Tuesday 3 December 2013

Dunya TV

Dunya TV

Michael Clarke fit to play in Adeliade test

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ADELAIDE (AFP) - Skipper Michael Clarke said Wednesday he is fit to play in the second Ashes Test against England, announcing an unchanged Australian team after the home side's huge win in the series opener.Clarke turned his ankle during training on Monday but said he is feeling no ill-effects and batted in the nets ahead of the match in Adelaide, starting on Thursday.The ankle feels fine, Clarke said after training. I think not training yesterday obviously gave me an extra day.... I feel fine.Clarke named an unchanged team following Australia's 381-run victory in the first Test in Brisbane.All-rounder James Faulkner is again 12th man, with spinner Nathan Lyon likely to play a leading role on an Adelaide Oval drop-in pitch that is anticipated to take turn.It's a real positive to where the team is at, Clarke said of retaining the same line-up.He also said Australia would not change their aggressive approach from the first Test, which was marred by verbal clashes with the tourists.We will continue to play a tough brand of cricket on the field... we all know there is a line we can't cross, he said.Australia: David Warner, Chris Rogers, Shane Watson, Michael Clarke (capt), Steve Smith, George Bailey, Brad Haddin, Mitchell Johnson, Peter Siddle, Ryan Harris, Nathan Lyon, James Faulkner (12th man)

Edward Heffron, of WWII's 'Band of Brothers,' dies

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PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Edward J. Babe Heffron, whose World War II service as a member of the Army's famed Easy Company was recounted in the book and TV miniseries Band of Brothers, has died. He was 90.Heffron died Sunday at Kennedy Hospital in Stratford, New Jersey, said his daughter, Patricia Zavrel.Heffron and the rest of his Band of Brothers fought through some of World War II's fiercest European battles. A paratrooper in Company E, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, Heffron took part in the Battle of the Bulge in Belgium and helped liberate the Kaufering concentration camp in Landsberg, Germany. He received a Bronze Star and Purple Heart.After the war, the Philadelphia native returned home and found work at a whiskey distillery. He later checked cargo on the Delaware River waterfront.He was prominently featured in historian Stephen Ambrose's 1992 book, Band of Brothers, upon which the HBO miniseries that began airing in September 2001 was based. The miniseries followed Easy Company from its training in Georgia in 1942 all the way to the war's end in 1945. Its producers included actor Tom Hanks and Steve Spielberg. Heffron was portrayed by Scottish actor Robin Laing.Along with one of his comrades, William Wild Bill Guarnere, and journalist Robyn Post, Heffron wrote a 2007 memoir called Brothers in Battle, Best of Friends.In addition to his daughter, he is survived by his wife, Dolores.Zavrel said funeral arrangements are private.

China lodges WTO complaint over US anti-dumping move

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GENEVA (AFP) - China launched a fresh WTO trade dispute against the United States Tuesday, challenging anti-dumping measures taken by Washington against Chinese products.The complaint, filed on the first day of a crunch World Trade Organization summit in Bali, takes issue with the wayWashington assesses whether exports have been dumped at unfairly low prices onto the US market, the global trade body said.China alleged that the United States, in violation of WTO rules, was continuing a practice known as zeroing, which calculates the price of imports compared to the normal value in the United States to determine predatory pricing.The United States has repeatedly lost cases before the WTO over its calculation method and has said that it had phased out the practice.As a first step in the trade dispute process, China, which did not reveal which products were involved in the case, requested dispute settlement consultations.Washington now has 60 days to try to settle the dispute before the process moves on to arbitration.The case was just the latest of a string of WTO complaints the worlds two largest economies have lobbed against each other.Tuesdays complaint is the eighth China has filed over US trade remedies, and the fourth so far this year, WTO said.

Ross Taylor keeps New Zealand in firm control

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DUNEDIN (AFP) - Centurion Ross Taylor ensured a commanding New Zealand first innings total against the West Indies on Wednesday, despite the loss of two further wickets including skipper Brendon McCullum.New Zealand went to lunch on the second day of the first Test in Dunedin at 445 for five with Taylor on 144 and BJ Watling on 26.McCullum added just four to his overnight total to be removed for 113 and Corey Anderson failed to score after New Zealand resumed the day at 367 for three.The West Indies generated more fire and accuracy than on the opening day and Tino Best twice had McCullum in difficulty before Darren Sammy claimed the prized scalp with a ball that moved back between bat and pad to remove his off stump.Anderson never looked settled in the 14 balls he faced before he edged a faint touch to a Best delivery heading down the leg side and wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin took a good one-handed catch diving to his right.Watling also had anxious moments at the start of his innings before finding his rhythm and sharing in an unbroken 60-run stand with Taylor for the sixth wicket.Taylor had earlier put on 195 with McCullum to set a record fourth-wicket partnership for New Zealand against the West Indies.Sammy, who had to leave the field for treatment to an injured leg, had the best bowling figures for the tourists with two for 79 while Best had two for 101.

