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Somalis dying in world's worst famine in 20 years

2011-07-20T10:39:00.000-07:00

Somalian refugees are checked in at a refugee settlement camp close to the Kenyan border with Somalia. (Oli Scarff, Getty Images - July 20, 2011)

Exhausted, rail-thin women are stumbling into refugee camps in Kenya and Ethiopia with dead babies and bleeding feet, having left weaker family members behind along the way.

NAIROBI Keny Tens of thousands of Somalis are feared dead in the world's worst famine in a generation-the U.N. said Wednesday - a crisis so severe that the United-States is loosening rules meant to prevent emergency funds from falling into the hands of Al-Qaida linked militants. Exhausted - rail-thin women are stumbling into refugee-camps in Kenya and Ethiopia with dead babies and bleeding feet - having left weaker family members behind along the way.

Somalia is facing its worst food security crisis in the last 20 years, said Mark Bowden, the U.N.'s top official in charge of humanitarian aid in Somalia. This desperate situation requires urgent action to save lives. it's likely that conditions will deteriorate further in six months.

The crisis is the worst since 1991-92, when hundreds of thousands of Somalis starved to death, Bowden said. That famine prompted intervention by an international peacekeeping force, but it eventually pulled out after two American Black Hawk helicopters were shot down in 1993.Since then, Western nations have mainly sought to contain the threat of terrorism from Somalia an anarchic nation where the weak government battles Islamic militants on land and pirates hijack ships for millions of dollars at sea.

Oxfam said $1 billion is needed for famine relief. On Wednesday, the U.S. announced an additional $28 million in emergency funding on top of the $431 million in assistance already given this year.Most importantly, those new U.S. funds won't be placed under restrictions implemented in 2009 - that are designed to keep food and money from being stolen by Islamic militants.

Aid groups have called for the restrictions to be lifted entirely and say the rules have severely limited their operations. U.S. humanitarian contributions in Somalia fell from $237 million in 2008 to $29 million last year.

We've seen a very large shortfall over the past few years given the political restrictions attached to humanitarian funding, said Tanja Schumer of the Somalia NGO Consortium, which represents 78 aid agencies working on Somalia. To get American money we have to vouch for all our contractors and all our local partners and that is tricky.

Somalia is the most dangerous country in the world to work in, according to the U.N.'s World Food Program, which has lost 14 relief workers in the past few years. Kidnappings, killings and attacks on aid convoys occur frequently. Two years ago W.F.P pulled out of Islamist controlled southern Somalia after the rebels demanded cash payments and other concessions.

U.S. military operations against terrorism suspects also have disrupted-humanitarian operations, said Bowden. Insurgents vowed to target foreign aid workers after a U.S. missile strike killed the head of the Islamist al-Shabab militia and 24 other people in 2008. Aden Hashi Ayro was reputedly Al-Qaida's commander in Somalia and linked to a string of attacks on foreign aid workers and journalists. But W.F.P head Josette Sheeran said the agency is willing to return to southern Somalia if the insurgents guarantee safe passage and free access to aid. Two regions of Somalia Bakool and Lower Shabelle are suffering from famine and eight more are at risk.

"We are absolutely fully committed to going where the hungry are," she said.

The Horn of Africa is suffering a devastating drought compounded by war, neglect, poor land policies and spiraling prices. Some areas in the region have not had such a low rainfall in 60 years, aid group Oxfam said. Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti have all been badly affected, and Eritrea is also believed to be suffering, although its repressive government does not release figures.

Yet only Somalia is technically suffering from famine - defined as when two adults or four children per 10,000 people die of hunger each day and a third of children are acutely malnourished. In some areas of Somalia, six people are dying a day and more than half of children are acutely malnourished, Bowden said. Prices of staple foods have increased 270 percent over the last year, compounding the misery.

Somalia's civil war is partly to blame - said Joakim Gundel, who heads Katuni Consult, a Nairobi based company often asked to evaluate international aid efforts in Somalia. He said aid groups found fundraising easier if they blamed natural disaster rather admitting the emergency was partly caused by a complex, 20year civil war worsened by international apathy and incompetence.

There is no clear cut answer he said. People are suffering and there is a need to respond. But drought is not the only cause. Conflict is a key reason and it is not being addressed properly.

New foreign minister

2011-07-20T10:17:00.000-07:00

Ms Khar breaks away from the conventional image of persons entrusted to such key portfolios.

Fresh air blowing through the often stagnant realm of political life is usually a rarity. It blows in only now and then and this time seems to have done so with the appointment of Hina Rabbani Khar as Pakistan’s new foreign minister. Ms-Khar breaks away from the conventional image of persons entrusted to such key portfolios. In the first place, she is a woman; in the second she is young.
We must hope these factors alone can bring in some fresh thinking into the running of foreign-policy and how to improve Pakistan’s declining standing in the region. Ms-Khar has shown over her relatively brief career as a politician that she is quite capable of going about her mission with determination and sincerity. This is what the Pakistan Foreign-Office needs right now. There have been too many months of floundering, bickering & uncertainty.

Some issues however - go beyond the questions of who is acting as minister. It is essential to the needs of Pakistan and its people that its foreign policy be an independent one, with parliament exercising control over it as should be in the case of a democracy, with the military establishment in the background. Of course, this is easier said than done, and hence the perception that the Foreign-Office acts on the dictates of the establishment will be hard to change any time soon. On some issues-such as ties with India and the U.S the civilians need to assert themselves and if they did it could have a positive outcome certainly in the case of India where all political parties want greater engagement with it. Foreign policy should be based on the wishes and aspirations of the people of Pakistan as express through their elected representatives and should not be based on other extraneous factors.

This will be one of the main challenges Ms-Khar faces in the future. She also takes over her assignment at a time when there is friction with the U.S and a degree of doubt over how things should proceed with Washington. All these matters will need to be addressed and worked out in the coming days. We believe Ms-Khar has the capability & the capacity of doing this in a professional and intelligent manner. The future in terms of foreign policy may be brighter than before.

Harry Potter fans, an era is ending

2011-07-10T01:08:00.000-07:00

By Carrie Rickey

Inquirer Movie Critic

Friday marks the end of an era. Some, like Warner Bros. executive Dan Fellman, compare its finality to the breakup of the Beatles.

When Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, the eighth and presumably final film based on the phenom--that has sold 450 million books and close to a billion movie tickets, opens this week in theaters from Lahore to Los Angeles, it will be twilight in the Potterverse.

No more pajama-clad kids lining up at midnight to buy the new Harry volume. No more getting out the crimson-and-gold Gryffindor garb for the 12:01 a.m. premiere of the latest Harry movie. No more convoys of FedEx trucks delivering the one about Azkaban straight to readers' doors.

"It's a little melancholy," observes Johanna Winant, a doctoral student in literature at the University of Chicago. Winant grew up in Mount Airy inhaling the seven books that vividly detail seven years in the life of the orphaned wizard who acquires the skills and courage to avenge his parents' deaths.

Not only the fans of J.K. Rowling's hero are experiencing symptoms of withdrawal. For film execs and book publishers, educators and costume merchants, e-tailers and neighborhood booksellers, the pangs are likewise acute.

Nearly as universal as Harry's appeal is admiration for his cultural impact. Harry Potter has broken publishing and box-office records, boosted adolescent reading-habits, erased the line between young-adult and adult fiction, and had a steroidal impact on the profits of Amazon.com.

"It's the highest-grossing franchise in the history of the motion-picture industry," says Fellman, president of theatrical distribution for Warner.

"Usually, the law of diminishing returns applies to movie franchises," says Paul Dergarabedian, analyst at Hollywood.com, who notes that from the first Harry film, in 2001, to the seventh, in 2010, box office has been consistently strong. "No other series has had a trajectory like this."

The series made millionaires of its young stars. Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), 21, pocketed $20 million for each of the last two Harry films, while Emma Watson (Hermione Granger), 21, and Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley), 22, earned $15 million apiece.

"I don't think it's possible to overstate the effects of Harry Potter on reading and on publishing," says Diane Roback, children's book editor at Publishers Weekly. "In terms of number of books sold, anticipation for new--volumes in the series, getting children to read, getting adults to read books for children, and creating a cultural phenomenon, it is unmatched."

"It reminded Hollywood that blockbusters don't need to be male-oriented action films," says Jeanine Basinger, chair of film studies at Wesleyan University. "And that a movie could appeal at once to kids, teens on dates, parents, and grandparents. It had a real unifying effect on-audiences."

Don't discount "the Harry Potter factor" for the uptick in young-adult reading between 2002 and 2008, says Sunil Iyengar, a researcher at the National Endowment for the Arts. "I wouldn't be surprised if the Harry Potter books played a role in the resurgence of young-adult reading."

In other words, not only did Harry strike gold, but he also struck a chord felt around the world.

There are other, measurable, Harry Potter effects.

The New York Times created a children's best-seller list because Harry titles were crowding the fiction roster. The Free Library of Philadelphia, which routinely had purchased--three or four copies of popular books for circulation, had to buy up to 25 Harry Potter books per branch to keep pace with demand. From booksellers to multiplex operators, the Harry Potter effect was palpable in the increased interest in other narratives.

"It really triggered the use of our fantasy collection," says Siobhan Reardon, president of the Free Library.

"It was the gateway book for a lot of young readers. When the new Harry wore off, they came in for other books," says Michael Fox, proprietor of the Joseph Fox bookstore in Center City,

Nearly everyone agrees that Rowling, the welfare mom who wrote the first Harry Potter book in an unheated apartment in-Edinburgh, Scotland, while caring for her infant daughter, created characters and settings more notable for their emotional than their economic impact.

Harry and his friends Hermione and Ron grew up, it seemed, in real time, mirroring the readers' and moviegoers' own developmental stages.

"The early Potter books were written at an easier developmental level than the later ones," says Joel Nichols of the Free Library. "So readers who are Harry's age in each--given book see reflections of themselves developing friendships, relationships with teachers and parents."

Says Jesse Dougherty, a onetime English teacher and now head of the upper school at Friends Select, "The school setting is important. It is a universal feeling to wonder about your place in school that [Rowling] captures well."

"The Harry Potter books and movies have an empowerment effect," says Basinger. "They're about kids having power and-adults being wary. They offer a taste of freedom and an escape from childhood, but they present serious challenges."

Winant reflects, "For my younger brother's micro-generation, who were 10 when the first book came out, the cosmology of Harry Potter is the most important thing. And that's because in 2001, our country went to war against a shadowy evil."

"I wonder if Harry Potter would have been quite so important without al-Qaeda, which, like Voldemort, smeared itself across the sky in smoke," says Winant. The first of the--movies was released two months after the twin towers fell, and the last comes out two months after Osama bin Laden was slain.

Predictably, not everyone is wild about Harry.

"The impact of Harry Potter is overrated," says Lark Hall, an English teacher at Central High School. "Our kids are still reading Lord of the Rings on their own and the old classics such as Beowulf that contain-supernatural beings and mortal family conflict."

Still, she concedes, "Promoting reading in any way is our job. And Potter on iPad is certainly reading."

It's useful to make a distinction between the Harry books and the Harry Potter "entertainment-industrial complex," says Robert Thompson, Syracuse University professor of popular culture.

"I am convinced that the Rowling books will join J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis as classics," he says. Of the Potter empire, which includes an Orlando theme-park attraction, Bertie Bott's puke-flavored candies, and what-costume saleswoman Jen Simms calls the "slutty Hermione" minidresses flying off shelves at Masquerade in South Philadelphia, Thompson audibly shrugs.

He does note the near-magical synergy between the Harry books and movies, staggered like time-released pleasure givers.

"The Harry Potter movies are a perfect storm of great story, great special-effects technology hitting the cultural zeitgeist at a moment when people were looking for something magical," says Hollywood.com's Dergarabedian.

While she doesn't think that the movies are "cinematically groundbreaking," Basinger says she is impressed with their visual distinction and consistency. "Harry Potter does not fall off in quality, like Star Wars."

"I didn't think the movies would count," says Julian Bennett Holmes, a music student at Mannes College in Manhattan. "But somehow the movies became an integral part of the-experience. The book doesn't feel complete without the movie." He has already bought his ticket to the midnight Friday screening of Deathly Hallows: Part 2.

Harry Potter is ending, but is it the end of Harry Potter?

"One hears J.K. Rowling is writing a prequel," says a reliable Hollywood source who does not want to be identified, "with Volume 1 about Harry's parents, their meeting, and love, and Volume 2 about the birth of Harry and the-killing by Voldemort."

"We know she's working-on a project," says Warner's Fellman, "but she hasn't discussed it with us."

With a hearty laugh he adds, "We like that rumor."

7.1 Earth quake jolts northeast Japan

2011-07-10T00:52:00.000-07:00

A strong earthquake jolted-northeastern Japan on Sunday, triggering an evacuation at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant but there was no sign of further damage at the facility or reports of casualties along the coast.
The Japan Meteorological Agency issued, and then lifted, a tsunami alert after the 7.1 magnitude quake which hit the same area that was devastated by a massive quake and tsunami on March 11. Officials said a 10 cm wave had been recorded.

The shaking lasted rather long and became gradually stronger," an official at Iwaki City, Fukushima told national broadcaster NHK. "I saw a book shelf shaking--but nothing fell off. We are advising people not to go near the coast."
At least 21,000 people were killed or went missing during the March disaster, which also cut power to the Fukushima nuclear plant and triggered a radiation crisis.
There were no reports of injuries or damage from the quake so far, national broadcaster NHK said. The meteorological agency said the earthquake had occurred at a depth of 10 km (6 miles) off the northeastern coast just before 10 am local time.
Tokyo Electric Power said workers at Fukushima had been-evacuated to higher ground, adding that there was no immediate signs of further damage at the facility where workers have been struggling to build a cooling system to stabilize the reactors.
The company said that despite the evacuations, water was still being pumped into the reactors to cool them, and nitrogen was also-still being injected in two of the reactors, a safeguard meant to prevent further hydrogen explosions.
The US Geological Survey initially estimated the quake's magnitude of 7.3, but then revised that estimate down to a 7.0 magnitude.
The March 11 earthquake that struck off the coast of northeastern Japan had a magnitude of 9.0 and caused a tsunami that caused extensive damage along the coast and measured about 14-meters at the Fukushima nuclear plant.
Japan's government has come-under fire for its handling of the disaster, putting pressure on unpopular Prime Minister Naoto Kan to resign.

Security forces take control of Karachi troubled areas

2011-07-10T00:45:00.000-07:00

Security forces took partial control of the-troubled areas of Orangi Town, Qasba Colony and Kati Pahari where violence claimed over 65 lives with over three hundred wounded.

The troubled--areas of Qasba Colony, Kati Pahari and surrounding areas of Orangi Town, where gunmen had taken positions and were in control for the past four days, were once again in the control of security forces. Various other localities of Orangi Town and other areas of the city remained tense with-intermittent gunfights that claimed four more lives while dozens were injured. Two bullet-riddled bodies were recovered from Pirabad police limits and shifted to morgue for identification after autopsy at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre.
A worker of-MQM-was gunned down in PIB colony. The Old Sabzi Mandi area and Gulshan-e-Iqbal Block 4 were also tense as gunfights continued, in which nine people, including women and-children, were injured. According to reports, heavy contingents of security-forces entered Qasba Colony and Kati Pahari after getting orders from high-ups. They did not face any resistance. Police and Rangers high ups claimed arrest of at least 100 miscreants and recovery of weapons from them. The details about the alleged--terrorists booked by security forces were not disclosed.

Residents-evacuated from the troubled areas claimed that not a single culprit was arrested by security forces during the operation. They said that the arrested persons-were mostly bystanders and those defending themselves. The also alleged that security forces had tipped off the militants holed up in the hills before launching-the operation thus allowing them to escape.

Hundreds-of families have been evacuated from the troubled areas and shifted to safer places. They said surroundings of Orangi Town and-various other localities remained-tense and police and Rangers personnel were yet to be seen in-these areas. Residents said that Rangers had regained the-control of Kati Pahari, Baloch Goth, MPR colony, Bukhari Colony, Muslimabad Colony, Qasba 2½ and sector A-1, Paharganj, Umar Farooq Colony and Manghopir areas. Security forces had-also taken control of Banaras Bridge but the area was still tense.

Meanwhile, the police-and Rangers, under a joint strategy, have taken control of the pickets erected by alleged criminals in the Kati Pahari and other troubled areas of the-metropolis on Saturday.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik revealed-this to a law and order meeting held at the Chief Minister’s House.

The federal minister and Chief Minister Sindh Syed Qaim Ali Shah were jointly-chairing the meeting held to review the volatile security situation in the city.

Malik said that more-Rangers men would be deployed in the violence-hit localities, adding the law enforcement agencies have been directed to take indiscriminate action against the criminals and miscreants in the troubled areas so that law and order could be fully restored-there.

The minister said-more drastic actions would be taken to wipe out the criminal activities and violence in the city.

It was decided to hold another meeting after eight hours to review the law and-order situation, which would also be jointly chaired by the provincial chief executive and the interior minister.

The meeting reviewed the steps taken by the police and Rangers specially in Orangi, Qasba Colony, Kati Pahari and other areas and expressed-its satisfaction over their outcome as situation was returning to normalcy. The participants said that the LEAs have demonstrated “excellent performance” to restore law and order.

The chief minister instructed the police and Rangers and other LEAs to take-sustainable and permanent steps for protection of life and property of the citizens. He asked them to take the criminals, miscreants, terrorists and anti-social elements to task in addition to ensuring the peace and tranquillity.

Home Minister Manzoor Husain Wasan, Chief Secretary Raja Muhammad Abbas, IGP Wajid Ali Durrani, Additional Chief-Secretary, Home, Waseem Ahmed, CCPO Karachi Saud Mirza, among others, attended the meeting.

Fasahat Mohiuddin adds: The PML-F chief Pir Sahib Pagara said his party wanted the revival of the commissionerate system in Karachi as it was good for the people.

He was talking to the media after a meeting with Interior Minister Rehman Malik, who called on him at the Kingri House.

Rehman Malik on the occasion said the Rangers-had taken control of the pickets occupied by the militants on top of the Kati Pahari in the Orangi Town area.

The minister said, “Adjoining areas of Orangi are also gradually coming under the control of Rangers and the police.” He said the people who had left their homes were now coming back and being provided relief goods by the government.

Malik said he-himself visited the affected areas of Orangi Town on Sunday where the situation was improving.

He said besides Rangers, police and 250 FC men had also been deployed there while the rest of the FC personnel were on their way from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

He revealed that 87 terrorists had been arrested from the affected areas and said that terrorists were using children and elders as the human shield “therefore, we keep on changing our strategy”.

Moreover, the minister said the intelligence sources had-also revealed that some terrorists were operating on the directives of those in jails, adding, “We are trying to trace their communication system”.

He said President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani had given instructions for zero tolerance in action against terrorists to restore peace in Karachi.

