Wednesday, 13 October 2010

Watches AP / Jae C. Hong US lifts Gulf of Mexico deepwater oil drilling ban

Hong US lifts Gulf of Mexico deepwater oil drilling ban

By Karin Zeitvogel
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 06:49:00 10/13/2010

Filed Under: Oil & Gas - Upstream activities, Health and Safety at Work
WASHINGTON—The United States on Tuesday lifted a ban on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico imposed after the BP oil spill, but set operators tough new safety conditions, officials said.

"We have decided it is now appropriate to lift the suspension on deepwater drilling for those operators that are able to clear the higher bar that we have set" for safety, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said.

Shortly after the BP oil disaster began in April, President Barack Obama ordered a six-month freeze on deepwater offshore oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The moratorium was due to expire at the end of next month.

The new rules, which were laid out by the Interior Department two weeks ago, toughen up companies' obligations on drilling and workplace safety, well containment and spill response, he said.

They were crafted in the wake of the blowout on a BP deepwater well that killed 11 rig workers and sparked the worst oil disaster in US history, the effects of which are still being felt in Gulf Coast states.

Key among the tough new rules for deepwater drilling is an obligation for the CEO of any company wishing to drill in deep water to "certify that the rig has complied with all new and existing rules," said Salazar.

Executives from the companies involved in the BP-leased well that blew out in April have blamed each other for the accident which happened some 50 miles (80 kilometers) off the coast of Louisiana.

Environmental group Greenpeace called the end of the ban on deepwater drilling "pure politics of the most cynical kind."

"Scientists haven't even assessed the full ecological impact of the BP disaster and yet the government is in a rush to allow oil companies to get back to drilling. It is irresponsible to say the least, reckless at worst," said Greenpeace USA director Phil Radford.

Peter Lehner, executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the moratorium was being lifted "prematurely."

"To ensure a disaster like this never happens again, we must know what caused it in the first place. We’re still waiting for that answer and until we get it, the moratorium should remain in place," he said.

Louisiana Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu, who has called the moratorium an "uninformed" and "reckless" move that endangered the environment, national security and jobs, welcomed Tuesday's announcement as "a step in the right direction."

"But it must be accompanied by an action plan to get the entire industry in the Gulf of Mexico back to work," including an acceleration of the permitting process, she added.
Coppied by http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/world/view/20101013-297456/US-lifts-Gulf-of-Mexico-deepwater-oil-drilling-ban

Watches Child Malnutrition Worsens Global Hunger

Child Malnutrition Worsens Global Hunger

Child Malnutrition Worsens Global Hunger, Says Report

AHEAD of this year's World Food Day billed for October 16, the latest Global Hunger Index (GHI) indicates that malnutrition among children under two years of age is one of the leading challenges to reducing global hunger.

This, going by the Index that was wired to AkanimoReports on Tuesday, can cause lifelong harm to health, productivity, and earning potential.

Released ahead of World Food Day for the fifth year, the report is published by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Welthungerhilfe, and Concern Worldwide.
The Index scores countries based on three equally weighted indicators: the proportion of people who are undernourished, the proportion of children under five who are underweight, and the child mortality rate. The biggest contributor to the global score is child undernutrition, which accounts for almost half of the score.

“To improve their scores, many countries must accelerate progress in reducing child malnutrition. Considerable research shows that the window of opportunity for improving nutrition spans from conception to age two. After age two, the negative effects of undernutrition are largely irreversible,” explained Marie Ruel, director of IFPRI’s Poverty, Health and Nutrition division and co-author of the report.

The Index is calculated for 122 developing and transition countries for which data on the three components of hunger are available. Twenty-nine countries have levels of hunger that are “extremely alarming” or “alarming.” Most of these countries are in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

While the highest regional GHI scores are for South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia has made much more progress since 1990. In South Asia, the low nutritional, educational, and social status of women is among the major factors that contribute to a high prevalence of malnutrition in children under five.

In Sub-Saharan Africa, low government effectiveness, conflict, political instability, and high rates of HIV and AIDS are among the major factors that lead to high child mortality and a high proportion of people who cannot meet their calorie requirements. In some countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, for example Burundi, Madagascar, and Malawi, about half of the children are stunted (low height for age) due to poor nutrition.