Graeme Swann seeks Malletts help to turn fortunes

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ADELAIDE (AFP) - Graeme Swann has linked up with former Australian Test spinner Ashley Mallett in an effort to lift his fortunes and bowl England to a series-levelling victory in Adelaide, reports said Wednesday.Swann, 34, met Mallett on Tuesday, two days before the second Test starts, to get tips on what he needs to do to achieve success at the Adelaide Oval.Mallett and the English spinner have a long-standing relationship stretching back to 2001 when they held one-on-one sessions while a young Swann was in Adelaide with an England academy team. They keep in regular contact and took the opportunity to catch up in the lead-up to Thursdays Test.We just had a chat about bowling, generally, Mallett told Fairfax Media.Adelaide-based Mallett revealed he told his protege he had given Australias left-handers too much room outside off-stump in the first Brisbane Test.Mallett believes a more attacking line outside off-stump turning into the right-handers is required in Adelaide due to less bounce on offer. Swann will do that, he told Fairfax.You still have to get the ball up above the eyes and dip it. Its a bit (of a) different surface. I reckon youll see more top-spin from him this game, he added.Swann struggled at the Gabba, taking two wickets for 215 runs but his seven wickets were a major factor in Englands innings victory over Australia in Adelaide three years ago.Mallett has an intimate knowledge of Adelaide conditions and has taken more wickets than any other finger-spinner (off-spinner) at the Test venue, with 25 victims in six games from 1971-80.Former England captain Michael Vaughan said Australia had been clever in stacking their batting with right-handers as Swann prefers bowling to left-handers where he can turn the ball away from the bat.The Aussies have counteracted that with a good selection policy and theyve attacked him, which is the right message to send to the England team, Vaughan said.

Bali summit may be last chance for WTO trade deal

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BALI (AP) - Top trade officials began talks Tuesday that will either produce an eleventh hour deal that could boost the global economy by $1 trillion or possibly spell the end of the World Trade Organizations relevance as a forum for negotiations.After more than a decade of inertia in WTO talks, negotiators are close to a slimmed-down deal but there is no finished document for the dozens of trade ministers attending a summit on the Indonesia resort island of Bali to sign. So close to an agreement, some have been urging the trade ministers to take the unusual step of completing the negotiations themselves.An agreement on simplifying customs procedures could help revive the WTOs broader Doha Round of trade negotiations, sometimes known as the development round because of sweeping changes in regulations, taxes and subsidies that would benefit low income countries. Still, WTO ministerial summits are designed for enshrining done deals, not technical negotiations, so producing an agreement at a four-day conference would be unprecedented.Even though still possible, the chances of reaching a deal are rather slim, said Matthias Helble, a global trade expert at the Asian Development Bank Institute and former WTO adviser.The goal of the Doha Round, so called because it was launched in the Qatari capital in 2001, is to create unified rules for the 159 member economies of the WTO in myriad areas: lowering import taxes on hundreds of goods, limiting market-distorting subsidies for farm produce and creating one standard for customs procedures that will make it easier for goods to move across borders.The idea is that if all countries play by the same trade rules, then all countries, rich or poor, will benefit. With fewer trade barriers, goods and services of all types would be more affordable, creating more employment and business opportunities. The WTO estimates that easing customs barriers would increase total world trade to $23 trillion from its current estimate of $22 trillion.Critics of the WTO rules, though, say they may hinder countries from setting their own priorities in environmental protection, worker rights, food security and other areas. And they say sudden reductions in import tariffs can wipe out industries, causing job losses in rich and poor countries. Hundreds of Indonesian activists protested outside government buildings in Bali.We know it is not an easy task, said Brazils Foreign Minister Luiz Alberto Figueiredo Machado. But we are now here, and we are here to do something, he said. We are willing to do our best effort to leave Bali with an adopted package.Because all WTO members must agree on every aspect of the dozens of points of contention for a broad trade agreement, progress has been tortuously slow. The recent negotiations meant to revive the talks are on trade facilitation, only part of the agenda but still sweeping and complex.In the meantime, the U.S. and other countries have been developing separate regional trade deals. Many such pacts already exist. The newest, largest of them in the works, the Trans-Pacific Partnership among the U.S. and 11 other Pacific Rim economies and a U.S.-European Union free trade deal, would give developed economies fewer incentives to forge WTO deals.Thats why another summit with no deal after more than a decade of trying could signal the twilight of the WTOs significance as a forum for trade negotiations. It has thrived in its other a major role, as arbitrator of trade disputes, where countries can file complaints against each other for distorting world commerce by using tools such as subsidies to create an unfair advantage.Failure is not an option, host Indonesias president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told delegates Tuesday as he opened the summit. I fear that should we let this opportunity slip, it is developing countries that will lose out the most.With last weeks progress on customs rules, the difficult issue of limiting agricultural subsidies remains. Anti-poverty activists have long argued that billions of dollars that the U.S. and Europe give to support their farmers help large agricultural conglomerates more than family farmers and also hurt developing countries.Economist Mark Malloch Brown, former head of the UN Development program, has said that developing countries lose potential earnings of $50 billion per year because wealthy countries subsidies keep them from competing in markets.The last best attempt to seal the Doha deal failed partly because the U.S. refused to give up cotton subsidies. But with budget crunches in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, subsidies have lost favor in many developed nations and they are now more willing to limit them.Yet since the core principle of the WTO is the same rules for all members, developing countries that subsidize agriculture to feed the poor, like India, whose recently enacted food security law would provide $22 billion in grain subsidies, might be unable to do so under the new rules. That is why India may hold the key to any last-ditch attempt to produce an agreement at this weeks summit.Indian Trade Minister Anand Sharma said Sunday that Indias food-for-the-poor programs cannot be compromised for minor gains of the developed countries.