To a question, Malik said the operation in the disturbed areas will be strategically-targeted, across the board and go on till results were--achieved.

“Enemies want to destabilise the economic hub of the-country but the government will foil all such conspiracies with the help of the people and media,” he pointed out.

The interior minister said that he visited the Kingri House specially to seek guidance from one of most senior politician and with messages of well-wishes by the president and the prime Minister for the Pir Sahib.

Malik said he was working with the leadership of the MQM, ANP, JUI and particularly Pir Sahib Pagara and they all had supported the efforts of the government to restore peace in the-metropolis, which was backbone of the country.

He said that there were some politicians and even media people who were giving irresponsible statements, which was regrettable, and they-should refrain from such practice.

The minister regretted the criticism on the role the army, Rangers-and police and said they were frontline defenders of the country and sacrifice their lives to protect civilians.

He said that it was on the requisition of the Sindh government that the Rangers were deployed in Karachi.

“The federal and Sindh-government are fully backing the actions of Rangers, who have now been given powers of police.”

Rehman Malik said, “The government is fully-determined to protect the life and property of the people and it is our prime responsibility to bring peace not only in Karachi, but across the country.

Final Shuttle Flight's Secret (Not So Secret) Souvenir Stash

2011-07-08T08:27:00.000-07:00

Various U.S., military and country flags, as well as assorted space shuttle mission patches are among the mementos packed aboard Atlantis for the final space shuttle mission.

The final astronaut-crew to fly on a space shuttle has a secret in store for everyone watching when the astronauts pause during their mission to offer a tribute to NASA's 30-year shuttle program.

The four crewmembers have some special souvenirs packed on shuttle Atlantis, but what they are, they aren't saying.

"Our commander wants to keep a lot of that a surprise for the day that we do those things," said Atlantis' pilot-Doug Hurley in a pre-flight interview. "Obviously, there may be some mementos involved before we leave the space station for the last time

But just trust us. Watch the mission and you'll see some neat stuff," he said.

Hurley did share with collect SPACE.com that he thought it was their commander, veteran spaceflyer Chris Ferguson, who came up with the idea for what to fly. [9 Weird Things That Flew On NASA's Space Shuttles]

"When he said it, we were all like 'Perfect, let's do that,'" Hurley said. "I think it will be appropriate. I think-it will be a nice way to kind of honor the shuttle program."

Ferguson, Hurley, and mission specialists Sandy Magnus and Rex Walheim are scheduled to launch aboard Atlantis on Friday (July 8) at 11:26 a.m. EDT (1526 GMT), weather permitting. Their 12-day mission, called STS-135, will be the 135th and final-flight of the shuttle program.

Atlantis will lift off with a large cargo module packed with thousands of pounds of critical equipment, experiments and a year's worth of supplies for the International Space Station.

The fully packed shuttle still had room however, for some souvenirs not all of them secret.

Official Flight Kit

"We've had a lot of requests. Everybody with just that one last thing that they would like to fly on a space shuttle," said Ferguson. [Photos: NASA's Prepares for Final Shuttle Flight]

Since before the first orbiter flew on April 12, 1981, shuttle astronauts and their NASA managers-have had two types of opportunities to grant some of those requests.

The crewmembers can pack up to 20 small mementos in their Personal Preference Kits, or PPKs. These items cannot be commercial in nature and are generally gifts for family members and friends.

Then there's the Official Flight Kit (OFK), a duffle bag size container used to fly mementos for-organizations in and outside of NASA that have contributed to the mission's goals or to the astronauts' success. The contents of the OFK remain stowed inside a locker for-the length of the mission, only to be unpacked and distributed after the shuttle has landed.

As its name implies, the PPKs are personal and so, like this mission's secret commemorative mementos, it is up to the astronauts whether-they publicly disclose--what they are flying. The OFK's inventory is slightly less secretive, and collectSPACE.com has obtained this last mission's flight kit contents and published it here.

Among the final shuttle OFK's highlights are more than 20,000 small American flags, nearly 2,000 various shuttle mission patches, almost 4,000 space station patches and more than 900 assorted U.S., military and-country flags. These flown-in-space souvenirs will be given out to space program workers and VIPs as a token of gratitude for their support of the mission and program.

Crew's choice

That's not to say that all the mementos flown come in large quantities; many are unique to the individual organizations-for which they are on board. [Final Countdown for NASA's Last Shuttle Flight]

For example, Ferguson and Hurley chose items honoring their shared earlier role as naval aviators.

"I am taking a medallion that will celebrate the centennial of naval aviation," said Ferguson. "It's a milestone for the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard as they-celebrate 100 years of flying and with Doug and I both with naval aviation training backgrounds, we thought it appropriate."

"I have a small Marine Corps flag and a small Navy flag," added Hurley. "We're very proud to be naval aviators and we just want to take a little-bit of that with us into space.

Both the commander and pilot also have items that reflect their personal histories and interests.

Ferguson--grew up in Philadelphia, where he said he often visited a local science museum, the Franklin Institute. The astronomy director there offered Ferguson a small part of the Institute's Fels-Planetarium to fly.

"I will take that and when [the flight] is all done, I'll present it back to them and they-can hold it up as an example of what flew on the very last space shuttle flight," Ferguson said.

For his part, Hurley has included several NASCAR flags, including a "No Limits" banner flown for the Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth.

"I am a season ticket holder and the president of the-speedway found out about-that a couple of years ago. So we got to be friends," said Hurley. "It was kind of cool to be able to do this for them."

Magnus and Walheim both-have on board "small trinkets" and "charms" for their family members. Walheim also has "some medallions" while Magnus chose to fly items from the universities she attended.

Magnus told-collectSPACE.com that she believes she understands the appeal of having something aboard the shuttle.

"I think for people who are outside the space-program it is sort of exciting because it makes you part of the space program. It is special because it is the idea that this--thing has been on this long wonderful journey and I think that excites people," she said.

source: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/07/08/final-shuttle-flights-secret-and-not-so-secret-souvenir-stash/

'Syria' slams-U.S-diplomat's trip to Hama

2011-07-08T08:11:00.000-07:00

U.S. ambassador to Syria Robert Ford visited-Hama Thursday, stayed overnight, and left on Friday.

By the CNN Wire Staff

The embattled Syrian-regime is lambasting the U.S. ambassador for his trip to the restive city of Hama, where it says he met with "saboteurs," incited protests and undermined its national dialogue initiative.
The government also said Robert Ford did not ask for proper--permission to travel to the city, where thousands of people have taken to the streets for anti-government protests in recent days, including a huge turnout on Friday.
In a visit meant to show solidarity with the Syrian citizenry, Ford journeyed to the city on Thursday, stayed overnight, and left on Friday.
State Department-spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Thursday that Ford planned to stay through protests. But a State Department official said Ford left Hama around 1:30 p.m., before Friday prayers and in advance of the demonstrations, in order to ensure his presence would not cause a distraction. He met with Hama residents and visited a hospital.
Syrian-run media on Friday-slammed Ford for his activities.
A State TV banner accused Ford of inciting and participating in the protests in Hama.
Another TV report said he met with "saboteurs in Hama," urging them to-protest and reject the government-backed national dialogue process.
The process is designed to generate-society wide participation on issues, the government has said. A "consultative meeting" of the National Dialogue Committee is scheduled this weekend.
But opposition to that-process is the theme of today's nationwide turnouts, dubbed "No Dialogue.

The state news agency SANA reported that a Foreign Ministry-source accused Ford of going to Hama without obtaining permission from the-government.

According to the report, the Foreign Ministry-official said Ford's visit was "clear evidence of the U.S. involvement in the ongoing events in Syria and its bids to aggravate the situations which destabilize Syria.''
But Nuland said on Thursday U.S. officials notified the Syrian government that an embassy team was traveling to Hama.

"The embassy informed Syrian officials that an embassy delegation, without specifying whom, would be heading to Hama. And they then proceeded to make their way there and were allowed to proceed," Nuland said.
Ford's delegation did not include any official-Syrian "handlers," Nuland said, adding that Syrian authorities allowed him through check points to reach the town.
"For him to go personally at this-time and stand with the people of Hama, I think, expresses in physical terms not to mention political terms our view that the people of Hama have the right to express themselves peacefully and that we are concerned about the posture that the security-forces have taken," Nuland said.

Bouthaina Shaaban, an adviser to President Bashar al-Assad, called the visit "an escalation on the part of the U.S. ambassador. Never before an ambassador visited a city with a problem like the case of Hama without-permission."
Speaking to BBC Arabic in an interview that was reported by the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency, Shaaban said Ford's visit was inauspicious, coming at the "moment when a meeting is prepared-between the residents, mosque imams and the civil authorities in the city aimed at finding a solution to the problem."

She said his arrival undermines efforts to solve the problem.
"By whose help was he able to reach al-Sreijeh Mosque without being encountered by any of the gunmen in the streets who have blocked-employees in Hama from reaching their jobs for the fourth day in a row." she asked.
"Syria doesn't want to cut the thinnest thread with the U.S. administration, but there is great protest and resentment among the Syrian-people about the U.S. State Department's statement, that the ambassador is in Hama and intends to stay till Friday on the eve of the national dialogue due to be held among all spectrums of the Syrian society... This gives us a message that the U.S. says 'No' to dialogue," Shaaban said.

She asked why the United States hasn't backed the regime's dialogue initiative-despite its talk of the need for reform in Syria.

2,000 year old Objects found in Pakistan Taxila

2011-07-02T05:34:00.000-07:00

About 200-objects dating back to the first century AD have been found during excavations near Pakistan's ancient site of Taxila.

Taxila shows the different stages in the development of a city on the Indus that was influenced by Persia, Greece and central Asia and which, from the 5th century BC to the 2nd century AD, was an important-Buddhist centre of learning.

It lies 30 km northwest of Rawalpindi.

Dawn reported that a team of Taxila Institute of Asian-Civilisation (TIAC) found the 200 objects during excavations at an ancient-Buddhist Stupa and monastery near Taxila.
The objects are mostly stamped pottery parts of terracota, iron pieces and-lamp.

The institute's director Mohammad Ashraf Khan noted-that the site had the potential of holding ancient treasures.

He said the first excavation at the site was carried out in 1916-17 by Sir John Marshall, the second in 2005 and then in 2006.

Khan said the history of Taxila-should be rewritten in light of the fresh-discoveries.

JOSH back in Pakistan Rock again

2011-07-02T05:29:00.000-07:00

Internationally famed Indo Pak music band JOSH is all set to rock-again in Pakistan. This will be the first appearance of JOSH after the successful launch of their album “Beyond Kismat” who recently clinched the top spot on music charts across South-Asia with their song “Pyar Hogaya”.

JoSH performed last night at the Canadian embassy, Islamabad and now making its way to the Expo Centre, Lahore today, to perform on the vibrant-beats of their songs from “Beyond Kismat”.

The album “Beyond Kismat” has not only won hearts of millions in Pakistan but also pumped the heart beats of the people residing across the border. JoSH is expected to stay in Pakistan until July 4, 2011 during which it will be appearing in front of public for the promotion of their album who-already attained the title of “Audience Favourite” with in no time. JoSH will be performing in concerts that will be held in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad leaving no stone unturned to convey their message of love, unity and peace to the maximum number of people possible. Th\e JoSH will-leave for Mumbai, India on July 5 to launch their album “Beyond Kismat” in India.

This was the first time JOSH has launched their album in Pakistan and Rupinder Magon (Rup) and Quraam (Q) believed this album to get the best response ever. Nevertheless, promising-Pakistani audience and prospective music lovers have met the anticipated response and the band received the overwhelming response in Pakistan and even-abroad.

Talking-upon their arrival in Pakistan, Indian born “Rup” is excited to perform again in Pakistan in front of music loving nation and said “it is always been a matter of great-excitement to perform in Pakistan and I also feel delighted over the fact that Pakistanis appreciate our music and they praise us which ultimately becomes the great source of tremendous-encouragement that inspires us to continue working with same zeal and zest”.

At the same-occasion, Pakistan born “Q” looks forward their tour to Pakistan as a challenging one as he believed that it takes a lot of perspiration and hard work on stage to entertain the people and especially when it comes to Pakistan where the crowd is used to get on its feat upon-their arrival at the stage. “I believe this would be hectic this time but I feel performing in Pakistan like “performing in home”. So InshAllah, we will rock-again, Q added.

JOSH’s “Beyond Kismat” has done remarkably-well across the borders and their this very tour to Pakistan in the arena of concerts is been-much awaited by their fans.

Thousands People expected for wedding of Monaco prince

2011-07-02T05:22:00.000-07:00

By Pierre Thebault

MONACO (Reuters): Flags, fanfare and thousands of well wishers awaited the-wedding of Prince Albert II to his South African fiance-Saturday in a union hoped to restore the luster of the luxury playground on the Riviera.

The nuptials are the-first of a ruling prince in Monaco since the prince's father, Prince Rainier III, married the Hollywood star Grace Kelly in 1956, and come two months after Britain's royal wedding-of Prince William to Kate Middleton.

Monaco's long hoped for princely wedding thrusts into the spotlight the tiny principality built on the fairytale image of luxury, high-stakes gambling and fast cars, and its ancient House of Grimaldi-whose family members have ruled since 1297.

Albert, the 53 year old sovereign ruler of Monaco and long-time bachelor, is set to marry the 33-year-old Charlene Wittstock in a religious ceremony-scheduled for 5 p.m. (11 a.m. EDT). The couple married in a more private civil ceremony in the palace throne room Friday.

Plush red and gold chairs in the palace-courtyard awaited some 3,500 guests, including heads of state. Barricades were set up to accommodate the thousands more officials say are expected to flood the city state-surrounded on three sides by France.

"It gives me great-pleasure that the Prince of Monaco has chosen a South African like me," said Danielle Dourdent, a visitor who traveled from eastern France to cheer the-couple.

Home-to the Monte Carlo Grand Prix race car, Monaco is still considered a playground of the very rich: residents pay no income or property tax, and yachts are a dime a dozen at the-port.

But tragedy and scandal, including-past admissions from Albert that he fathered two illegitimate children, have chipped away at its mystique over the years.

The son of Prince Rainier III and Kelly who as Princess Grace ushered in an--era of glamour to the tiny city-state before--dying in a car crash in 1982 Albert met Wittstock while presiding over a swimming match in 2000.

Wittstock, whose appearance draws comparisons with that of Kelly, is a former national champion swimmer from middle-class roots who retired from-competition in 2007.

Within days of the wedding, rumors of discontent threatened to mar the festivities. The palace strongly denied a report in French weekly L'Express that Wittstock--tried to skip town on a one-way flight to South Africa and that it took "infinite persuasion" by the prince and his entourage to change her mind.

The culmination-of months of painstaking preparations, the event has generated building excitement on the part of the 8,000 Monegasques who hold citizenship from the world's smallest independent state after the Vatican-City.

Free-concerts by The Eagles and French pop star Jean Michel Jarre preceded Saturday's wedding. Fireworks are to follow the official dinner from celebrity chef Alain Ducasse-and ball.

(Additional reporting by Marina Depetris; Writing by Alexandria Sage; Editing by Michael Roddy)

Newlyweds Prince Albert II of Monaco waves-alongside Princess Charlene on the Palace balcony after their civil wedding-service in Monaco

Princess Stephanie of Monaco (C) and her-sister Princess Caroline of Hanover (R) and her daughter Princess Charlotte Casiraghi (L) stand together after the civil wedding service-between Monaco"s Prince Albert II and Princess Charlene in Monaco

Newlyweds Prince Albert II of Monaco waves as Princess Charlene rests her head on his-shoulder as they stand on the Palace-balcony after the civil wedding service in Monaco

Newlyweds Prince Albert II of Monaco and Princess Charlene-kiss on the Palace balcony after the civil wedding service-in Monaco

Newlyweds Prince Albert II (2ndR) of Monaco-and Princess Charlene stand on the Palace square after their civil wedding-service in Monaco

Prince Albert II of Monaco and his bride-Princess Charlene Princess arrive on the Palace square after the civil wedding-ceremony in Monaco

source: http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCATRE7605D920110702?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=0

Transformers: Dark of the Moon: Movie review

2011-06-30T23:29:00.000-07:00

Transformers: Dark of the Moon: The Autobots return to action when a mysterious event from Earth's past erupts into the present day, threatening to destroy humanity

A director whose-bombast knows no bounds, especially in the second "Transformers" film, Michael Bay manages to keep the volume down by his standards-for a while in "Dark of the Moon."

But in the end, he can't help himself. As if realizing he's spent all this money on such spectacular-effects, Bay pulls out all the stops in the last act in an orgy of cacophony, pitting shrieking, grinding metal against metal in one incoherent battle after another.

Up to that point, however, this "Transformers" is better than the second film (though that's not saying much), with some enjoyable bits here and there. If nothing else, Bay knows his audience these things are huge worldwide, and a lot of people come--to see things blow up. If you are one of them, you will not be disappointed. It just takes a little longer to get there.

Part of the reason is because a fair chunk of the first act takes place on the moon, where it's quieter. You know, the "Alien" tagline, "In space, no one can hear you scream," that sort of thing. Everyone can, however, hear the annoying voiceover narration of Optimus Prime (voice of Peter Cullen), who explains what happened in the war between the Autobots and the Decepticons, and how that came to kick-start the race to the moon--between the U.S. and the Soviets and how it led to the abrupt end of lunar missions, as well. It involves Sentinel Prime (voice of Leonard Nimoy), an ancient Autobot (their Albert Einstein, we're told), who must be revived. Or something.

Back on Earth, the Autobots remain our ever-vigilant friends, helping to keep the human race from destroying itself in wars. But while they're preventing disaster, Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) can't get a job. He has, however, landed another hot girlfriend. Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, in her first role) is beautiful and supportive, and works for the rich, too cool to be true Dylan (Patrick Dempsey), who showers her with--things like a $200,000 Mercedes. Sam's jealous, naturally, but he finally gets hired by an over the top John Malkovich, for whom that is becoming the default description. Before long, the Autobots and Decepticons are at it again, with Sam eager to get back into the mix. He's hampered temporarily by an uptight intelligence-director played by Frances McDormand, who proves she, too, can overact. But soon enough, Sam is back to his screaming self, along with franchise regulars Josh Duhamel and John Turturro. There are deceptions-and twists but, in the end, mostly special effects.

But to what end? When two cars turned robots start fighting in close combat, it's nearly impossible to tell who's who, or what's what. Which makes it hard to care who wins; you just sit on the--sidelines and wait for them to sort things out, then move on to the next clash.

Too long, too dumb and too loud, "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" is at least an improvement on its immediate predecessor. That's not much to get-excited about, but if you're looking for a reason to justify seeing it and millions will-see it I suppose it's something.

"We had a longing to come here" Prince William tells adoring crowd

2011-06-30T23:18:00.000-07:00

Britain's Prince William greets war veterans after a ceremony at the National War Memorial in Ottawa June 30, 2011

Katie Daubs and Bruce Campion-Smith

Staff reporters

More about

Royal Visit: Charles and..»