The burden of child undernutrition could be cut by 25-36 percent by providing universal preventive health services and nutrition interventions for children under two and their mothers during pregnancy and lactation.

“The health of women, specifically mothers, is crucial to reducing child malnutrition Mothers who were poorly nourished as girls tend to give birth to underweight babies, perpetuating the cycle of undernutrition,” noted Welthungerhilfe chairperson Bärbel Dieckmann. “Nutrition interventions should be targeted towards girls and women throughout the life cycle and especially as adolescents before they become pregnant.”
coppied by http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO1010/S00208/child-malnutrition-worsens-global-hunger.htm

Watches Grisly new footage revives horror of London bombings

Grisly new footage revives horror of London bombings



AFP/File – Hazel Webb (left) and Julia Nicholson, whose children were killed during the July 7 bombings in 2005,
LONDON (AFP) – Chilling footage of the devastation wrought by the 2005 London bombings has been shown in public for the first time at the inquests into the deaths of 52 passengers.
The courtroom saw slow-moving, silent video from inside the Underground trains, revealing the bloody, scorched wreckage left by three simultaneous suicide bombings in footage filmed just hours afterwards.
The hearing on Tuesday was also told in distressing detail about each victim's final moments, pieced together from eyewitness and forensic evidence, reviving the horror of July 7, 2005.
The 8:49 am rush-hour explosions on three trains, and on a bus about one hour later, were the largest terror attacks on British soil.
The eerie forensic police footage that was screened had been edited to ensure no human remains were shown. Parts were blurred out.
The video made at Aldgate station, where seven innocent people were killed on a train, showed empty platforms.
Blood and rescue equipment were visible on the concourse.
The camera then entered the darkness of the tunnel, towards the stricken train.
The side doors of the second carriage, next to where suicide bomber Shehzad Tanweer stood, were blown out and buckled, with other doors similarly damaged.
Ladders went up to the train floor. The inside of the carriage was wrecked, the floor littered with debris. The ripped ceiling was spattered with a dark substance.
Newspapers, clothing and bags were visible in the gloom. The seats were ripped up and apparently bloodstained.
Outside the train, twisted metal lay on the tracks.
One police officer described the soot-covered and blood-soaked passengers emerging from the Aldgate tunnel as looking like "zombies".
"A number of passengers paint a terrible scene of mangled flesh, debris and metal which had descended from the ceiling," said counsel Hugo Keith, who presents the evidence to the inquest.
Keith went through each victim of the four bombings in turn, linking together evidence to tell what happened to them.
They included immigrants, young accountants, economics graduates, biomedical scientists, musicians, people soon to marry, commuters who had changed their usual routes, and men who had let others squeeze onto a previous train.
Wounded commuters tried to help their fellow passengers, attempting resuscitation, tying clothing around injured limbs and laying coats over the deceased.
Coppied by http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101013/wl_uk_afp/britainattacksinquest

watched Chilcot inquiry makes fact-finding visits to Iraq

Chilcot inquiry makes fact-finding visits to Iraq


Sir John Chilcot said there could be further public hearings if the evidence was not conclusive
The UK's Iraq inquiry has visited the cities of Baghdad and Basra as part of its fact-finding mission.

Members of the panel held talks with Deputy Foreign Minister Labeed Abbawi and former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, as well as leading Iraqi officials.

Its report, into the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and its aftermath, is due to be published early next year.

Inquiry chairman Sir John Chilcot promised that the panel would "seek to fill" any "gaps in the evidence".

Its public hearings in central London, which numbered former Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown among the witnesses, concluded in July.

But Sir John said there could be more sessions, if it was judged that the information gathered so far was inadequate.

'Immeasurably helpful'
From 26 September to 1 October, four of the five-member inquiry panel visited Iraq for private discussions with leading politicians and officials.

As well as Mr Abbawi and Mr Allawi, these included Iraq's planning minister Ali Baban and Ahmed Chalabi, leader of the Iraqi National Congress Party.