Frankfurt clubs breaks contract with Saudia

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FRANKFURT (AP) - A German second-division football club has terminated a short-lived sponsorship contract with the Saudi Arabian national airline Saudia following protests from Jewish and other local groups.The deal with FSV Frankfurt was revealed last week and immediately came under fire because of a New York Post report that Saudia refuses to fly Israeli citizens.FSV Frankfurt said it had asked Saudia for clarification but had been told to contact the Saudi embassy in Berlin, upon which both sides agreed to terminate the contract by mutual agreement immediately. The club did not disclose the value of the sponsorship deal, which had been negotiated by a management agency.

NYC train derailment airs queries about technology

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YONKERS, New York (AP) - The revelation that a New York City commuter train derailed while barreling into a sharp curve at nearly three times the speed limit is fueling questions about whether automated crash-avoidance technology could have prevented the carnage.Safety officials have championed whats known as positive train control technology for decades, but the railroad industry has sought to postpone having to install it because of the high cost and technological issues.Investigators havent yet determined whether the weekend wreck, which killed four people and injured more than 60 others, was the result of human error or mechanical trouble. But some safety experts said the tragedy might not have happened if Metro-North Railroad had the technology.The train was going 82 mph (132 kph) as it entered a 30 mph (48 kph) turn Sunday morning and ran off the track, National Transportation Safety Board member Earl Weener said Monday. He cited information extracted from the trains two data recorders; investigators also began interviewing the trains crew.New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo vowed to make sure any responsible parties are held accountable after investigators determine why the train was going so fast.Investigators began talking to the trains engineer, William Rockefeller, on Monday but postponed completing the interview, likely until Wednesday, National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Keith Holloway said Tuesday. Holloway wouldnt say why; union leader Anthony Bottalico said it was because Rockefeller hadnt slept in almost 24 hours and was very distraught.Bottalico said the engineer planned to have a lawyer accompany him to the interview. The attorney didnt immediately return a call Tuesday.Weener sketched a scenario suggesting that the throttle was let up and the brakes were fully applied way too late to stave off the crash. He said the throttle went to idle six seconds before the derailed train came to a complete stop, very late in the game for a train going that fast, and the brakes were fully engaged five seconds before the train stopped.Investigators are not aware of any problems with the brakes during the nine stops the train made before the derailment, Weener said.Weener would not disclose what investigators know about the engineers version of events, and he said the results of drug and alcohol tests were not yet available. Investigators are also examining the Rockefellers cellphone; engineers are allowed to carry cellphones but prohibited from using them during a trains run.Positive train control, or PTC, is designed to forestall the human errors that cause about 40 percent of train accidents, and uses GPS, wireless radio and computers to monitor trains and stop them from colliding, derailing or going the wrong way. In 2008, Congress ordered rail lines to adopt the technology by December 2015.The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs Metro-North, began planning for a PTC system as soon as the law was put into effect, spokeswoman Marjorie Anders said.But the MTA has advocated for an extension to 2018, saying its difficult to install such a system across more than 1,000 rail cars and 1,200 miles of track.Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, which also is served by Metro-North, said Sundays derailment underscored the need for the technology.Id be very loath to be more flexible or grant more time, he said.