William never had a chance.

The Fleming-twins were a flytrap of sweetness, holding carnations addressed to “our Prince Charming” and wearing matching sailor hats and dresses.

As the Duke and Duchess walked up the lane at Rideau-Hall he was swallowed into their vortex of adorableness.

“He said he really liked the flowers,” Alice, 7, said. “He was really handsome.”

“It made me feel-really happy,” said Annika, who just recently lost a front tooth.

Their mom, Heather Fleming, couldn’t see for the media swarm. But she was-impressed.

“He’s quite the prince. The people’s prince,” she said.

As the royal couple arrived in-Canada, the warm and personable traits of the late Princess Diana were with them at every handshake and conversation, leaving a trail of warm and fuzzy-feelings.

The crowd was-already in their pocket before they arrived, cheering “Kate, Kate, Kate” as they stepped out of the limousine at the National War Memorial.

The couple gave the love back, tossing the tightly scripted schedule out the-window to talk to appreciative veterans and royal watchers.

Grade 2 student-Jackson Davidson, of Guelph, lured the prince with a finely crafted poster he and his mom made that proclaimed, “Welcome to Canada, Eh!!” and featured pictures of William and Kate.

Sure enough, William strode over.

“Awesome,” Jackson said afterwards.

“He was very warm, very comfortable, everything you would expect and then a bit more,” said Holly Davidson.

As William chatted up Jackson, Kate, looking tan in a black and white lace dress, worked the crowd with ease.

“She’s so down to earth. You think about these people and you think you’re never-going to meet them . . . then something like this comes up and you get to and you realize they’re a person just like you,” said Alexandra Anghel, 18, of Ottawa.

The scheduled-departure time came and went. Royal minders hovered impatiently.

“They took their good ol’ time and made sure everyone was spoken to,” said Mabel Girouard, the Silver Cross mother who met the couple.

And at Rideau Hall, from the moment William said “Merci beaucoup,” a cheer rose through the crowd.

“Catherine and I are so delighted to be in Canada. Instilled in us by our parents and grandparents who love this country, we’ve been looking forward to this moment for a very long time,” he said. “Before we were-married we had a longing to come here together.”

He paused, and the crowd went, “Awww,” and the Duchess smiled.

While the Duke-inspected the military, Kate chatted and laughed with Governor General David Johnston. Next to them, Prime Minister Stephen Harper looked like that guy at a party just waiting for his chance to jump in to the conversation.

The Duke started off his remarks in French, with a fairly natural accent that became a little rigid as he read off his notes. “I’ll improve as I go along,” he assured the crowd, who delighted in his trifle with-bilingualism. Allie Daze, 9, said the Duke’s French was better than the Governor General’s but still only gave it a “4 out of 10.” Many other said it was excellent.

Fascinators-were the dress code of the day, but only the Brinkman sisters had the distinction of wearing Dollarama paper plates and doilies. Samantha, 10, said she likes Will and Kate because it “doesn’t seem like they’re looking down on us and stuff.”

After the official welcome, the Duke and Duchess had some downtime before a reception with 120 youth who had been selected for their volunteer service.

The invitation of a lifetime read “Dress code: smart casual”

“That can be attributed so many ways,” said Hollie McLauglin, 23, of Richmond Hill.

McLaughlin, who was selected for her work with Equal Voice, confirmed-that like many women of a certain vintage, she used to have a crush on William.

“He’s not that much older than we are, and growing up, there is that stereotypical dream of marrying a prince, he was the-modern day fairy tale,” she said.

And for the people who saw the couple on day one of a historic royal tour, this was a very-good start to happily ever after.
source: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/royalvisit/article/1017969

'Google+ could make 'Twitter' the next 'Myspace'

2011-06-30T23:05:00.000-07:00

By Peter Yared

Google+ coThere are numerous-comparisons between Google’s new Google+ social offering and Facebook, but most of them miss the mark. Google knows the social train has left the station and there is a very slim chance of catching up with Facebook’s 750 million active users. However, Twitter’s position as a broadcast platform for 21 million active-publishers is a much more achievable goal for Google to reach.

There are two different types of social networks, private and public each defined by its default privacy setting. Facebook is by default private--and meant to connect actual friends.
Twitter by default is public and anyone can follow anyone else. Google+ is decidedly in the Twitter camp meaning you can follow anyone, including Google CEO Larry Page. Google+ lets you see Page’s posts and “like” his photos of kite surfing in--Alaska. When posting on Google+, it forces users to select specific social circles they are posting to, which includes “everyone” as an option that mimics a Twitter-style broadcast. If not for the lawsuits and FTC settlement about Google Buzz automatically broadcasting posts, it is likely that Google+’s default setting-would be pubic posts.

Although Twitter is growing (having just hit 200 million tweets a day), Twitter has left itself open to be displaced with a slow pace of adding features. Even newly returned founder Jack Dorsey has said that it was too difficult for “normal” people-to use Twitter.

So, how can Google go after the 21 million people who are actively publishing on Twitter, and, more importantly, the few thousands that own the majority of Twitter followers? These types of posters are-generally publishers, and Google’s core competence is serving publishers. Publishers pay a lot of attention to Google, from search engine optimization to increase-the ranking on Google searches, search engine marketing keyword ads to drive traffic, and on-site advertising solutions ranging from AdSense to DoubleClick.

Publishers are interested in increasing their search rankings and improving-their reach. Posting content to Google+1 increases search rankings. The black toolbar across the top of all Google services (other than YouTube), which integrates both Google+ and Google+ notifications, definitely provides reach and is now in front of as many user minutes as Facebook commands. Users commenting or liking on items from publishers will show up in their friends’ toolbars. Even if they--only have a few friends, the overall traffic bump will be significant. The Google+ bar has not yet been activated on YouTube, a key publisher and celebrity channel, and likely will broadcast YouTube likes, comments and shares.

uld make Twitter the next-Myspace While Facebook is not sweating about Google+, the threat to Twitter is significant. Google has the opportunity to displace-Twitter if it gets publishers and celebrities to encourage Google+ follows on their websites as well as pushing posts to the legions of Google users while they are in Search, Gmail and YouTube. Google was turned down when it tried to buy Twitter for $10 billion, and now it is going to try to-replicate it. With Google+, the company actually-has a shot.
Source: http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/30/google-could-make-twitter-the-next-myspace/

Samsung sells 2m smart TVs in very short period

2011-06-30T22:52:00.000-07:00

Islamabad-: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., a global-leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, recently unveiled that it’s cumulative ‘Smart TV’ sales has surpassed 2 million-units cumulatively since their introduction in March 2011.
It is an unprecedented record and reinforces Samsung’s brand leadership as “Smart TV Samsung TV” the world over. The highest-number of Smart TV’s sold was in North America at 730,000 units, followed by Europe with 710,000 units and Middle East, Africa and South Asia with 170,000. In Korea alone the-number of Samsung Smart TV’s sold on its launch were more than 120,000 units.
Samsung Smart TV’s sales success was made possible by its widest product lineup, user interface, differentiated smart functionality-and enriched content which provide what consumers want. With Samsung Smart TV, users can enjoy smart tips, smart search, social networking, web browser, and Samsung Apps TV all via Smart Hub a customized user interface. At the same time, Smart Hub’s well arranged main-menu allows them to look through a wide array of content at a glance-which is just a click away.
One of the key-differentiation points is its Qwerty remote control which makes it easier for users enjoy all smart TV functions. Built-in wireless dongle is also another notable smart function, ensuring the most optimized Internet environment to be provided for users without-additional costs. Another is Samsung’s App’s store which provides over 600 applications to full the needs of its consumers for games, education, movies, and lifestyle.
Samsung Smart TV delivers the most optimized smart experience, while being faithful to TV’s original features such as picture quality and design. Offering both product convenience and enriched content is the secret behind the success of-our Smart TV,” said Hee Chang Yee, MD Samsung Electronics Pakistan. “We expect that along with D7000 and=D8000, our further expanded models will drive up our Smart TV sales in the-second half of this year.

World’s First Flying Motorbike Ready to Fly

2011-06-30T22:43:00.000-07:00

Traffic jams-could soon become a thing of the past thanks to an amateur inventor who has built the world’s first flying motorcycle in his garage. Australian Christopher Malloy ploughed his entire-life savings into the project which took him two and a half-years to complete. His futuristic creation dubbed the Hoverbike can reach an altitude of 10,000ft and-speeds of over 100mph.
Fans of the design have already compared Mr Malloy’s work to the ‘speeder bikes’ from the Stars Wars sequel Return Of The Jedi or the hovering car from Back To The-Future.
The futuristic prototype has the potential to travel up to 92 miles or for about 45 minutes on one tank of fuel and is expected-to come with a hefty price tag of more than £45,000. So far the bike, which weighs 270kgs, has only been tested while tethered to the ground to prevent it flying too high. But-plans to test it’s capabilities without any restrictions are set to go-ahead soon.

5 Reasons the iPhone 5 Will Dominate--Game Over

2011-06-27T23:54:00.000-07:00

Details are scarce, but even from what little we know, the iPhone 5 could revolutionize smartphones...again.

Apple--reinvented the-mobile phone, and revolutionized the smartphone when it introduced the iPhone. It has been surpassed in overall market share by the me-too, copycat Android OS, and Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 is a worthy challenger as well, but this fall Apple has an opportunity to set the bar-for the industry once again, and leave the competition in the dust with the iPhone 5.

1. Verizon (et al). The iPhone 5 will be the first new iPhone model introduced since the exclusivity with AT&T ended (no, the white iPhone does not count not even a little). The Verizon iPhone 4 has been a huge success anyway, but many Verizon customers held off knowing that a-new iPhone is just around the corner, and not wanting to be shackled to an iPhone 4 with 18 months left on the contract. The new unlocked iPhones will make a difference as well.

2. iOS 5. Apple has already shared with us the details of iOS 5. The new iOS will finally free the iPhone (and iPad) from the PC syncing and updating wirelessly instead of requiring a physical connection to a USB port. The improvements-in the iOS mail client, the addition of iMessage, tabbed browsing in the default Safari browser, and the behavior of the Notification Center will all contribute to the success of the iPhone 5.

3. iCloud. Along with iOS 5, Apple will also officially launch iCloud around the same time the iPhone 5 is-expected. iCloud will enable effortless, seamless syncing of email, files, music, contacts, calendars, and other content between the iPhone, iPad, and Windows or Mac PCs.

4. The Specs. The iPhone 5 is expected to (or rumored depending-on your perspective) to use the same dual-core A5 processor Apple uses in the iPad 2. The processor really just plays catch up to the status quo rather-than blowing rival smartphones away, but Apple somehow squeezes better performance and a superior experience out of equivalent, or even inferior hardware.

5. The Camera. The smartphone is quickly replacing the point and shoot, and emerging as the camera of choice for most consumers. It has already put the nail in the coffin of the Flip video camera. But, there is more to-digital photos than maxing the megapixels, and most smartphone cameras take inferior quality photos. Speculation suggests that the iPhone 5 will have an 8 megapixel camera, with dual-LED flash for better low-light photography, and that the iPhone 5 camera will set the bar for-smartphone photos.

Some of this is based on speculation we don't really know what the camera functionality or hardware specs will be just yet. But, just the things we already know for a fact are enough to make-the iPhone 5 the king of the hill and leave all smartphone competitors playing catch-up.

It will be like-June of 2007 all over again.

Pakistani Mass 12 to 15 hours loadshedding facing this time

2011-06-27T23:32:00.000-07:00

LAHORE--Despite having generation capacity of about 16,000mw from the power producers, the national grid is still-facing above 5,000mw shortfall as the country is in the grip of 12 to 15 hours worst outages.
In rural areas people are facing more than 15 hours of shutdown.
In Lahore, about 12 hours loadshedding is continuing with two to three-hours long spells in some areas, the sources added.
Unscheduled-tripping has also added to the woes of Lahorites, the sources said.
It has also been reliably learnt that LESCO was conducting loadshedding with discrimination while less outages were witnessed in elite areas and more for poor and underdeveloped areas of the City.
Minister for Water and Power Syed Naveed Qamar about two months back had announced at National Assembly floor that the shortfall would-remain under 3,000 megawatt during summer but his tall claim remains unfulfilled since the announcement was made.
Similarly, PEPCO Managing Director Rasul Khan Mahsud had also announced that if the power sector was-being provided proper fuel, there would be minor loadshedding.
But the situation is worsening day by day and the government had totally failed to provide relief to the people.
The PEPCO officials believe that controlling electricity shortfall under 3,000 is not a difficult task, yet it looks that the government is not serious-to solve the crisis.
On Monday, according to PEPCO the electricity demand stood at 18,114 mw against the generation of 13,669mw, as per PEPCO’s claim.
The sources told this-scribe that apart from severe fuel and gas shortage hampering power generation, PEPCO’s failure to maintain its own thermal units is causing a considerable portion of the total shortfall.
According to the sources, FESCO, MEPCO was conducting average 15-hour loadshedding in their limits while the-areas in the limits of HESCO, PESCO and QESCO had been facing about 8 to 10 hours loadshedding.
Meanwhile, PEPCO stated that 500kv double circuit (HUBCO-Jamshoro) transmission line tripped due to humidity.
Hence, it created 1,200mw additional shortfall with the-national grid.
However, the company is hopeful to repair the transmission-line on Monday.

In ZAB case Judiciary cannot apologise for individuals’ acts, says CJ

2011-06-27T23:21:00.000-07:00

Every judge makes decisions according to his conscience and is responsible for his action: CJP PHOTO: ONLINE

By Qaiser Zulfiqar

Every judge makes decisions-according to his conscience and is responsible for his actions, observed Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhary, during the hearing of the presidential reference for revisiting the death-by-hanging verdict awarded to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. “Repentance is an individual act; the judiciary cannot apologise for individuals.”

The judiciary as an institution should regret-awarding the death penalty to ZA Bhutto, argued Dr Babar Awan, counsel for President Asif Ali Zardari. Awan contended that repentance should not be restricted to individuals, before the 11 member-larger bench headed by the chief justice.

“If an institution can commit an error, why can’t it repent?” No one is above the law. “If that is so, why were DG Rangers and IGP Sindh removed for Sarfraz Shah’s murder in Karachi which was committed by a subordinate?” he argued. Former chief justice of the apex-court Justice (retd) Naseem Hassan Shah regretted the verdict in his book, “Memoirs and Reflections”. It is a classic example.”

Should the court express repentance? Justice Nasirul Mulk asked. The President’s counsel replied, “Absolutely. The court should regret its verdict.” 7 judges of the Supreme Court dismissed ZA Bhutto’s review appeal for which they were individually responsible. “You would like the incumbent judiciary to repent their decision to uphold the death sentence,” the chief justice observed. Justice Naseem-regretted his decision after retirement.

The counsel sought the Supreme Court’s opinion on legal questions raised in the reference. He enquired whether the former chief justice of Lahore High Court was biased against ZA Bhutto. He quoted the cases of Joan of Arc and Galileo and contended that they were declared innocent after the sentences were handed down. “Joan of Arc was declared innocent by the Pope and not by a court of law,” the chief justice remarked. “We want to strengthen the Constitution, the law and the institutions. Parliament has pardoned many other people, he said referring to the presidential-pardon. “We want to strengthen the parliament-which can legislate to refer cases to the apex court and implement the law.”

People blame us for not being able to protect the author of the 1973 constitution, Awan submitted. He asked the bench whether-Bhutto was awarded the death sentence in accordance with Islamic law.

The court remarked that ZA Bhutto’s sentence was in accordance with the constitution and the law as the co-accused could also be penalised. Awan contended that the co-accused could be-sentenced to life imprisonment, but he could not be sentenced to death. If a judge has committed any wrong, it must be condoned irrespective of any consideration, he argued. The hearing has been-adjourned for Tuesday (today).
source:http://tribune.com.pk

North Bollywood rocks

2011-06-27T01:34:00.000-07:00

Actress Bipasha Basu (below), who stars in a sequel to the comedyKyaa Kool Hai Hum in April 2012, performs at the show watched by 700 million.

Photograph by: Reuters, Postmedia News; National Post

Hollywood A listers Hilary Swank and Cuba Gooding Jr. joined Bollywood's biggest stars on the green carpet this weekend for the-Floriana IIFA awards in Toronto.

The glitzy awards gala celebrating the best in Indian film thrilled a live audience of 22,000 in the Rogers Centre; another 700 million viewers were estimated to have tuned-in to the song and dance extravaganza.
Anil Kapoor, who played the game show host in the Oscar-winning Slumdog Millionaire, thanked Canada for "making us feel . . the Indian summer's warmth." Then he gave a rock star's welcome to "the star of stars . . my friend who has made this happen," Ontario premier-Dalton McGuinty.

"We have been waiting for this day to come," said McGuinty, who walked the green carpet with superstar Shah Rukh Khan. "I want to introduce you to Ontario. This is my place."

Outside, fans crowded the streets to catch a-glimpse of the stars as they arrived. Spectators came dressed in evening gowns and saris and stood on planters with binoculars-focused on the green carpet.

"We came to see the colour, the glamour. They're pretty much style icons for us," said Doveeni Uthayaseelan, 30. Screams swelled-around her.

Dost Mughal, 54, brought his entire family to Toronto from Winnipeg for the weekend to attend the spectacle. "We couldn't miss this opportunity," the Pakistan-born travel agent said. He stood against the gate near-the green carpet before the show with his wife and his three adult children. "Once in a lifetime, this show is in Toronto."

He has been watching--Bollywood films for decades: "We watch, we learn, we cry and we laugh."

He was most excited to see Khan who was nominated for best actor in the drama, My Name is Khan. Khan performed the- evening's finale.

"It's a dream come true when you see them in person," Mughal said.

And the dream was realized when Khan's vehicle pulled up in front of the Mughal family and the icon waved at them. Mughal-captured the moment on video. "A one minute, 32 second video," he said with a smile. "He's the king."

Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai, a story about two gangsters surviving in Bombay in the 1980s, led with 12 nominations, followed by Dabangg, a film about-a mischievous and corrupt cop, with 11 nods, including best film, director and actor.

Bollywood actor Anil Kapoor (left) and Hilary Swank arrive for the International Indian Film Academy(IIFA) Awards in Toronto on Saturday.

My Name is Khan, which was highly popular overseas, was nominated in seven categories. It tells the story of an Indian family living in the United States during the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorism attacks. Shah Rukh Khan was recognized for his lead role as the Muslim patriarch who suffers from-Asperger's syndrome.
Source:http://www.theprovince.com

West Indies vs India: Statistical highlights of 1st Test

2011-06-23T23:04:00.000-07:00

Kingston, Jamaica--Statistical highlights at the end of the first cricket Test between India and the West Indies here on Thursday.