United Nations, European Union and World Bank officials also held discussions with the panel.

Sir John said: "Since the end of the public hearings in July, we have heard from many individuals; from British service personnel who served in Iraq, to Iraqi politicians and civilians living and working in the country today.

"All those meetings have been immeasurably helpful to the committee, and we are grateful to those who have hosted us and those who have taken the time to meet us to share their insights and experiences."

He added: "As I have said before, if there are gaps in the evidence we will seek to fill them, including seeking further written evidence or potentially holding a small number of further public hearings either with new witnesses or with those from whom we have heard before.
Coppied by http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11528927

Watches Record protests hit France in pensions showdown

Record protests hit France in pensions showdown



AFP – People demonstrate in Paris against President Nicolas Sarkozy's plan to raise the age of retirement
PARIS (AFP) – French workers in several sectors were to vote Wednesday on whether to strike for a second day after more than a million people marched in the biggest protest yet against pensions reform.
The SNCF national rail company, which ran just one in three trains on Tuesday, said services would likely be as badly disrupted on Wednesday, indicating that workers were expected to renew their strike.
Strikers in the RATP Paris transport network had already voted on Tuesday to renew their action.
"This is not a last stand," said the president of the CFTC union, Jacques Voisin after Tuesday's marches.
"The movement is taking things up a notch."
The nationwide protests were the biggest since the anti-reform battle began earlier this year, unions and police said, estimating the number of demonstrators at 3.5 million and 1.23 million respectively.
That made the street protests the biggest in strike-prone France since 1995, when a month of stoppages crippled the country and forced the right-wing government at the time to drop its own pensions reform.
The strike and marches were against President Nicolas Sarkozy's pensions reform, key elements of which had already passed into law just a day earlier.
And in what some commentators saw as a significant development, students and school pupils joined the movement for the first time.
"Sarko, you're screwed, the young are on the streets," chanted students as they marched beside trade unionists and their supporters on the fourth major nationwide demonstration against pension reform in just over a month.
Travellers faced major delays, with up to half the flights to and from Paris Orly airport and one in three at the capital's Charles de Gaulle-Roissy and the smaller Paris Beauvais cancelled.
Coppied by http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101013/bs_afp/francestrikepoliticspensions

Watches Chile celebrates as first miner is rescued

Chile celebrates as first miner is rescued



Florencio Avalos, the first miner to be rescued, (left), is embraced by Chilean President Sebastian Pinera after reaching the surface
There were few words, in the end, that Florencio Avalos could find to express the joy he felt when he finally reached the surface of the San Jose mine shortly after midnight. Just a smile as wide as the Atacama Desert as he stepped out of the Phoenix escape capsule and fell into the arms of the wife and two children that he’d last embraced almost seventy days ago.

It was a magnificent sight to see, this shy and exhausted man breathing fresh air he must have thought he’d never breathe again, and bear-hugging the men who had managed to bring him to the surface in one piece. When the cage painted in patriotic red, white and blue cleared the top of the escape shaft, the cheer that went up over Camp Hope might have been heard half way to the moon.

A cloud of balloons filled the freezing Chilean night sky and church bells were rung in the camp and across the nation. The joyous crowd, many of whom have been camped out at the surface as long as “Los 33” have been trapped underground, hugged each other, set up party poppers, and chanted the words they will surely be chanting for days: “Chi! Chi! Chi! Le! Le! Le!
Coppied by http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/chile-celebrates-as-first-miner-is-rescued-2104648.html

Watches Ahmadinejad in Lebanon on controversial visit

Ahmadinejad in Lebanon on controversial visit


Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in Lebanon on Wednesday for a controversial visit that will take him close to the border with arch-foe Israel and seen as a boost for key ally Hezbollah.
The hardline leader was greeted at the airport by parliament speaker Nabih Berri and a delegation of Hezbollah politicians.

He was then headed to the presidential palace outside the capital Beirut for an official welcome ceremony and talks with his counterpart Michel Sleiman.
Coppied by http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=/data/middleeast/2010/October/middleeast_October176.xml§ion=middleeast