, the rebels let them go.

“To be a black African in the wrong part of town at the wrong time,” Mr. Thomson concluded, “is to be in a very frightening place.

nytimes

Travellers vulnerable to hacking of information (BLOG)

Frequent travellers rely on mobile phones, laptops and other electronic devices to stay in touch and take care of business on the road, away from the safety and security of their offices. But reliance on these personal devices potentially exposes sensitive corporate or personal information to the world.

In light of the voicemail hacking scandal stewing in the United Kingdom this summer, have you ever wondered how easy it might be for someone to hack in to your mobile phone voice mail?

Turns out it’s frighteningly easy. In many cases, all a perpetrator needs is your mobile phone number and a cheap or free “spoofing” service widely available online. (Just google “caller ID spoofing” to learn specifics.)

In a nutshell, caller ID spoofing services make calls appear to be coming from any number a hacker chooses. This means they could use the service to fool your mobile phone voicemail system into thinking that a call is coming from your phone, and potentially providing access to your saved messages.

To eliminate this possibility, always be sure that your voicemail ispassword protected for calls coming from your phone or any other phone. You should also opt out of offers from mobile phone companies to bypass entering a password when calling from your own phone.

It’s important to choose a good password and change it from time to time. “Many brand new phones come with common default voicemail passwords such as 0-0-0-0 or 1-2-3-4 which many users neglect to change when setting up their phones. If you are concerned about hacking, set up your phone with a unique password and change it from time to time,” said Atlanta-based telecommunications analyst Jeff Kagan.

There are other ways travellers expose sensitive information to n’er-do-wells too. For example, when working on your laptop on a crowded flight or at an airport gate, have you ever worried about who might be snooping at your laptop screen? A survey commissioned by 3M found that nearly half of all business travellers admitted to sneaking glances of others’ laptop screens while in public spaces. And of those who do peek at other’s screens, 42% admit to being “interested” in what they see.

To help protect sensitive, personal or proprietary information from wandering eyes, 3M has developed what they call “privacy filters”— a thin plastic film that slides over your laptop screen and works like vertical mini-blinds to block the view to anyone trying to view it from the side. (Thescreen is obscured when viewed from the side.) The $50 to $70 privacy screens are available online or at office supply stores.

Finally, if separation from your laptop or mobile phone while travelling scares you as much as it does me, try this low-tech tip: put a small label on the device (right now while you are thinking about it) with your mobile phone number and email written on it. If you’ve mistakenly lost or misplaced it, in most cases the person finding it will make the effort to return it to you, so make contacting you easy.

bbc