The 63-run win is India's fifth in 43 Tests in the Caribbean - lost 16 and drawn 22.
India's 63-run convincing triumph is their biggest in terms of runs in the Caribbean, eclipsing the 49-run-victory at Kingston in 2006.
India have recorded two wins in succession in the Caribbean for the first time. They had won the previous Test in the West Indies by 49 runs at Kingston in 2006.
India have recorded a victory in the first Test of a series-against West Indies for the first time in the West Indies.
India's overseas record has improved considerably since January 2000, winning % 36.92: Won 24, Lost 21 and Drawn 20 out of 65 played.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni, with 15 wins (success % 60.00) out of 25, has surpassed Mohammad Azharuddin's tally of 14 victories out of 47 - the second-best by an Indian captain, behind Sourav Ganguly - 21 in 49 Tests.

West Indies posted-their 50th defeat at home - Played: 214, Won: 76, Lost: 50 and Drawn: 88 - success % 35.51.
Rahul Dravid received his third Man of the Match award against-West Indies - his 11th in Test Cricket.
Dravid has posted 14 hundreds in a winning cause, averaging 65.69 - 4927 in 54 Tests.
Darren Sammy (25) posted-his highest Test score against India.
Ravi Rampaul (34) has registered his highest innings against India in Tests.
Darren Bravo (41) has recorded his highest innings against India.
Carlton Baugh has posted his first duck in Tests.
Ravi Rampaul's innings of 34 off 32 balls is his second highest innings in Tests, next only to the 40 not out against Australia at Adelaide in December 2009.
Bishoo and Edwards were associated in a stand of 39 for the tenth-wicket, equalling West Indies' highest against India at Kingston. Wayne Daniel and Vanburn Holder had recorded a 39-run-stand in April 1976.
Suresh Raina took four catches in the Kingston Test - the most taken by him as a fielder in aÂ match.
Devendra Bishoo (26) recorded his highest-score in Tests, eclipsing the 24 against Pakistan at Providence in May 2011.
India have posted five victories in the Caribbean - three at Port of Spain and two-at Kingston.

Geo’s bold and beautiful ‘Bol’ premieres in Lahore

2011-06-23T22:55:00.000-07:00

LAHORE--In a similar vein as when Napoleon Bonaparte said, ‘give me good mothers and I’ll give you a good nation’, Shoaib Mansoor has proved true through “Bol” his own version of this saying, ‘give me a good script-and good cast and I’ll give you a great movie’.
Proving to be the biggest event of the year, the premiere of “Bol” was a festival of stars, glitz, glamour and-epic achievement at the Cinestar Thursday.
Notables from not just the film and fashion industry but all walks of life showed up to witness the exquisite work put together by the team crafting “Bol”. Senator Shafqat Mahmood, Geo TV CEO Mir Ibrahim Rahman, Geo TV President Imran Aslam, eminent journalist--and diplomat Maleeha Lodhi, performing arts icon Nighat Chaudhry, renowned poet Wassi Shah, film producer Hassan Askari, filmstar-Ghulam Mohiyyudin, pop icon Ali Zafar, TV sensation Umaima and Rashid Khawaja were some of the many who showed up to be the first to--watch the much anticipated Geo-production.
“Bol”, is set among apparently ordinary characters and is a celebration of innovative movie making which manages to draw all flavors of entertainment, storytelling and a lasting impact of morals-and social conduct.
As if unfazed by the culture of fear and conservative-ness woven intricately in the present day Pakistani society, Shoaib Mansoor has yet again shown-character and perseverance in telling a story that makes a bold social statement against stereotypical pressure groups who believe in imposing--their brand of life on others.

Challenging the culture of preconceived judgments about everyday characters, the writer has expressed how titles associated with individuals--based on profession and status become insignificant when the test of time is more of an opportunity rather than crisis for those who shine through their humane values.
While character played by every-actor in the movie seemed engorged deep within there natural selves, they contributed to the treatment and grip of the movie in a befitting manner. Mahira although a rookie in the world of silver-screen, has surfaced as an exciting prospect and a great find for the industry which-is short in supply of such talent.
The movie seeks to fix responsibility of the everyday crisis and the bigger catastrophes of life in a concrete manner-yet leaves a lot of judgment to its audience to ponder upon. Promoting freedom of thought and snubbing all ideologies based on tunnel vision, “Bol” assumes a position more than just a movie in the present-circumstances and in addition to raising a lot of questions regarding our social norms, it asserts a liability, on all who watch it, of doing-our part to create a positive change instead of sitting it out apathetically.

The Rise of the Hacker

2011-06-23T22:47:00.000-07:00

An attack on Brazil's state website yesterday shows that the criminal activity is now a spectator sport, says Christopher Williams.

Gary McKinnon and Mark Zuckerberg Photo: AP

By Christopher Williams

A month-and a half ago, a group calling itself Lulz Security embarked on a nihilistic hacking spree against high-profile corporations and government agencies. Yesterday morning, it was boasting of its latest coup bringing down the-websites of the Brazilian government and the president an action marked with a Twitter message beginning "TANGO DOWN".

Lulz Security the "Lulz" is a derivative of the online abbreviation for "laugh out loud" has challenged the-CIA-to catch its-members, dumped huge quantities of personal data on to the web, and built up a following of 250,000 Twitter users, many of whom send messages in support of its attacks.

LulzSec is pioneering hacking as a spectator sport and taking requests as to who-it should target next. Its members, thought to number not many more than half a dozen and going by online nicknames such as "Sabu", "Topiary" and "Kayla", are revelling in the attention, including from figures such as Sir Paul Stephenson, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. He was-- prompted by their antics to say yesterday that "the challenges around cyber crime are significant and deeply worrying".

While LulzSec's publicity machine is unusual among hackers, the likelihood is that its members would appear familiar to anyone who has read-a Stieg Larsson book or seen Die Hard 4.0.

In the real world, Gary McKinnon, a UFO aficionado who spent long, solitary nights in a fog of cannabis while hunting for evidence of alien visitors in the Pentagon computer network, is perhaps the archetypal-hacker. McKinnon is, according to his mother Janis Sharp, an Asperger's sufferer who would not cope with life in a federal penitentiary, but nine years after indictment the US continues to seek his-extradition.

Indeed, the standard profile of the lone computer hacker has not changed much in 25 years. Brilliant online but often seen as strange in the real world, theirs is an occupation that can be a constructive hobby or a destructive obsession. It can become a profitable criminal enterprise or lead to a legitimate fortune.

In 2004, in a messy Harvard dorm room, a 19-year-old computer hacker decided to spy on his enemies by breaking into their email accounts. Given the powerful data he had already collected via his popular student website, it was easy: he had records of their passwords.

The hacker was Mark Zuckerberg, and his enemies were reporters at the college newspaper, the Harvard Crimson, who were investigating allegations that his website, TheFacebook.com, was based on stolen ideas. Seven years and a $100 billion company later, the hacking incident merits barely a mention in Facebook's success story, and it demonstrates the world-changing potential of those with the hacker skills and mindset. Indeed many "hackers" object to the use of the term to describe cyber criminals.

Most high-profile hacker stories do not have a happy ending, although many are just as extraordinary as Zuckerberg's. In 2003, 22-year-old Albert Gonzalez was arrested by the NYPD after being spotted withdrawing cash from several bank cards in a row in Manhattan. The subsequent Secret Service investigation showed he was a major cyber criminal, hacking into payment systems to access account details and trading them on underground websites.

The Secret Service agents used this information to turn Albert Gonzalez into an informant and consultant, extracting him from his solitary life of long nights in front of a computer – in his case fuelled by a cocktail of cocaine, ecstasy and prescription anti-narcoleptics. Or so they thought.

As it turned out, although he had cleaned up his appearance and dropped his chemical dependencies, Gonzalez had never given up criminal hacking. By the time the authorities caught on, in 2008, he had amassed more than 170 million credit card numbers and $1.2 million in cash, kept in a barrel buried in his parents' backyard. He is now serving 20 years in prison.

While he was clearly motivated by money, a psychological report prepared for the court said Gonzalez "identified with his computer". "It is hard if not impossible, even at the present, for Mr Gonzalez to conceptualise human growth, development and evolution, other than in the language of building a machine," it said.

LulzSec claims its members are not motivated by money, but by a nihilistic view of the internet and security. In a self-justifying manifesto released at the weekend, the group claimed that "you find it funny to watch havoc unfold, and we find it funny to cause it. We release personal data so that equally evil people can entertain us with what they do with it.

"We're attracted to fast-changing scenarios, we can't stand repetitiveness, and we want our shot of entertainment or we just go and browse-something else, like an unimpressed zombie."

There is no evidence that LulzSec's technical methods are anything special. The majority of their attacks since their emergence early in May, including against the CIA and Serious Organised Crime Agency, have been Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks; flooding target websites with traffic to force them offline for a short time. Something similar happens to the taxman-every year, as millions rush to file online returns on deadline day.

These attacks are mounted by a botnet, a network of thousands of computers infected with viruses that can order them to join the flood. Writing a virus is relatively difficult, as well as unnecessary: botnets can be bought or even rented on message boards.

The group has perpetrated actual network intrusions too, hacking-into systems to access private data. The vulnerabilities LulzSec has exploited in raids on Sony and the US Senate are, however, well known among the fraudsters, activists, mischief-makers, security professionals and-government spies that mix on the hacking scene.

But unlike hacking groups before it, LulzSec excels at publicity. Its members have taken advantage of Twitter to announce its targets and taunt enemies and authorities. They are anonymous, using an array of technical measures to hide their identities, and even their online handles.

The group splintered from Anonymous, a larger and more politically motivated collective that first surfaced early in 2008 to attack the Church of Scientology. The church was attempting to suppress-online criticism of its eccentric texts, and received a barrage of DDoS attacks for its trouble.

Anonymous gained mainstream prominence last year when it hit PayPal, Amazon and others for withdrawing services from WikiLeaks. More recently-it has targeted Arab government websites in support of the waves of protest across North Africa and the Middle East.

One of the founding principles of the collective, and a key difference between it and LulzSec, is that anyone can join in. This open policy means that Anonymous is a much larger group, but authorities have had greater success tracking down its members. In February, the-FBI-issued 40 arrest warrants, six British men and teenagers are on bail and a week and a half ago Turkish police detained 32 suspects.

LulzSec is more closed and daring. Though there is no evidence that its attacks on the CIA and Soca posed any threat to classified-data, they showed contempt for the authorities and their sophisticated internet investigation capabilities.

A review of logs from chat rooms used by both LulzSec and Anonymous shows informants are a bigger worry for hackers than any technology. They know that human agents like Albert Gonzalez are the authorities' best hope.

Informants are hated and targeted. LulzSec has warned that "snitches get stitches", a violent threat borrowed from American gang culture. Adrian Lamo, the hacker who reported the US serviceman Bradley Manning to the FBI for allegedly sending classified material to WikiLeaks, has been-hounded into hiding.

Like Gary McKinnon, Lamo has been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome; like Albert Gonzalez, he abused amphetamines; and like LulzSec, his criminal exploits in the early 2000s were designed, at least in part, to amuse. But, unlike thieves, there is no honour among-hackers.

Nokia to launch Microsoft Windows platform phones in 2011

2011-06-21T08:25:00.000-07:00

By Alex Kennedy

Associated Press

SINGAPORE -Finnish handset maker Nokia plans to introduce its first mobile phones using the Microsoft Windows operating system this year, the company's chief executive said Tuesday.

Nokia is facing steep competition from competitors in several products. At the top end of the market it is struggling against smartphones such as Apple's (AAPL) iPhone, Research in Motion's Blackberry as well as Android, and on the lower end against emerging market phone makers who are dropping their prices.

Nokia will start to deliver the Windows-based mobile phones in bulk next year, CEO Stephen Elop said in a speech at a technology trade show in Singapore.

"Our primary smartphone strategy is to focus on the Windows phone," Elop said. "I have increased confidence that we will launch our first device based on the Windows platform later this year and we will ship our product in volume in 2012."

Elop has acknowledged Nokia has been too slow to meet the challenge from competitors and has hinted that the company would drop its cellphone prices. Last month, the company warned both sales and profit margins in the second quarter would be substantially below previous forecasts.

Nokia also unveiled Tuesday its N9 smartphone, which is based on the MeeGo platform. The company said it plans to launch up to 10 new symbian based smartphones over the next 12 months

Elop said the N9 would go on sale later this year, but declined to specify the date or price.

Nokia developed MeeGo last year in a partnership with Santa Clara chipmaker Intel (INTC). In February, Nokia turned to Microsoft's Windows Phone software as its main smartphone operating system.

Hundred (100) Years of IBM--Milestones

2011-06-16T08:35:00.000-07:00

By Marc Ferranti, IDG News

IBM is celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding Thursday. Led by American capitalist icons Thomas J. Watson, Sr. and Thomas J. Watson, Jr. until the 1970s, the-company grew from a pre-World War I conglomeration of companies making tabulating machines and time-keeping devices into a globe-spanning technology behemoth that pioneered the development of electronic computers and dominated the mainframe era.

The company holds a mind-boggling array of patents and pioneered advances in a wide range of technologies including punched cards, processors, transistors, storage, word-processing, databases-and OSes. As one of the emblematic 20th-century corporations, IBM also went through turbulent times. The U.S. government brought several antitrust lawsuits against the company, and critics have-attacked it for alleged cosiness with repressive regimes. After Tom Watson Jr. retired in the 1971, the company seemed to lose its way as mainframe computing began to face competition from smaller, more modular systems. Increasing bureaucracy contributed to missteps during the PC revolution, and IBM suffered a series of annual losses in the early 1990s. Under the reins of then-CEO Lou Gerstner, starting in the mid-90s, the company bounced back to profit by focusing on software, system integration and other services, which remain key to the company's growth today.

Though Hewlett-Packard, after its acquisition of Compaq, overtook IBM as the world's largest computer company by annual revenue, IBM's global reach and broad product portfolio still make it one of the largest and most profitable IT companies in the world, with about 427,000 employees and a profit of US$14.8 billion on sales of $99.9 billion last year. The following is a timeline of milestone events in one of the quintessential U.S. corporate success stories.

--1889: Time-recording equipment maker Bundy Manufacturing Co. is incorporated.

--1896: Punched-card, electric tabulating equipment maker The Tabulating Machine Co. is incorporated.

--1911: Incorporation on June 16 of the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company (C-T-R), which merges Bundy, the Tabulating Machine Co., the Computing Scale Company and the International Time Recording Co. Headed by trust organizer Charles Flint, the company has 1,300 employees.

--1914: Thomas J. Watson, Sr., joins C-T-R at age 40, after learning aggressive sales tactics at the National Cash Register Co. that led to his conviction on antitrust charges. The verdict was set aside after an appeal. Within 11 months of joining C-T-R, Watson became its president. His focus on marketing and sales and large-scale tabulating solutions for businesses helped company revenue more than double in his first four years at C-T-R, to $9 million. Over the next four decades as IBM CEO Watson became an American business icon, pioneering worker benefits-such as paid vacations and group insurance while instilling discipline and loyalty in generations of IBM workers.

--1923: The first electric key punch is introduced, representing an advance on mechanical systems.

--1924: Taking the name from a Canadian affiliate, C-T-R formally becomes International Business Machines.

--1928: The 80-column IBM punched card, doubling prior capacity, is unveiled and remains a standard for 50 years.

--1931: A watershed year in advances: IBM 400 accounting machines offer alphabetic data, the 600 series calculating machines perform multiplication and division, and the first automatic multiplying punch and reproducing punch machines are introduced.

--1933: IBM acquires Electromatic Typewriters, acquiring entry in the typewriter business, which ultimately leads to innovations in word processing.

--1936: Tom Watson, Sr.'s, insistence on making machines during the Depression, even when demand dried up, pays off when IBM is in a position to participate in what was then billed as the biggest accounting operation of all time, supplying punched-card equipment to the U.S. government in the wake of the 1935 Social Security Act.

--1937: Tom Watson, Sr., is elected president of the International Chamber of Congress, and at a Berlin meeting promotes "World Peace Through Trade," taken on as a slogan by the ICC and IBM. Germany awards him with an Order of the German Eagle medal. He returns the medal in 1940, enraging the Fascist government, but IBM's business in Germany in the 30s stirs criticism over the years.

--1944: IBM's first large-scale computer, the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator or the Mark I, is the first machine to accomplish long operations automatically, using electromechanical relays.

--1946: IBM's 603 Electronic Multiplier is the first commercially available machine to offer electronic arithmetic circuits. It is more than 50 feet long, eight feet high, and weighs almost five tons.

--1948: IBM releases the Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator, a large-scale digital calculating machine that uses electromechanical relays and offers for the first time the ability to modify a stored program.

--1952: The IBM 701 is IBM's first production electronic computer, featuring tape-drive technology that ultimately led to the ascendance of magnetic tape.

--1952: Thomas J. Watson, Jr., becomes IBM president. He was a force behind the 701, essentially a bet-the-company stance on electronic computers before they became more cost-effective than electromechanical machines, leading the way for IBM to dominate computing for the next few decades during the mainframe era.

--1956: Consent decree ends a 1952 U.S. antitrust suit, as IBM adapts a more liberal policy toward licensing equipment.

--1956: Tom Watson, Jr., takes over as CEO in May, before the death of his father in June. Tom Jr. moves to reorganize IBM along divisional lines, based on a "line and staff" concept that is adopted by American business at large.

--1957: IBM introduces FORTRAN, which becomes the main language for technical work and is used to this day.

--1961: The Selectric typewriter is released; later models offer memory and give rise to modern word processing.

--1964: The IBM System/360 uses Solid Logic Technology microelectronics and introduces the concept of a family of computers that share compatible technology, in what was essentially a $5 billion bet on future trends.

---1966: IBM's Robert Dennard invents the Dynamic Random Access Memory cell, which remains an industry standard.

--1969: IBM technology including an onboard computer used in first manned flight to the moon.

--1971: Tom Watson Jr. steps down, is succeeded by Frank Cary, and the floppy disk is introduced; it later becomes the PC data storage standard.

--1975: The IBM 5100 Portable Computer enters the market, weighing 50 pounds and priced at $9,000 to $20,000.

--1981: The IBM Personal Computer becomes the smallest, and at $1,565, the lowest priced PC to date. IBM's deal for Microsoft to supply the operating system and allow competitors to buy it for "IBM-compatible" clones fuels a growing industry and paves the way for-competitors such as Dell and Compaq.

--1982: A U.S. antitrust suit filed in 1969 is dismissed, but arguably pushes IBM to further separate hardware from software, allowing customers to increasingly mix and match products from different companies, a trend that takes off during the PC era.

--1984: The Personal Computer/AT, IBM's second-generation PC, runs on a 6MHz Intel 80286 processor.

--1987: The IBM Personal System/2 (PS/2) is launched along with the OS/2 operating system, jointly developed by Microsoft and IBM. OS/2 offers multitasking capabilities and in six months one million PS/2s are shipped. But while IBM PC chief James Cannavino wants OS/2 to maintain compatibility with the AT going forward, Bill Gates wants to move on to machines built around the Intel 80386 chip. Windows 3.0, released in 1990, offers crude multitasking features but makes use of '386 memory management and becomes a hit, leaving OS/2 in the dust.

--1990: IBM releases the System/390 family, comprising midrange machines and supercomputers, calling it the company's biggest product development in 25 years. New technology includes high-speed fiber optic channels, ultra-dense circuits and extended supercomputer capabilities.

--1991: As Microsoft and PC clone makers rake in profits, client/server architecture takes off and IBM shocks long-time industry insiders by announcing an annual loss of $2.82 billion, the first of three annual losses in a row. Under CEO John Akers, IBM considers breaking up into smaller, nimbler companies.

--1993: Louis Gerstner, former chief executive of RJR Nabisco, takes the reins as chairman and CEO. At his inaugural press conference, Gerstner plainly states his intention to keep IBM together as an integrated company, and his belief that there is a need for a broad-based IT company that can serve as both supplier and systems integrator to customers.

--1995: IBM acquires Lotus Development Corp. and its Notes collaboration software, making IBM the world's largest software company.

--1995: IBM introduces the ThinkPad 701cm, which runs on the Intel 133MHz Pentium processor. The sleek black design is a departure for IBM and wins accolades.

--1996: IBM's launch of the DB2 Universal Database, capable of querying alphanumeric data as well as images, audio and video, marks IBM's firm embrace of the Internet.

--1997: Deep Blue, an IBM RS/6000 SP supercomputer able to calculate 200 million chess positions per second, defeats grandmaster Garry Kasparov.

--2001: The publication of Edwin Black's "IBM and the Holocaust" coincides with an Alien Tort Claims Act claim, later dismissed, against IBM for allegedly suppling punched card technology that enabled the Holocaust. IBM's response points out that along with hundreds of foreign-owned companies in Germany at that time, its affiliate came under the control of Nazi authorities prior to World War II.

--2002: Sam Palmisano becomes CEO in March, and in July IBM signals it is further strengthening its services business with a $3.5 billion acquisition of the PricewaterhouseCoopers global business and consulting technology unit.

--2005: Though IBM has sold more than 20 million ThinkPads, it announces the sale of its PC business to Lenovo in an effort to further focus on software and services.

--2011: Watson, comprising 90 IBM Power 750 servers, shows off IBM's artificial intelligence and systems-architecture expertise by defeating two Jeopardy game show champions in a two-game match.

Sources:

--IBM

--Interview with James Birkenstock, interviewed in 1980 by Roger Stuewer and Erwin Tomash for the Charles Babbage Institute

--"Big Blues: The Unmaking of IBM," by Paul Carroll, Crown Publishers, 1993

--IDG News Service archives

FIFA says Pakistan can host World Cup qualifier

2011-06-16T08:26:00.000-07:00

BERNE-- Pakistan have been cleared to play next month's 2014 World Cup qualifier at home in Lahore and there have been no formal requests from opponents Bangladesh to switch the game, FIFA said on Thursday.

The Asian zone preliminary round second-leg tie will be one of the first important international sporting events to be held in Pakistan since gunmen attacked the Sri Lankan cricket- team bus in Lahore in 2009, killing seven people.
We have been in contact with the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and neither organisation has so far received any communication-or request related to this two-legged qualifying match, contrary to recent media reports," FIFA said.

"Prior to the qualifying competition kicking off, FIFA, in conjunction with its confederations-sought to establish any countries where matches could not currently take place, either due to more long-term internal problems, or more recent events such as in Syria and Yemen.

"However, Pakistan was not on that list." FIFA added that Pakistan had already hosted an Olympic Games qualifier against Malaysia in March at the Punjab stadium, Lahore, where the July 3 match is due to be held.

Bangladesh football federation president Kazi Salahuddin said on Monday-that FIFA had turned down its request to relocate the match.

"During the FIFA congress in Zurich earlier this month we requested them to allow us to play both legs in Dhaka. But they did not agree," Salahuddin told reporters.

Bangladesh said former coach Robert Rubcic, fired on Tuesday after a pay row, had been reluctant to travel to Pakistan.

Six Pakistani policemen-and a driver were killed in the attack in March 2009 while five Sri Lankan players were also wounded in the team bus which came under attack near the Gaddafi stadium.

Afghanistan last month became the first foreign cricket team to play in Pakistan since the attack when they played a Pakistan A team.

Neither Pakistan nor Bangladesh have ever qualified for a soccer World Cup and neither team is seen as having a realistic chance of playing in-Brazil in 2014.

The first leg of the tie will be in Dhaka on June 29.
source:http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Arshad Warsi-said too many misconceptions about Islam

2011-06-14T05:37:00.000-07:00

Indian Bollywood actor Arshad Warsi and wife Maria Goretti pose during the Chivas Studio Spotlight party in Mumbai. PHOTO: AFP

MUMBAI--Bollywood actor Arshad Warsi feels-that there are too many misconceptions about Islam and that 90% of what people know about the religion is a myth.

“Islam is a very nice religion, but it’s been misinterpreted very badly” Arshad told IANS.

He said, “90% of what people say about Islam is a myth. People-say that in Islam you get a divorce by just saying the word talaaq three times. All that is rubbish. It is not that you say the word three times and marriage is over.

Explaining the divorce process, he said: “You go to the court, say talaaq there once. Then you have to live together (with your wife) for a month…and again you go back to the court and say the word again and then again stay together for another month. Even then-your problems are not resolved, then you go to the court again and say talaaq again. That’s how it happens. Even after that you have to give maintenance to your divorced wife.”

Arshad also said that the four marriages concept is not exactly the way it has been perceived so far.

“It’s not that you can marry four women. You can’t get married again without the-permission of your first wife.

Half of the people don’t know the truth about Islam,” said the actor who is married to Maria Goretti, a Christian, and they have two children, a son-named Zeke Warsi and a baby girl named Zene Zoe Warsi.

The 43-year-old actor however says he is not a very religious person.

“I’m not religious. I don’t believe in rituals. However, I’m not an atheist. I believe in god. I believe-that there is a power and I believe that all the-religions are just different roads of reaching that one power. But those roads are made by people that I don’t like,” said the actor, who made his debut in 1996 with “Tere Mere Sapne”.

“I go everywhere, I celebrate everything. My kids if you see, you’ll see them-more as Christians as they go to church very often. I have no problems with that,” he added.

Arshad, popular for his role as Circuit in “Munnabhai MBBS” and its sequel “Lage Raho-- Munnabhai, is right now looking forward to the release of his comedy-film “Double Dhamaal” slated-for June 24.

Shahid Afridi and Ijaz Butt meet in presence of government officials

2011-06-14T05:29:00.000-07:00

It must be noted here that while-the lawyers of Afridi and the PCB are preparing for a Sindh High Court hearing on 16th June, pressure from various political circles might force-both parties to settle the issue out of court. -Photo by AFP

Pakistan’s former ODI captain Shahid khan Afridi and (PCB) Chairman Ijazz Butt held a closed door meeting in Islamabad amidst the presence-of several members of the government, DawnNews reported.

According to a source within the (PCB), the objective of the meeting was to thaw out a quick solution to the present crisis that is engulfing Pakistan cricket.

An out of court solution was also discussed, the source added.

Some sections of the media stated that Afridi was likely to be-reissued clearance to play overseas after he withdraws his petition in the Sindh-High-Court.

(PCB) spokesman Nadeem Sarwar neither-denied nor confirmed Tuesday’s meeting.

It must-be noted here that while the lawyers of Afridi and the (PCB) are preparing for a Sindh High Court hearing on 16th June, pressure from various political circles might force both parties to settle the issue-out-of court.

Afridi went to court after the Pakistan Cricket Board punished him for allegedly breaching a code of conduct by announcing his retirement after he was dumped as one-day captain, and levelling allegations-against the board.

It suspended his central contract and revoked all his no-objection certificates (NOCs), which would have allowed him to play in England where he was due to represent-Hampshire in the Twenty20 league and Sri Lanka.

The Sindh-high-court in Karachi adjourned Afridi’s case until June 16, when (PCB) officials are expected to justify their sanctions against the all rounder before a two member bench- makes a decision.

Somali pirates 6 Indian sailors release

2011-06-14T05:19:00.000-07:00

Six Indian sailors, held captive by Somali pirates for over 10 months, have been released and they will return home in the coming days, their family-members said on Tuesday. The release materialised after the continuous efforts of Pakistan-based Ansar Burney Trust, which is run by Pakistan's former
federal minister for human rights, Ansar Burney.
The Indians were among the 22 crew members of MV Suez, an Egyptian-cargo vessel which was hijacked by pirates in the Gulf of Aden Aug 2, 2010.

We are very thankful to Ansar Burney and Pakistan government for their help. They have paid a ransom of 2.1 million dollars to the-pirates to make this release possible. Burney was negotiating with the pirates for the last few months," Sampa Arya, wife of Ravinder Gulia (30), one of the hostages and resident of Haryana's Rohtak town, told IANS Tuesday.

I have talked to my husband over the phone. He said that they have been released-and all of them are in good health. They will reach India in the next few days, she added.
Apart from the six Indians, the 22 hostages comprised 11 Egyptians, four Pakistanis and one Sri Lankan. The Indians include two from Haryana-and one each from Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Jammu and Kashmir. One of the Indians is from Mumbai.

The family members of the hostages had met many senior Indian politicians to secure their-release but all their efforts went in vain.
Haryana chief minister-Bhupinder Singh Hooda had urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to intervene in this matter but nothing fruitful worked out.

Burney had raised funds with the help of the Pakistan government. Here, the Indian government has let us down. We met many leaders but nobody helped us. They said paying ransom is not the right-way. I have lost all my faith in Indian politicians, stated Arya.
Rajender Gulia, father of Ravinder, said, "Pakistan has helped us like an elder brother in this matter. We had lost all hopes as no Indian politician was ready to help us. Saving a human life was not important for them. But Pakistan-emerged as a saviour for us.

Tomorrow the Longest and darkest total lunar eclipse of century

2011-06-14T05:09:00.000-07:00

New Delhi--The longest and darkest total lunar eclipse of the century will occur tomorrow, giving sky enthusiasts all over the country an opportunity to witness the-event.
An unusually long lunar eclipse with the Moon immersed deeply inside the umbral (darker) shadow of the Earth will occur tomorrow, Nehru Planetarium Director N Rathnasree-said.
The total phase-of this lunar eclipse will last 100 minutes. The last eclipse to exceed this duration was in July 2000, she said.
The next such eclipse will only take-place in 2141.

The total lunar eclipse will begin at 00:52:30 IST and end at 02:32:42 IST. The partial eclipse, meanwhile, will-begin at 23:52:56 IST and end at 03:32:15 IST.
The eclipse will be visible-completely in Africa and Central Asia. It will be visible rising over South America, Western Africa and Europe, and seen setting over Eastern Asia, and Australia, C B Devgun from Science Popularisation-Association of Communicators and Educators (SPACE) said.
The magnitude of one of the relatively rare total lunar eclipse will be 1.70, N Sri Raghunandan Kumar of Planetary Society of India said.

The next lunar eclipse to be viewed in India will be in December-this year.

Also, a star named 51 Ophiuchi will be occulted-during the eclipse.
Sky enthusiasts can witness the whole-sequence of the occultation in the zodiacal constellation of Ophiuchus.
At 11:29 PM tomorrow, the Moon will occult (hide) behind the star 51 Ophiuchi. The star will reappear after 90 minutes-at 01:01 AM of June 16, Kumar said.
A lunar eclipse occurs when the Earth, in course of its orbit around the Sun, comes between the Moon and Sun in such a way that Moon is hidden in the shadow-cast by Earth.

This can occur only when the Sun, Earth, and Moon are aligned in a straight-line.
Vigyan Prasar, Department-of Science and Technology, along with the Nehru Planetarium and the Children's Resource Centre of the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library will be organising an all-night lunar eclipse 'Moon Carnival' for all interested sky enthusiasts in the capital-tomorrow.
Scientific groups are gearing up students, space enthusiasts and tourists for tomorrow's cosmic event.

"The lunar eclipse on June 15 is the longest and darkest total lunar eclipse that will occur in the 21st century, and will not be surpassed in duration until 2141. So, we are trying our-best to popularise the event," Nehru Planetarium Director N Rathnasree told PTI.
Moon observation will start well ahead of the eclipse, she said, adding participants will be encouraged to learn and identify lunar features.

This will help them determine precise timings of the immersion of the various lunar craters in the umbral shadow of the Earth, during the eclipse, she added.
The enthusiasts will also witness some of the brighter stars of the-constellation Ophiuccus being occulted by the Moon, before and during the eclipse, she said.
Science Popularisation Association of Communicators and Educators (SPACE), an NGO, is working to break the myths and superstitions associated with the celestial phenomenon.

Many people still believe that eating food-during eclipse harms the body. SPACE will encourage eating during the eclipse and then reporting the condition of your health before and after the phenomena. This cumulative report will be sent to UNESCO, SPACE PRO Mila Mitra-told PTI.
Avid photographers will capture the celestial treat on camera and contribute the images to a collective pool. A live webcast of the eclipse-will be shown on-the SPACE website.

Facebook Has denied losing users

2011-06-14T04:59:00.000-07:00

Facebook has denied-that it is losing customers, saying it is "pleased" with growth.
Figures from Faceboook monitoring site Inside Facebook suggested that during May, Facebook lost six million users in the US and 100,000 in-the UK.
But the social network, which does not usually comment on third party statistics, questioned how it arrived at this figure.
Other net measurement firms said they had seen growth-over the same period.
From time to time, we see stories about Facebook losing users in some regions. Some of these reports use data extracted from our-advertising tool, which provides broad estimates on the reach of Facebook ads and isn't designed to be a source for tracking the overall growth of Facebook, the firm said in a statement.

We are very pleased with our growth and with the way people are engaged with-Facebook. More than 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day, it added.
The figures from Inside-Facebook claimed that 1.5 million Canadian users left the social network in May.

But overall it showed that Facebook was growing, to a total of 687 million users-worldwide with many new customers coming from countries such as India, the Philippines and Indonesia.

Its figures on customer-leakage do not appear to tally with those from net measurement firm comScore.
It told the BBC it had seen a 21% growth for US users on Facebook during May, while-the UK gained 368,000 new recruits between February and May.

According to comScore, the average amount of time spent on the site was also up, from 21 minutes per day in December 2009 to 25 minutes per day-by-December 2010.

Measurement firm Nielsen said its figures also showed growth.
There are months when figures dip but I'd be very cautious on calling a trend based on two months, said Nielsen spokesman-Neil Beston.

The idea of Facebook fatigue, where users desert the social network after a certain period of time has long been talked about by experts but remains-unproven.
In developed countries such-as the US and the UK Facebook penetration is hitting 50% and at that level it is inevitable that users will sign up who aren't frequent visitors, said Adrian Drury, lead analyst at research firm-Ovum.

Government may have hacked IMF

2011-06-13T08:11:00.000-07:00

Hackers-who broke into the International Monetary Fund's computer system may have been backed by a nation-state, according to security experts.
They point to the sophisticated nature of the attack-and the resources needed to develop it.
Malicious-software, designed to steal confidential files, was installed on at least one IMF computer.
Although government involvement is widely suspected, the IMF has not released enough-details to be sure.
Digital insider
Based on the limited-information made public, it appears that the attack came from a specific PC that had been deliberately infected.
Hacker-software was likely to have been installed on it in what is known as a spear phishing attack, which sees highly targeted scam e-mails sent to specific-victims.
A memo circulated internally at the IMF reported that "suspicious file transfers" had been-detected.
Tom Kellerman, a security-expert who has worked for the IMF and now sits on the board of the International Cyber Security Protection Alliance told Reuters news agency that it was "a targeted attack" with code written specifically to give a nation state a "digital insider presence" on the-IMF network.
Graham Titherington, a security analyst with research firm Ovum agreed with the nation state-theory.
Any attack-that shows money, time and resources went on it points to a state attack. States and their intelligence agencies have far more resources than criminal gangs, he said.
The information-held by the IMF would be clearly be most valuable to a country, he added.
It has masses of economic information from the performance of countries to the state of their balance sheets. For countries deciding-where to invest it is invaluable," he said.
State-sponsored hacking has gained prominence in recent-months.
Google shifted the debate by going public on a hack attack-believed to be by China," said Mr Titherington.
The Chinese government has denied-involvement in the recent attack on Google's e-mail accounts.
The incident compromised the personal Gmail accounts of hundreds of top US officials, military personnel and-journalists.
Google said that the campaign to obtain-passwords originated in the Chinese city of Jinan and was aimed at monitoring e-mail.
According to Mark Darvill, director of security firm AEP Networks, many countries are involved in cyber-espionage but China remained at the forefront.
China has recently set up a cyber terrorism unit-which is very likely to be looking at opportunities rather than to stop attacks, he said.
Convenient excuse
Not-everyone is convinced that state-sponsored attacks or Advanced Persistent Threat (APTs) are the cause of the IMF hack.
Tal Be'ery, a web Research Team Leader at the Application Defense Center (ADC) said it could be a convenient excuse.
It is easier for organisations to hide under-this excuse when really it is something lacking in their defences.
We don't have enough credible information about the IMF attack. It needs to provide good evidence that it was a APT. It is just as likely to be alone-hacker acting out of curiosity, he said.
The most high profile state-sponsored attack to date remains the-Stuxnet worm, which targeted Iran's nuclear facilities.
Experts believe the complex malicious code originated from either the Israeli or US-governments.
source:http://www.bbc.co.uk

Shahid Khan Afridi Rejects PCB Offer

2011-06-12T23:44:00.000-07:00

Karachi-: Former skipper of national cricket-team Shahid Afridi dn't want to solve the matters with (PBC) outside the court and he just-want justice from the court.

According to sources, Shahid Afridi is ready to put on stake his carrier-instead of bowing before Pakistan Cricket Board because he is disappointed-from the behavior of team management and Pakistan Cricket Board.

Friends advised former caption to reconcile with Ijaz Butt and should resume his cricket but he refused this-suggestion by saying that till the last movement he will fight-judicial war.

Sources-informed that Chief Operating Officer of Pakistan Cricket Board Subhan Ahmed sent a message to Shahid Afridi that if he would appears before the disciplinary committee then Pakistan Cricket Board would grant him apology with fine. However, Shahid Khan Afridi refused to appear before the disciplinary-committee.

Three injured in a blast near Malpur village Roadside explosion

2011-06-12T23:32:00.000-07:00

Men are seen through the shattered windscreen of a car after it was damaged in an explosion in the outskirts of Islamabad June 12, 2011. PHOTO: REUTERS

Low intensity roadside blast Islamabad injured three people including a child on Murree Road near Malpur village on the outskirts of the city on-Sunday.

Blast was heard as far away as Bari Imam, some 10 kilometres-away from the site. Police officials cordoned off the area, covered in clouds of-smoke, within minutes and the injured were taken to Polyclinic Hospital. Two of them were discharged after being given first aid.

Blast left a two-feet-deep and three-feet-wide crater at the median between the double-road. The Bomb Diposal Squad officials collected evidence from the site and sent it for-examination.

They said the blast did not appear to be planned. However, they were-not willing to rule out terrorism.

We heard a huge bang and rushed to the place. There were clouds of smoke covering the site of blast, said a police official who was present at the nearby Community Police Centre in-Malpur.

35-year-old Waheed and his 12-year-old nephew Zafar Sagheer residents of Malpur suffered injuries as they were taking a shortcut on their-motorbike. The explosives went off a couple of feet from them. They received wounds on the lower half of their body, with most of the injuries-being on their legs.

Another car driver Salman Ahmed, a businessman from F-6/4, suffered minor injuries after his car went turtle due to the impact of the blast as he was close to the site at the time of blast.

Ahmed, police said, panicked at the huge sound of blast and lost control over his Toyota Corolla. The car hit the median and flipped. The driver received minor-injuries to his arm.

Police were investigating multiple-possibilities to ascertain the nature of the blast. However no terrorist hand was-traced till the filing of this-report.

A bomb disposal expert, however, said there are high chances that-someone hurled an explosive device or accidentally dropped it there. There was less than a kilogram of explosive-material and it did not appear to be old, he added.

He added that the explosives were completely consumed so the exact type of explosives and the detonating-mechanism could-not be ascertained. However, he said there were shrapnel in the explosives as well.

Some police officials also suspected that there were also chances, though very remote, that the explosives were buried at the place some time ago. There is a possibility that explosives were buried at that place some time ago and they went off today as the place was not freshly dug up shrubs had grown over the patch, a police official said.

Experts said such un detonated rockets or explosives could lie, not so deep, in the earth for years-before going off whenever their fuses detonate the-explosives.

James Anderson insists that He is Fit to play in Third Test at Rose Bowl

2011-06-12T09:09:00.000-07:00

James Anderson-is confident he will be fit to return to international duty at the Rose Bowl on Thursday when England get their third Test against Sri Lanka under way despite heavy rain denying him the-chance to confirm his recovery in today's Friends Life t20 washout for his county-Lancashire.

The clash with Worcestershire at New Road was abandoned at 2.30pm by umpires Jeff Evans-and David Millns without a ball being bowled after a steady-downpour which had set in at dawn.
Recalled to the England squad earlier in the day 28-year-old Anderson was hoping to confirm his recovery-from a side strain by bowling four overs for the Red Rose.
He had been assured of his place providing he came through unscathed, but in the event his only pain was financial as he was restricted to the card table-throughout.
I've come through relatively unscathed I lost a bit of cash!" he joked. Getting my four overs of action would have helped that bit more, but unfortunately it's not to be.
I'd quite like to get the overs under my belt because a match situation's very different to bowling in the-nets. Unfortunately it's not going to happen, but I feel fine and-hopefully I'll be fit for Thursday's Test.

It was a very-minor (strain). I think it was more precautionary and if I'd carried on bowling in the Cardiff-game it could have got a lot worse.
He replaces Surrey's Jade Dernbach in the squad and his return will add variety to an attack which lacked penetration in the second Test at Lord's, with towering-trio Chris Tremlett, Stuart Broad and Steven Finn struggling to make an impact.
"Hopefully there'll be a bit more in the pitch at Southampton. It looked like a tough five days for the lads there," said Anderson, who looks set to replace either Finn or Broad as Test cricket-comes to Hampshire for the first time.
"You never know what-you're going to get with the pitch, and they've never had a Test before so it'll be interesting what we get-there.

We didn't bowl as well as we'd have liked over the last five days, but certainly over the last couple of years we've been fantastic with the ball so it's just about getting back to what's made us so-successful in the last couple of years.
National selector Geoff Miller welcomed Anderson's return, and told the BBC: "He bowled extremely well at Cardiff and is a fine, top class bowler. You-always miss quality bowlers. But it is not just about one individual it's about a squad of bowlers and people coming into the side for injuries.
"When you start being a successful international side you do have to make these difficult-decisions so we'll wait and see what conditions are like down in Southampton and make the decision accordingly.

"That is what we are all about strength in-depth."
Miller acknowledged Anderson offered different options to the England attack.
Jimmy (can make it) pitch up and swing, he said. "The others are tall, bouncing bowlers and you are always looking for options because conditions alter and change and sometimes you need that-difference.
Jimmy is an extremely good-exponent of that art.

Miller also expressed his faith in batsman Kevin Pietersen, who has had a fallow time-of late before scoring a second-innings 72 at Lord's.
He said: "Kevin Pietersen is a top quality player we know that. He has had a tough time. He's had a bad run. He knows-he can score runs internationally and has again just-proved that.
He's a very good player.

Sarfaraz Shah incident: Rangers men to be tried in ATC

2011-06-12T07:01:00.000-07:00

Sarfaraz Shah case-against six Rangers men involved in killing unarmed boy has been filed in Anti Terrorism Court and the six paramilitary troops will now be presented in the Anti Terrorism Court on Monday, report said. On the directives of the apex court, an investigation-team headed by DIG Sultan Khawaja began its work on Saturday to complete the probe within seven days and submit a charge sheet in court.
Section 7 of the Anti Terrorism Act (ATA) have been-included in the case against Rangers-personnel involved in extrajudicial killing of a young man in Karachi on the orders of the Supreme Court of Pakistan. The police also have custody of the G-3 rifle with which Sarfaraz Shah was shot and the Rangers mobile carrying the six Rangers personnel at the time of the-killing.

After Maqbool Fida Husain's death Passions run high even

2011-06-12T06:50:00.000-07:00

Even as intellectuals, celebrities and art lovers-continue to mourn his death, unidentified men in Allahabad-destroy the sand sculpture created by an artist to pay tribute to the-Picasso of India

New Delhi--Maqbool Fida Husain, known as much for his-works of art as for his controversial nude paintings on Hindu gods and goddesses during his lifetime, continues to be debated even-after his death.
Husain remained-uncensored in life.
The man, whose flowing white locks and beard became his trademark style, was admired or hated. But never-ignored.
Even as intellectuals, celebrities and art-lovers continue to mourn his death, unidentified men in Allahabad destroyed the sand sculpture created by an artist to pay tribute to the Picasso of India.

Maqbool Fida Husain in-Politics
Husain has also become a topic of one-upmanship among politicians.
While the Congress party leaders are-taking jabs at ‘fundamentalist' saffron parties for forcing the artist to live in self imposed exile, Bajrang Dal, a hardline Hindu organization, which created a ruckus by attacking his-studio and home and hounded him out of India, seems to have ‘mellowed' though not ‘forgiven' Husain after his death.

Bajrang Dal Chief, Subhash Chauhan said, "We are certainly not happy with his portrayal of our deities, but what is left to say now." He asked, "But why are-people like Congress leader Ambika Soni and artist Jatin Das-shedding crocodile tears now? Where were they when Husain ran away from India? They could have provided-him shelter then."
Taking jibes at the Congress leaders he said, "They are recommending Bharat Ratna for Husain on the one hand, but look at their attitude towards Taslima Nasreen on the other-hand."

Why did he abscond?
On being reminded-that it was Husain's birthright to live in India, Chauhan retorted, "Then why did he abscond? He should have mended his ways rather than insulting the sentiments of millions of Indians. Although we have forgiven-him, we can't say that about our millions of Hindu-brethren.
"People who are now crying hoarse over his death-should bring his mortal remains to India and shower them in River Ganga, so that his soul can-rest in peace."
Reminded that he was a Muslim, hence the ritual was not expected, he shot-back, "Then he will not find a place in heaven."

Burial in India
Rajesh Bidkar, one of the persons who had filed a case in an Indore court, however, was in no mood to relent. "The man who insulted Bharat mata, will not get even a small piece of land for-burial in India," he said.
Dr Surender Kumar Jain of Vishwa Hindu Parishad had his own take. He said, "Husain did not abscond from India out of fear of Hindu organizations, but because he was afraid of the results of the court cases registered-against him due to his misdeeds. If his followers-wanted to defend him in the name of ‘freedom of expression', they should have dared to paint religious leaders of other faiths in the same manner."

Although not showing open antipathy towards Husain, Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray was reported to have described Maqbool Fida Husain as a great painter. "The sheer force of his lines was amazing. His mortal remains should be brought to India for burial," he conceded.

But stating that Husain had a mercurial temperament, Thackeray said that in-matters of art, he gave up the country but not his stubbornness.
Ahmed Ali, President, All India Shia Personal-Law Board said, "irrespective of what VHP or even Jammat e Islami leaders may say or feel, an artist of his stature should have been given respect. Religious extremists do not-appreciate and understand that an artist is a free thinker. It's hurting that he died and was buried in an alien-land.

Pics Peshawar Bomb blasts: Taliban deny responsibility, blame "foreign agencies"

2011-06-12T00:40:00.000-07:00

Injured await-treatment at a hospital in Peshawar. 34 people were killed and more than 100 people were-injured as multiple bomb blasts took place in Peshawar-late Saturday night. PHOTO-REUTERS

Peshawar--Taliban on Sunday denied responsibility for twin bomb blasts that ripped through a crowded market in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 39 people and injuring dozens.
The attack, one of the deadliest in a series to hit-Pakistan since US Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden in May, devastated the Khyber Super Market district which includes a hotel, shops and student accommodation.
The Taliban, who have vowed to carry out attacks to avenge the killing of bin Laden, denied any role in the bombing and said they target only the government and military.

“We did not carry out this attack in Peshawar. It is an attempt by foreign secret agencies-who are doing it to malign us,” Tehreek-e-Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told AFP on phone.
“We do not target innocent people. Our targets are very clear, we attack security forces, government and people who are siding with it, Ehsan said.
Updated from print edition (below)
Midnight terror: At least 34 killed in Peshawar Cantt blasts
At least 34 people were killed and over 90 injured, among them television journalists and a senior police officer, when two blasts ripped through a marketplace in the garrison area of Peshawar just before midnight on Saturday.
“First a gas cylinder exploded at Lala Restaurant in Khyber Supermarket in Peshawar Cantt,” a witness told The Express Tribune. “People flocked to the site-out of curiosity,” he added. “Minutes later, a huge blast rocked the market.”
SSP Operations Ejaz Khan corroborated the eyewitness’ account, saying it was a trap. “The cylinder was exploded to attract people to the site,” he added.
Khan said that the bomb was strapped to a motorcycle parked outside the ill-fated restaurant a famous eatery of the city which is usually frequented by a large number of food-lovers. He said the explosive device weighed-around 10 kilogrammes.
Capital City Police Officer Liaquat Ali Khan confirmed that at least 34 people were killed and over 90 wounded in the bombing. The casualties were ferried to different-hospitals of the city, where a state of emergency was declared.
Medics at the Lady Reading Hospital told The Express Tribune that they have received 12 bodies and over 40 injured people – some of them in critical condition. The injured also include television journalists among them Dunya TV Bureau chief Safiullah Gul – and SP Cantt Shafiullah Khan. However, doctors said their wounds are not life threatening.
Witnesses said that the restaurant and several adjoining shops were badly damaged in the explosion-which also triggered a huge fire in the market. The explosion also caused a power outage in the area, and security and rescue officials were forced to work in the-dark.
Khyber Supermarket is located in a high-security zone of Peshawar’s cantonment-area.
The office of Khyber Agency’s political agent and a Pakistan Army residential colony are situated nearby.
The explosion took place exactly where a tribal journalist, Nasrullah Afridi, was killed in a targeted bomb blast last month.
Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Information-Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain condemned the ‘cowardly terrorist attack’. Speaking to the media outside the LRH, he feared that the death toll could rise further.
Taliban militants-have carried out a string of bombings and brazen gun attacks on civil and military targets to avenge the killing of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.
Iftikhar Hussain called for bridging the trust deficit between all regional and international players to defeat-terrorism.
The KP-K information minister added: “Pakistan, Afghanistan and the US-led coalition forces must abandon hypocritical policies if they want to defeat-militancy.

source: http://tribune.com.pk

ATC Reissued Permanent Arrest Warrant for Pervez Musharaf In BB-Murder Case

2011-06-11T22:11:00.000-07:00

Islamabad-The Rawalpindi Anti Terrorist Court (ATC) on Saturday reissued the arrest-warrants against former President General (Rtd) Pervez Musharraf in the Benazir Bhutto murder case. The arrest warrants will be valid till his arrest.The court also asked for complete details of the former-president’s property. in Pakistan.

The case was heard in the Adiyala Jail by ATC special Judge Rana Nisar Ahmed. The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) had requested the court to issue a permanent warrant-for Pervez Musharraf. The FIA also requested for the confiscation of Musharraf’s property.

During the hearing, DG FIA Malik Iqbal apologised for attempting to change the investigation-officer in the Benazir Bhutto murder case. He moreover told the court that Khalid Rasool was still heading the investigation in the case.

Director FIA informed the court in hearing-that the case investigation officer Khalid Rasool has been restored and other court orders have also been implemented and requested for withdrawal of the contempt charges. The court-adjourned the hearing till June 25.

Panetta-CIA Director leaves without any deal

2011-06-11T22:00:00.000-07:00

CIA Chief Leon Panetta. - AP file photo

ISLAMABAD--Leon Panetta, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, left Islamabad on Saturday morning after a meeting with Chief of the Army-Staff Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and ISI head Gen Shuja Pasha, but without a deal on resetting the relationship-between the spy agencies.

Mr Panetta, who arrived on Friday-evening, did not meet anyone other than the Kayani-Pasha duo who he met at the Army House over dinner and discussed what was described by the ISPR as “framework for future intelligence sharing”.

Mr Panetta’s departure without routine calls on President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was seen by observers-here as a sign of stalemate in his discussions with the military leadership. According to sources, Mr Panetta was surprised by the rigidity shown by the military, which went to the extent of even declining an offer by Washington of security-assistance.

But government officials insisted that unlike in the past this time he was not scheduled to meet-anyone else.

While Gen Kayani had even before his visit made it clear that the Army would not allow the CIA to carry out independent operations and that any future intelligence cooperation would be reciprocal and-transparent, Mr Panetta did little to pacify Pakistani generals and instead confronted them with “evidence of collusion with Taliban militants”.

This, a source claimed, would further sour the relationship which had already been under strain since the start of this year and got-worse after the May 2 Abbottabd raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound.

According to US media reports, Mr Panetta shared with the military leadership video and satellite imagery of militants leaving two bomb-making factories in Waziristan after allegedly having been tipped-off about a raid.

The US reportedly-shared the information with Pakistan last week, asking it to take action against the two sites. But Mr Panetta alleged at the meeting that the information was leaked within 24 hours of sharing and by the time the raiding teams reached those places, the militants had melted-away.

A defense source said the CIA chief, who is set to take over as the next US defense secretary, reportedly used this as an instance to tell the army and intelligence chiefs why America distrusted Pakistani military establishment and needed to have its own independent-operations inside the country to deal with Al Qaeda and Taliban.

Efforts to get a version from official sources in Islamabad did not bear fruit.

CIA FOOTPRINT

Mr Panetta, during his visit, reportedly tried to convince the Pakistanis to allow some critical CIA operations to continue after the agency was asked to cut down its footprint. He also asked for some CIA operatives to be given visas to enable them to enter the country and work-independently.

Gen Kayani and Gen Pasha are reported to have insisted on joint operations and intelligence sharing, but no independent operations. They said that a recently constituted joint task force for coordination of intelligence activities should be the nerve centre of any-future ISI-CIA collaboration.

Reuters adds: The army and intelligence chiefs told Mr Panetta that they were not willing to reverse a decision to cut the number of US troops allowed in their country, Pakistani military officials said on Saturday.

“He (Panetta) expressed concern over the reduction of trainers and-operatives. We told him very clearly ‘no boots on our soil is acceptable’,” said a military official.

“We told him (Panetta) that we are clear. We don’t want their people. Intelligence sharing is fine and we are ready for that,” said another military official. “Any action against the militants will be taken by our forces alone but we will share-intelligence on militants actively.”

A US embassy spokesman said he had no-information on Panetta’s talks.
source:http://www.dawn.com

Hypocritical India--mourn legendary M F Hussain

2011-06-11T21:48:00.000-07:00

MAQBOOL Fida Husain--India ‘s world renowned-artist, has passed away at a ripe old age of 93 at a London Hospital. M. F. Husain, as he was universally known, had been one of the most admired and controversial painters produced by India . However he often found-himself under attack and death threats for his epic paintings on Hindu deities, by extremists in that country. This drove the master painter to a self-imposed exile in 2006, to Dubai and London . Later, he took up residence in Qatar and was bestowed its-citizenship.
M. F. Husain had emerged as the highest ever paid painter, both at home and abroad, whose one painting-recently fetched $1.6 million at Christie’s. The ruling family of Qatar had announced to set up a museum dedicated to his monumental works in Qatar and he enjoyed international repute the world over. The great artist belonging to a remote-area of Maharashtra State , was a “rags to riches story”. He started off at a young age as cinema hoarding painter to rise to his eminent position through his long and dedicated years pursuing the profession.

I had met the great artist-twice. Once in Mumbai, many many years ago introduced by my dear old friend, Khalid Ansari, a noted journalist of India . Another chance meeting was in Karachi , where the great artist spent some time and painted on a wall at the Karachi Press Club. That momento to Karachi-Press-Club, which has also some prized paintings gifted to it by famous Pakistani artists-like late Sadeqain, Bashir Mirza (BM) and Guljee, is being preserved by the club management as a most prized-gift.

I was also told in Mumbai-that the rich and wealthy people quite often invested their wealth in paintings and notably of MF, as a most assured way of its guaranteed profit in years to come. M. F. Husain, was a colorful figure who was found to be going about bare-footed and also dabbled in the world of cinema producing films. He was known to be doting on famous-actress Madhuri Dixit and affection between the two was known to be mutual.

The passing away of legendary-Indian artist has been widely mourned in India , as both Indian President and Prime Minister have issued deeply touching condolence messages. But the fact remains, the exiled artist who was simply hounded out of India , is a sad reminder of the hypocritical-legacy of that country. In Pakistan , the artist would be notably remembered both at Karachi-and-Lahore where he had visited and spent some time with artist fraternity and art lovers in both cities.

Husain’s quiet passing away in London was described by an old friend of his and editor of prestigious, The Hindu, N. Ram, in these words “This bring to a close one of the sorriest chapters in independent India ’s secular history”. This may well be an appropriate epithet to the memory of the-remarkable M.F. Husain.
source:http://pakobserver.net

30 People killed : Bomb Blasts in Peshawar

2011-06-11T21:42:00.000-07:00

Peshawar--Two powerful blast ripped through a roadside restaurant located in the Khyber Super-Market in Peshawar, killing at least thirty persons and wounding-scores of others.

Some people died due to raging fire. Death toll may rise further due to critical condition of wounded-persons.The blasts to shattered windowpanes of nearby buildings while the restaurant located alongside a five-story residential tower was destroyed completely. A major-portion of the plaza has collapsed.

Police and law enforcement agencies rushed to the site and cordoned off the-area.

Andy Murray progresses to Queen’s final

2011-06-11T09:20:00.000-07:00

Murray serves in his semi-final match against Andy Roddick. Photo: Getty Images

London-- World no. 4 Andy Murray has booked a place in- Sunday’s AEGON Championships final at The Queen’s Club after a 6-3, 6-1 demolition of four-time champion -Andy Roddick in just 59 minutes.

Under a warm sun, the Scot fired 13 aces to the-American’s 3, managing to close out early breaks in both-sets. Murray also lost just nine points in his eight service-games.

The American : whose humour over the years has won over the crowd at The Queen’s Club called out “Keep it-social!” when he-was was serving to stay in the match and Murray fired a forehand-winner.

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Roddick, the world no. 10, maintained a first -serve percentage of 83 per cent but could not create a single-break point opportunity. He admitted his opponent was just too-good on the day.

“Everything he -touched turned to gold - he was too good for me today,” said the 28 year-old.

Roddick said- Murray was one of the best in the world at taking and controlling paces. “He had really good-ball control today, I felt like he was working it wherever he wanted to,” added the third-seed.

“I came up with a lot of really-good passing shots, which, you know, on another day you're not going to-make every single one,” said Murray. “Today was just one of those days where everything-went right.”

Murray, the second seed, will meet fifth seed Jo Wilfried Tsonga after he dispatched Great British-wildcard James Ward 6-3, 7-6(7).

Ward had the breakout week of his career, with wins over fourth seed Stanislas Wawrinka in the second-round and defending champion and 13th seed Sam-Querrey in the third round.

24 year-old Tsonga ended world no. 1 Rafael Nadal’s title hopes in the quarterfinal by toppling the-Spaniard 6-7(3), 6-4, 6-1.

The Scot has won four of the pair’s six career meetings including their most recent- grass encounter in the Wimbledon quarterfinals last-year.
source:http://www.smh.com.au

England vs Sri Lanka

2011-06-11T09:10:00.000-07:00

Spiner bollowing king: Graeme Swann believes bowlers will shine on Rose Bowl wicket Photo: GETTY IMAGES

But an improvement in those-standards, the return of James Anderson in place of Steve Finn, and the inherent-frailty in Sri Lanka’s batting line-up, add up to the tourists having another bad hour-during the third Test, which would give the series 2-0 to England.

"It’s a very easy thing to say 'oh yes, we’ve taken our foot off the gas or we weren’t focused,'" said Swann, the one England player who always-speaks his mind without being fettered by diplomatic niceties.

"I don’t know one single sportsman who goes out on the field in front of a full house and doesn’t try his bo-ks off. Sometimes it just doesn’t click for you.

"It is frustrating, because over the last six matches we’d set such high-standards by bowling teams out for under 100 and winning by an innings-that you come to regularly expect that." Swann added.

"We didn’t bowl particularly well in the second day and Matty Prior was diving around far more than-usual. But as the game went on the seamers picked up more rhythm and I thought Broady (Stuart Broad) was unlucky all game to be-fair.

By the end he was bowling exceptionally well. It wasn’t a complete performance. But you take a major factor out of your bowling in Jimmy Anderson, who’s basically- led the attack superbly for the last 12 months, and you can’t expect to remove a lynch-pin like him from the attack and just serenely glide by. It would be remarkable if we did."

The Rose Bowl will be more familiar to the England players than the Swalec stadium was in Cardiff on its Test debut in 2009. Swann- has taken only three championship wickets there, but it used to be the home ground of Kevin Pietersen and Chris Tremlett.

Collectively there are happy memories of beating Australia and Pakistan in one-day internationals last season, when Eoin Morgan made a century on both occasions.

"I know when- it first opened it was horrendous," Swann said. "It used to be the absolute nightmare for county batsmen, but that was when it was bedding in. Now it’s become a pretty good batting wicket.

"Hopefully it will have more pace- than the Lord’s wicket and we’ll be able to get some use out of it. The one-day wickets we’ve played on down there have been very good."

The Test pitch is next to the one used for one-day internationals, and together they have always received extra attention. In 2005 the centre of the square had to be relaid: it had sunk below the level of the outfield and too many balls kept low.

Last season the Test pitch was used for one championship game, against -Nottinghamshire in May, when every total was between 240 and 330 and there was "good bounce and carry" according to Hampshire’s captain, Dominic Cork; then it was used- for the high scoring Twenty20 finals day.

As the prevailing south westerly comes from wide mid-off if you sit in the pavilion, Swann and Anderson can be- expected to use the far or Northern end, while Chris Tremlett as was his wont and Broad use the pavilion end. But the wind assisted swing that-Anderson gets will be largely conventional.

Only once this season has the ball reverse-swung, according to Cork, when Somerset played there at the end of April and the weather was drier than it is now.

"Peter Trego and -Charl Willoughby reversed it both ways, and Steve Kirby reversed it in," Cork said. But spinners have never run amok at the Rose Bowl, even when Shane Warne was Hampshire’s captain.

Test pitches that do not deteriorate have become one of those annoyances of modern life, like a 51mph lorry trying to overtake another lorry going at 50.999mph on a dual-carriageway.

It would help if the ball deteriorated even if the pitch did not, but it is seldom going to be roughed up - for spinners and reverse-swingers - on grounds that have had new drainage installed: all of the international venues in England-and Wales, that is.

The reason is ultimately a commercial--one. When the rain stops, broadcasters and spectators even some players want a match to restart pretty soon. That means the top soil has to be sandy, for the rain to drain away.

And if the top soil is sandy, the grass has to be strong and evenly spread, otherwise the bowlers are running through sand and diving fielders are liable-to rupture their knees, like Simon Jones in Brisbane. So no rough outfields and wear-and-tear any more.

For once, Swann is diplomatic about pitches breaking up - or not. "You don’t necessarily need them to, although it’s nice if you’re a spinner. Lord’s never does. It’s a wonderful cricket pitch and I’ve got nothing against it.

"But the problem at Lord’s is that when the sun shines the wicket does less and less. When the clouds-come over the ball tends to swing, like on the fourth morning when we took those six or seven wickets.

"But I’m not going to have a go at Lord’s because it’s one of the best places to play cricket in the world and I’m an MCC member!"

In the batting conditions-the Rose Bowl will offer, Sri Lanka’s bowlers – having taken only 21 wickets in the first two Tests – are unlikely to take another 20. Farveez Maharoof has taken one wicket for 173 with his medium-pace.

We could deduce that 'Maha’ is the Sinhalese for 'My bowling average is about to hit the’. In 22 Tests he has taken 25 wickets at 65 runs each.

Kumar Sangakarra has made a century in the current practice game against Essex’s reserves, but even his running into form will not compensate for the absence of their captain Tillakaratne Dilshan.

Given five fullish days, England should win, and then they-will go second-equal in the ICC Test rankings, alongside South Africa, with only India ahead.

source:http://www.telegraph.co.uk

Pakistan to Panetta: No U.S. boots on the ground

2011-06-11T08:52:00.000-07:00

Pakistanis torch a U.S. flag during a protest against American drone attacks in Pakistani tribal areas, in Multan, June 10, 2011.(Credit: S.S. Mirza/AFP/Getty Images)

ISLAMABAD-- CIA Director Leon Panetta arrived in Islamabad on an unannounced visit Friday, his first to the country since bin Laden's killing. He came to urge Pakistan to reconsider its decision to seek the removal of nearly 100 U.S. military trainers tasked with helping the country's army cope with its conflict with al Qaeda- and the Taliban, according to a senior Pakistani government official who spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity.

Western diplomats say that, while Pakistan- depends on the U.S. for billions of dollars in military and economic assistance, Washington also requires Pakistan's help to gather intelligence on the movement of militants across the Afghan Pakistan border.

But Pakistan's position has hardened- on the issue of full-fledged military operations in north Waziristan ever since U.S. Navy SEALs attacked and killed Osama bin Laden in the northern city of Abbottabad last month. The country's civil and military leaders reacted angrily to the attack, arguing that any operation by foreign forces in the- country must be undertaken only with Pakistan's prior knowledge and permission.

The decision to seek the removal of -American forces is widely seen as another sign of hardening anti-U.S. sentiment among Pakistan's top army generals.

Mr. Panetta was told point blank, there will be no U.S. boots on the ground, said the Pakistani- government official who spoke to CBS News.

Meanwhile, Pakistan's civil and military- leaders promised Saturday to step up efforts for a reconciliation between Afghanistan's ruling structure and members of the pro-Taliban "Haqqani" network, but left the future of their support contingent upon U.S. acceptance of the hardliner movement.

On the second day of a high-profile visit to Pakistan by Afghan president Hamid Karzai, a Pakistani minister who spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity said, "President Karzai is returning to Afghanistan with the promise of our stepped-up support for a reconciliation- between his government and the Haqqanis. The only catch is whether the U.S. will be equally willing to accept that the Taliban - including the Haqqanis - cannot be militarily defeated, and have a political -role."

Western diplomats responding to the news said that Pakistan's promise marked a potential breakthrough at a time when the Obama administration appears to be keen on consolidating military gains inside Afghanistan while -supporting a peace process to end the conflict.

The minister's comments- appeared to reflect the clearest indication yet of Pakistan's determination to push for a reconciliation between the ruling structure (led by Karzai) and its Taliban foes.

Separately, at a news conference appearing alongside Karzai, Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani was asked specifically about the extent of Pakistan's cooperation in bringing the Haqqani network to the negotiating table. "Whatever is in our capacity, we will be- ready to assist," he replied.

The network is named after legendary Afghan warlord Maulvi Jalaluddin Haqqani, a key U.S.-backed insurgent commander in the 1980s who used weapons provided by the U.S. to fight Soviet troops in Afghanistan. But since the 9/11 terror attacks, the Haqqani network has emerged as one of the leading- groups in the Taliban camp that continues to resist U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

For the past two years, the U.S. has pushed Pakistan to attack what Washington believes are camps run by the Haqqani network in the country's north Waziristan- region, along the Afghan border.

American- officials consider the future of the Haqqani network - now run by a son of Jalaluddin Haqqani, Sirajuddin Haqqani as an important determinant of the conflict in -Afghanistan.

Source : http://www.cbsnews.com

Full Vedio :Brutally Killing of Sarfraz Shah By Pakistani Karachi Ranger Force

2011-06-10T11:53:00.000-07:00

Met Office Report Cyclone not moving towards Pakistan

2011-06-10T03:32:00.000-07:00

The cyclone is currently at a distance of 650 kilometres off the coast of Karachi. PHOTO: PAKISTAN METEOROLOGICAL DEPARTMENT

KARACHI--Pakistan Meteorological Office on Friday said that a cyclone-will not hit the coastal areas of Pakistan as had been expected earlier.
Chief Meteorologist, Naeem Shah said that low temperature had diverted the cyclone from the coastal areas of Pakistan and that it was moving to the north east-- instead.
The cyclone is currently at a distance of 650 kilometres off the coast of Karachi.

The coastal- areas of Badin, Thatta, Makran, Karachi and-Gwadar are expected to receive rain and winds early next week.
The Met office has advised fishermen against going into deep waters.
Earlier, it had been reported that a strong weather system in the northwest part of Arabian Sea was -gaining intensity and had nearly converted into a tropical -cyclone.

Pakistan Rangers held over videoed killing in Karachi

2011-06-10T03:20:00.000-07:00

Police in Karachi, Pakistan, say they have-arrested two paramilitary soldiers seen on video killing a young-man.
Video footage shows the man, Sarfaraz Shah, begging for his life before-being shot by six members of the Sindh Rangers paramilitary force.
The Rangers say the young man was caught trying to rob someone. His family denies this.
An inquiry is already under way into the killing of five unarmed Chechens last month by the security forces.
The video from Karachi, which has been broadcast- widely on Pakistani television, is disturbing to watch.

It shows a young man in a black T-shirt being dragged by his hair in a public park by a man in plain clothes.
He is pushed towards a group of Sindh Rangers who are in uniform and armed. The young man, who- does not appear to be armed, pleads for his life as one of the Rangers points a gun at his neck.
A little later, a Ranger shoots him- twice at close range, hitting him in the thigh. The young man is seen writhing on the ground, bleeding heavily and begging for help.
The paramilitaries remain close to the injured man but do nothing to help him. He died from his- injuries.
The journalists' union in Karachi- have said that the TV cameraman who shot the video had received threats and was being "pressured [by authorities] to say it was a fake".
Sarfaraz's brother, Salik Shah, said he had been the victim of an extrajudicial- killing.
The incident has sparked an outcry with some politicians calling for the Rangers- involved to be prosecuted.
It comes as a separate inquiry is under way in neighbouring Balochistan Province into the killing of five Chechens by members of the paramilitary.
Five civilians, including a heavily pregnant woman, were shot dead at close range in the western- city of Quetta, despite apparently trying to surrender.
Officials initially said that the five family members were armed- and were suicide bombers - but this was later found to be- untrue.
source: http://www.bbc.co.uk

Apple dramas customer loyalty, anti-Google cards with iCloud, say analysts

2011-06-08T14:23:00.000-07:00

It's all about trading hardware, and battling Android for smartphone and tablet supremacy

Apple's scheme isn't about producing cash with iCloud, analysts said today. Instead, it's all about utilising the free service to hold clients and assault Google for smartphone and tablet supremacy. On Monday, Apple CEO Steve Jobs revealed iCloud, the company's new cloud-based sync and storage service that will restore MobileMe this drop when it debuts beside iOS 5, the next-generation wireless functioning scheme for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

iCloud will be free to iOS apparatus proprietors and persons with Macs running OS X 10.7, aka Lion, which is slated to boat next month. Only the part of the service named "iTunes Match" will cost clients, and then just $25 a year. Jobs touted iCloud as a melodies, photograph, app, article and other facts and numbers sync service that holds multiple apparatus up-to-date with user-purchased or -created content. "Keeping these apparatus in sync is going by car us crazy," said Jobs throughout a production Monday at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC).

Analysts glimpse iCloud as another way for Apple to keep present clients and appeal new-ones, particularly for the iPhone and iPad.

I'd put this under the generic rubric of clientele loyalty," said Charles Golvin, an analyst with Forrester Research. "For persons who-own one or more iOS apparatus, they're going to find out an even better experience. Apple's calculus is that the advantage of future [hardware] sales is more than sufficient to support the cost of buying into in iCloud. Although analysts did not use the period "lock-in" to recount the iCloud scheme, that's vitally what they-meant.

For Golvin, iCloud will hold clients because one time they've utilised the service, they will hesitate to depart the Apple ecosystem. iCloud is-seamless, clients don't have to concern about where their content is stored, said Golvin. That will make them seem that much more persuaded with their smartphone or tablet, and entails that the next time they proceed to purchase one, they're more probable to purchase from Apple. Carolina Milanesi of Gartner agreed. The most significant thing is that it is a entire cloud package," said Milanesi. "It displays the advantage of dwelling in the Apple 'house.

Others furthermore glimpse iCloud as a way for Apple to keep clients in the face of a increasing surge of Android-based smartphones, and increasing affray from newspapers tablets that-run Google's functioning system. While it is improbable to proceed the "financial needle" at Apple anytime shortly, we accept as factual iCloud is important, as it rises the 'stickiness' of the Apple ecosystem," said Brian Marshall, a economic analyst who wrappings Apple for Gleacher & Co.

"These new broadcasts farther reinforce Apple's digital ecosystem by supplying buyers with expanded functionality, increased alleviate of use, larger effectiveness and cooling new characteristics that we accept as factual will propel farther adoption of Apple apparatus in the future," said Brian White of Ticonderoga Securities, in a note to purchasers Tuesday.

Although Apple bosses seldom cited competitors on Monday and then only when they touted diverse Apple benefits Golvin read iCloud as a shot at Google and Android. "This is much more than just an added component to the Apple ecosystem, it displays what Apple currently does that presents a marvellous-value, he argued.

Golvin was conversing about the alleviate with which iPhone and iPad proprietors can currently move their apps, melodies, photographs and other facts and numbers when they buy a new Apple smartphone or tablet. They conversed about how tough it was to cause a apparatus now through iTunes, but actually it's exceedingly seamless," said Golvin about how a new iPhone syncs with content retained on a Mac or PC. "It takes a while to churn through, but in the end you have everything on your new iPhone that was on your vintage one.

Android users have not anything like it, he said.

Apple's battling tooth and fastener with [Android], so any thing that tips the scale, like iCloud, is that much more meaningful," said Golvin.

Frank Gillett, a Golvin associate at Forrester, was more blunt in his assessment. Saying that Apple has now shifted into the lead in the individual cloud market, he discovered the affray lacking. Google is worth observing as a number two contestant, but will labour to agree Apple as it endeavours to proceed the world's apps into the Chrome browser," said Gillett in a blog mail Monday.

And Microsoft, with no articulated dream for individual cloud and Windows 8 anticipated one time in 2012, lags significantly," he said.

White furthermore provided the benefit to Apple as he sharp out the $25 cost for iTunes Match was smaller than alike charges ascribed by Amazon and less than what most anticipate Google to enforce for their "music locker" services. Earlier this year, Amazon and Google commenced cloud-based melodies services that need clients to upload their libraries to isolated servers, from which they can stream the melodies to wireless apparatus and individual computers.

Apple's taken a distinct set about with iTunes Match, and will rather than scan users' melodies collections and agree them contrary to Apple's library. Found agrees will be accessible for instant downloading to the greatest of 10 apparatus or computers.

Tracks bought by iTunes are accessible for downloading to the identical number of apparatus for free.

In the end, analysts said, iCloud was all about trading more hardware, not about developing a important income stream. "They desire to deal more iOS devices," said Golvin in interpreting Apple's strategy.

Apple's saying, 'Don't yield any vigilance to the cost of the thing the hardware; what you're buying is a way of managing these kinds of things, said Ezra Gottheil, an analyst with Technology Business Research in an interview previous this week.

Milanesi seconded that.

"Everything Apple displayed Monday, encompassing iCloud, Lion and iOS 5, illustrates Apple's full package," said Milanesi. "It's all about supplying a more affluent know-how [and] to consign that 'Wow' know-how, you require to have command over the ecosystem.

That's why it will assist persons very well," she added. It just works.

Saudi minister says OPEC Failed talks among 'worst ever',

2011-06-08T14:04:00.000-07:00

OPEC failed to arrive an-agreement on crude production for the first time in at least 20 years, after six countries opposed a Saudi Arabia-led group that urged members to raise output as oil trades above $US100 a barrel.
"It was one of the worst meetings we've ever had," Saudi Arabian Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said as representatives of the 12-member group left the meeting in Vienna after five hours of talks. "We were unable to reach an agreement." Crude jumped 2.7 per cent in 20 minutes in New York after the meeting ended. The split underscores growing-divisions within the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which accounts for about 40 per cent of the world's crude.
Oil has gained 10 per cent this year, boosting revenue for producers while raising concern that price gains will stunt economic growth and stoke inflation. A Bloomberg survey of 30 analysts conducted from May 24 to May 31 showed that 27 believed the group would probably leave its output target unchanged.

"It's a bit surprising because the Saudis usually get their way and the track record since 1998, on balance, has been pretty good," Mike Wittner, head of oil market research at Societe Generale SA in New York, said by phone. "But in this particular case, there were very diverse opinions going into the meeting and even looking at the fundamentals, there were different signals."

Crude for July delivery gained as much as 2.8 per cent to $US101.89 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange and was at $US100.62 as of 1:15 p.m. local time. Gasoline for July delivery rose 1.77 cents, or 0.6 per cent, to $US3.0096 a gallon.The US Labor Department said on June 3 that employers added 54,000 workers to payrolls in May, the fewest in eight months. The International Energy Agency cut US and Japanese growth-forecasts on April 11.

The International Energy Agency trimmed its 2011 forecast for oil demand last month for the first time, after saying on April 12 that oil above $US100 a barrel is starting to hurt the global economy. Saudi Arabia, OPEC's largest producer, together with Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, proposed that the group raise its actual output by 1.5 million barrels a day to 30.3 million barrels, Naimi said. The six that opposed an increase were Libya, Angola, Ecuador, Algeria, Iran and Venezuela, he said. They were "vehemently against increasing production," Naimi said, adding that he and his group tried for hours in vain to persuade the six of the need for more oil. "In 16 years, I've never seen an obstinate position," he said.
Mohammad Aliabadi, the acting Iranian oil minister and-current OPEC president, described the meeting as "polite and cordial," speaking through a translator.

"I don't know why he called it the worst meeting," Aliabadi said of Naimi's account.
Iran has replaced Saudi Arabia as the powerhouse in OPEC," said Olivier Jakob, Managing Director of Geneva-based Consultancy Petromatrix. "On the supply side, OPEC has been anyway producing outside of quota frame, so it is still unclear if it will really change anything or if Saudi just continues alone with its production increase."The IEA expressed "disappointment" over OPEC's failure to reach an agreement.

"Of course what really matters is actual supply, which should-move in line with seasonally rising demand, and we urge key producers to respond accordingly," the Paris- based agency said in a statement.Data from the secretariat show that demand for OPEC crude will rise by 2.1 million barrels a day in the third quarter from the group's total output in April of 28.8 million barrels a day, Naimi said. "Saudi Arabia is committed to supplying-the needs of the market regardless of the disagreement," he said. OPEC announced its biggest ever output cuts in December 2008 amid a collapse in global demand, capping-production at 24.845 million barrels a day for all-members except Iraq, which is exempt from the quota system. The limit has remained unchanged since then.

"Reaching the consensus would have been quite challenging," said Andrey Kryuchenkov , an analyst at VTB Capital in London who correctly forecast the group wouldn't change its targets. "This is crude bullish as there is certainly no consensus within the group and OPEC is not ready to act united. The market remains undersupplied. The 11 nations with production quotas pumped 26.15 million barrels a day in April, according to the IEA. That leaves the group with about 4.5 million barrels a day of spare capacity, most of it in Saudi Arabia, to be tapped in an-emergency. The 50-year-old organization met as fighting in Libya shut-off most of the output from Africa's third-largest producer.

A rebellion against Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi has cut shipments from the North African country by almost 90 per cent, according to Bloomberg estimates. The technical aspects of raising quotas with Libyan production near zero made it difficult to agree on what should be done," said Filip Petersson, a Stockholm-based commodity strategist at SEB AB. "Raising quotas would not have changed anything in practice. It would just have adjusted them to fit reality. OPEC's 12 members are Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and-Venezuela. Iraq is outside the quota-system.

Asia hails Li Na's-- French Open win, China-urges others to follow her example

2011-06-04T23:34:00.000-07:00

BEIJING, China - Li Na's landmark French Open victory sparked celebrations and recognition throughout Asia on Sunday, while China's state media told its athletes to learn from her as they prepare for the London Olympics.

"The First Asian! Li Na is Crowned the Empress of French Tennis," declared Taiwan's China Times newspaper in a headline Sunday.
Li's victory over defending champion Francesca Schiavone on Saturday came at 11 p.m. in Beijing on a holiday weekend, but Chinese state television-rebroadcast the match Sunday and it was on the front pages of most newspapers.
People's Daily, the flagship paper of the ruling Communist Party, put a large colour photo of Li kissing her trophy at the top of its front page under the headline "Li Na Reached the Summit of the Grand Slam."
Li's career had blossomed since she pulled out of China's government-run sports training system in 2008. That will likely raise questions about the costly system, which has produced Olympic champions in gymnastics and track and field along with other racket sports such as badminton and table tennis but has a poor record in more commercial sports such as tennis and golf.
Chinese sports officials publicly congratulated each other in an apparent effort to link the-government to the victory, even though Li trains independently.
The Chinese Olympic Committee and other agencies expressed "heartfelt congratulations" in a joint letter to the government's Tennis Sports Management Center, according to the state Xinhua News Agency.
"There is no doubt this will encourage and inspire Chinese athletes in other fields to undergo hard training, strengthen their confidence and make-excellent achievements in the London 2012 Olympics," said the letter.
Elsewhere in Asia, the victory was front-page news in Japan and Hong Kong, though tennis has only a small regional following and celebratory sentiment might be dampened by unease at China's rising military might and a series of political strains with its neighbours.
In Japan, which Beijing sees as a rival for-regional leadership, news media celebrated Li's victory as an Asian first. The giant Yomiuri newspaper ran a front-page photo of her with her trophy.
"First from Asia," said a headline in the Asahi newspaper.
In Hong Kong, the match was overshadowed in news coverage by commemorations Saturday of the anniversary of China's June 4, 1989, crackdown on pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square. Tens of thousands of people held candles aloft in a public park and laid a wreath at a makeshift memorial.
In Taiwan, the self-ruled island that Beijing claims as its own territory, Li's victory was the top story in the newspaper United Daily News, under the headline, "In the French Women's singles Li Na is Crowned-Empress."
In Singapore, the tabloid New Paper-declared, "At Last! A grand slam champion from Asia."
China is experiencing the second wave of Li fever this year following her runner-up finish at the Australian Open that saw her dubbed "the pride of China" by the mainstream media.
The head of the Chinese tennis federation was quoted at the time as comparing Li to Houston Rockets centre Yao Ming and Olympic champion hurdler Liu Xiang, until now China's best known international athletes.
In a microblog comment posted Sunday, Liu Xiang declared Li's victory "amazing and marvelous."
In China, tennis still is an elite sport, running far behind basketball, football and other sports in popularity.
At the Green Bank Tennis Club on Beijing's northern edge, fans-gathered late Saturday to watch the match on a big-screen TV set up on a tennis court.
"Throughout China's history people knew nothing of tennis. Now we're standing on the summit of the world game," said Zhang Yueming, the club's general manager.
Chen Jiaojiao, who said she is from Li's home-province of Hubei, called the win "a huge boost of confidence for Chinese tennis."
"She's brought the country so much-glory. She's really incredible," Chen said.
___
Associated Press writers Peter Enav in Taipei, Yuri Kageyama in Tokyo, Jim Gomez in Manila, Kelvin Chan in Hong Kong and Alex Kennedy in Singapore-contributed.

Top Pakistan terrorist Kashmiri killed in US drone attack

2011-06-04T23:28:00.000-07:00

Al Qaeda linked-terrorist Ilyas Kashmiri, a key suspect in the 2008 Mumbai terror-attacks, and Taliban commander Amir Hamza were killed in a US drone strike in Pakistan's restive South Waziristan tribal region, officials and local-residents said.
Kashmiri included along with Mullah Omar and Ayman al Zawahiri in a list of five most wanted terrorists drawn up by the US was among nine militants killed in the drone strike carried out late last night.
Three militants were injured in the-attack.
"Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami 313 Brigade confirms the martyrdom of our leader Ilyas Kashmiri in a US drone-strike on June 3, 2011 at 11.15 pm," HuJI spokesman Abu Hanzala said in a hand written fax message sent to Pakistani media groups.
"We will take revenge (for the killing of) our leader from the US," the statement said.
Kashmiri, 47, was killed when US drones targeted Laman village, 20 km from Wana, one of the main towns in South Waziristan-Agency.
He was reportedly sitting in an apple orchard with other militants and had come to the area shortly before the missile strike.
Amir Hamza, a resident of Wana and a commander of the Mullah Nazir faction of the Taliban, was killed in the same drone strike, local-journalists said.
Mullah Nazir has an agreement with the government and many Punjabi Taliban fighters are believed to be living in Wana and surrounding areas that are controlled by his group.
The bodies of the militants could not be identified but there was strong evidence that Kashmiri had been killed, officials were quoted as saying by TV news channels.
Kashmiri''s death is another blow to al-Qaeda and its affiliates as it comes just over a month after Osama-bin-Laden was killed in a US raid in the-garrison city of Abbottabad on May 2.

Gilani:Economic revival Pakistan's key concern

2011-06-04T00:08:00.000-07:00

Islamabad--Pakistani Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani said that revival of the-economy was the key concern of his-government.

"We have earmarked Rs 730 billion for the Public Sector Development-Programme (PSDP), including provincial-allocations. This development-expenditure will indeed trigger a multiplier effect on the entire economy," Associated Press of Pakistan-quoted Gilani as saying.

Addressing the special cabinet meeting to discuss and approve-budgetary proposals for the year 2011-12, Gilani said there was no room for-complacency.

He asked his economic team to pro-actively work in the coming-year in core areas of power sector reform, revitalising of tax machinery to improve tax to GDP ratio, fast track development of hydel-projects and better governance in the bleeding public sector corporations.

Gilani said Pakistan was entering into the new financial year after tremendous fiscal stress in the current financial year as the economy was devastated by unprecedented floods causing damages to the tune of Rs.800 billion as per independent-estimates.

The prime minister said deteriorating security situation imposed further costs on the economy in the shape of increased security spending and re-settlement of Internally Displaced Persons, reported APP.

Gilani said the government was expecting to close a record-year of exports and home remittances at $24 billion and $12 billion respectively. He said these two factors had cushioned the economy-against high oil and commodities-prices.

No terrorists involved in Layyah crash

2011-06-04T00:04:00.000-07:00

Punjab DG Rangers Major General Muhammad Nawaz was on a monitoring visit of possible action against banned militant organizations and the Taliban in southern Punjab at the time.

A detailed-investigation into the Layyah helicopter crash on Tuesday, concluded that the cause of the crash was bad weather which resulted in technical failure-during the flight.

Earlier, an investigation was ordered-fearing terrorist activity in the incident, as Punjab DG Rangers Major General Muhammad Nawaz was on a monitoring visit of possible action against banned-militant organizations and the Taliban in southern Punjab at the-time.

A search operation for the victims of the crash has been expanded to Guddo Barrage-near the river Indus flow and all parts of the helicopter were located near Taunsa Barrage. The search operation is still in process, as expert divers are searching for the bodies of several victims. Four dead bodies have been recovered-including that of Captain Asif Nawaz and lt Col Amir Abbas, the pilot-of the helicopter.

Pakistan has purchased this helicopter especially from the US helicopter manufacturers BELL in 1994 and it was assigned to the Punjab rangers. It has been considered one of the safest machines and was traditionally-reserved for transporting foreigners, special-guests and VVIPs.

Base operators confirmed that a complete check of the craft was carried out every six months.

According-to the report, the pilot had been flying the helicopter at a low level.

The wing of the fan at the tail of helicopter entered in the helicopter after breaking from the tail and caused the accident.

“Due to the low level flight, it was hard to safely land the craft,” said a Rangers-official.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 4^th, 2011.

One flight left--Space shuttle family feels impending loss

2011-06-02T08:09:00.000-07:00

The space shuttle Atlantis sits on Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39-A Wednesday, June 1, 2011 in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Atlantis is being prepared for a July 8, 2011 mission that will bring a close to the program. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

With Wednesday's landing of-Endeavour, just one more space shuttle flight remains, putting an end to 30 years of Florida shuttle launches and more than 535 million miles of orbits controlled at Houston's Johnson Space Center. Now a sense of melancholy has permeated the community that calls itself "the space shuttle-family."

George Mueller, the man considered "the father of the space shuttle," explained why he's not going to watch the final launch next-month.

"It's like going to a funeral. I'm never enthusiastic about-funerals," said Mueller, who at 92 is still flying cross-country to talk about space. But he's not going to Cape Canaveral, Fla., to watch the liftoff of Atlantis on July 8.

Neither is former astronaut Joe Tanner, who reflected the same thinking in an e-mail: "I have so many absolutely wonderful memories of my 24 years at NASA that I don't want to tarnish them by going to a funeral, if you understand what I mean."

In regions that identify so closely with the space program-cities like Houston, where the local sports teams are the Astros and the Rockets, and Cape Canaveral which calls itself the Space Coast and even has an area code of 3-2-1 the end of the shuttle era is an emotional punch in the gut. The emotions people describe in dozens of interviews resemble the stages of grief in psychology books: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. And the shuttle-program isn't dead quite yet.

"The grieving is totally-normal; that period of bereavement that we have over this kind of loss is pretty well documented in the research literature," said Sharon Hall, head of the psychology department at the University of Houston Clear Lake which is next door to Johnson Space Center. "It's kind of a transitioning en-masse."

Hall says the fact that the community is going-through it together will help speed up the healing process, along with a natural human resilience. It helps that the phrase "space shuttle family" is more than just management-speak, she said: "They are so supportive of each other, very protective, all the-characteristics you associate with a family."

From-orbit Monday, Endeavour Commander Mark Kelly, pilot Gregory Johnson and astronaut Drew Feustel all used the word "bittersweet" to describe their-feelings.

"It'll be sad to see it retired," Kelly said. "But we are looking forward to new spacecraft, new destinations. We're all excited about the future."

Some-people are trying to bask in the remarkable achievements of the shuttle program, like launching and fixing the Hubble Space Telescope and building the International Space Station. Houston Mayor Annise Parker, who talked about how space is part of her city's inner and now hurting psyche, said, "I feel like it's a wake. We celebrate the good-stuff."

Rice University scholar Neal Lane, who was President Bill Clinton's science adviser, said the shuttle's impending retirement "marks the end of an era. It's an example of one of America's greatest peacetime accomplishments. It's a sad time for many, but it's a time to celebrate and-remember."

Some of NASA's old-timers are not celebrating, however.

Christopher Kraft, the legendary engineer who began Mission Control nearly 50 years ago and presided over the initial shuttle flights, expressed pride, melancholy and anger all in little more than a minute.

"It's a sad day for the country. I'll be damned proud of what I did," Kraft said. "We're all very proud of what we've done. But I think we recognize-that the country is the one that will suffer not us."

The plan to retire the space shuttle was made by President George W. Bush in 2004. Bush wanted to replace it with new spacecraft that would return astronauts to the-moon.

Former-astronaut Jerry Linenger looked at the bright side then, dreaming of a new future. But the Bush moon plan ran into money and technical problems and couldn't meet its schedule. It was cancelled by President Barack Obama last year and replaced with a plan to go to an asteroid by 2025, and ultimately go on to Mars. But those plans are far from-detailed.

And when that happened, the measured joy Linenger expected to feel with the end of the shuttle program just evaporated and dismay took its place.

"To me, you were talking one giant leap-forward and now you're talking a leap backward," Linenger said.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, a former shuttle commander, chokes up when talking about the end of the shuttle fleet: "For me it's personal and to be quite honest, it's quite emotional."

But Bolden, who lives in the same neighborhood as Kraft and chats with him and other NASA legends, says the future is not bleak, but exciting.

"Everybody who has ever been associated with human-spaceflight knows we're not giving up on human spaceflight. We're committed to it," Bolden said. "We're going to do some pretty-exciting stuff."

When he became an astronaut in 1980, NASA was looking beyond Earth's orbit. The space shuttle era kept America flying in circles for 30 years. Bolden views the new space plan as "an opportunity to go back and do a do-over... go beyond low Earth orbit and-explore our solar system and other planets."

But-Mueller in an interview with The Associated Press would have none of that: "It's the end of a career, not the beginning of a new one. What we lack is the beginning of a new-one."

You will never be ready for this one

2011-06-02T08:01:00.000-07:00

It’s clear from the very beginning that director Anees Bazmee was trying hard to ride on the steam generated by Khan’s latest blockbuster Dabangg

Dubai: When Bollywood-hunk Salman Khan declared to reporters in Dubai that he’s done with acting in bad films, he should have ideally added a clause‘i.e after Ready’. A regressive love-story between Prem (Salman Khan) and Sanjana (Asin), the hero himself hits the nail on the head when he reprimands his side-kicks: “Right now, you guys look like villains from a cheap, B-grade Bollywood film”. This line was Khan’s attempt to raise their style bar, but his observation-holds good for the entire film. A pot-boiler with loud-mouthed baddies, grating family-members who espouse values of togetherness and a simpering beauty is a part of this ensemble comedy.

It’s clear from the very beginning that director Anees-Bazmee was trying hard to ride on the steam generated by Khan’s latest blockbuster Dabangg. But boy, does he fail. In certain scenes such as the climax, you are filled with a sense of déjà vu as Khan roars, flies across the room to bash up the beefy giant villain, and ripping his tunic for better effect. In Dabangg such antics worked, because it had a decent storyline backing his actions. But to watch a 45-year-old Khan play a determined lover who promises to rescue his damsel from her greedy uncles who also happen to be underworld-dons is as exciting as watching the grass grow.
And yes, the cheesy one-liners that are fast becoming Khan’s trade-mark have been painfully inserted and resuscitated throughout the film. “In life you should-never under-estimate three things: I. Me Myself,” is one such war-cry.
The dialogue-also borders on the dubious. Digest this: Prem’s mother to Sanjana (in Hindi): “Even though you lived in America all your life, your Indian values are intact my child”.
In case you are wondering what triggered that culture-centric compliment, it was a rather scheming-Sanjana singing hymns at the crack of dawn to impress her potential in-laws. To be fair, Asin tries to inject-some life into her badly-etched character, but her bad make-up and outdated costumes are a tad distracting. It almost makes you wonder-whether she forgot to bring along her stylist and make-up-man to work.
The chemistry-between the lead-pair is almost non-existent. The scene where a chivalrous Prem rescues Sanjana when she hangs off a cliff, was intended to be steamy but came off as the funniest sequence ever.
Watch it only if you are filled with an all-consuming love for the matinee idol Khan.
The rest, be warned: You will never be ready for this-one.