Iran deal sets peace precedent, say Palestinians

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RAMALLAH (AP) - Senior Palestinians say the diplomatic pressure that produced the nuclear deal with Iran, world powers negotiating jointly in Geneva and wielding the stick of sanctions, should now be applied to the long-festering Israeli-Palestinian conflict.The call for emulating the Geneva model is a result of plummeting faith in the traditional formula of U.S.-mediated talks with Israel that produced two decades of failures. With the current round in trouble, Palestinians are grasping at alternatives.What happened in Geneva is a model that proves that if the world wants something, then it can achieve it, said chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat. If they want to achieve peace and stability, then the (Israeli) occupation is no less dangerous than nuclear weapons.Others around Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have made the same point in recent days, though Abbas himself has not spoken on the matter. He says hell keep his promise to the U.S. to stay in bilateral talks with Israel throughout a nine-month period that ends in April.Any effort to change the format will meet resistance.Israel strongly opposes the idea of internationalizing the negotiations, fearing pressure from countries it considers less supportive.U.S. officials have traditionally been cool to the idea of bringing in other mediators, arguing that only Washington has the necessary leverage and influence with both sides.Were less than halfway through the nine-month timeline, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Monday.So our focus remains on the direct negotiations, and I dont think were, at this point, speculating on a different alternative forum.Peace efforts have been internationalized to a degree since the 2002 creation of the so-called Quartet of mediators comprising the United States, the United Nations, Russia and the European Union. Washingtons partners in the Quartet are often cast in secondary roles, such as helping finance Abbas self-rule government, but have not tried to challenge U.S. dominance.That said, there is a growing sense of urgency about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry returns to the region on Wednesday to try to salvage the effort. He is meeting separately with Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who remain so far apart in their positions they havent even met since negotiations resumed in late July.The atmosphere has grown extremely charged, in part because of Israels accelerated construction in Jewish settlements on occupied lands the Palestinians want for their state.The Palestinians already have said that once the set period for talks is over, they will resume their bid for broader international recognition of a state of Palestine, accepted a year ago by the U.N. General Assembly as a non-member observer state. Fearing further isolation, Israel might retaliate.At the same time, Palestinian officials have praised the Geneva deal as an important precedent because the international community pulled together, using sanctions, to defuse a dangerous conflict.In talks with six global powers, Iran agreed to freeze much of its nuclear program in exchange for relief from economic sanctions, even as Netanyahu warned a historic mistake was being made. The West has accused Tehran of seeking to build atomic weapons, although the Iranians insist their nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.Erekat said the world must now show the same determination to help establish a Palestinian state.In a taste of what might lie ahead, the EU linked hundreds of millions of dollars in research money for Israel to a pledge that the money would not be spent in occupied territories. Israel initially balked, but signed the agreement, while noting its opposition to the territorial clause in official documents.Netanyahu has said he is committed to the negotiations and supports the idea of a Palestinian state. But the Palestinians do not trust him because he has accelerated construction for Jews in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.Settlement housing starts have jumped by more than 130 percent to more than 2,100 apartments in the first nine months of this year, compared to the same period in 2012, according to recent Israeli government figures. Since March, the government has promoted plans for more than 11,000 additional settlement apartments, the Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now said.The number of Jews in the West Bank and east Jerusalem is approaching 600,000, compared to about 2.5 million Palestinians in those territories.The Palestinians claim both areas and the Gaza Strip, all captured by Israel in 1967, for their state and see settlement construction as a sign of bad faith.Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005 and dismantled its settlements there, but this required the removal of only several thousand settlers. The exploding settler numbers in the West Bank has led many on both sides to conclude that a partition of the Holy Land may no longer even be possible.Paul Hirschson of Israels Foreign Ministry dismissed the criticism.Let stop talking rubbish about this (settlements) being an obstacle, he said, arguing that some of the settlements would become part of Israel in a future deal. This has zero impact on the peace map.He was referring to the oft-cited, and much disputed, argument that most of the settlements are close enough to pre-1967 border that minor adjustments could leave them on the Israeli side of a negotiated border.Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator who is now at the European Council on Foreign Relations, a think tank, said that Israel currently faces no consequences for maintaining its occupation, while reversing it is politically costly. Without pressure, Israel is unlikely to change course, he said.This has led even some Israelis to call for international economic pressure aimed at forcing their country to halt its settlement enterprise.The time has come for sanctions, commentator Gideon Levy recently wrote in the liberal Haaretz daily. When these are felt in Israel, only then should an international committee be formed ... where the world will translate economic sanctions into political achievements.

3 stadiums to miss FIFA deadline for World Cup

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COSTA DO SAUIPE (AP) - At least three World Cup stadiums in Brazil will not be finished by the end of December as FIFA requested.Soccer's governing body said Tuesday the stadiums in Sao Paulo, Curitiba and Cuiaba are unable to meet the deadline because of construction delays.The announcement came after the World Cup organizing committee received updates from the six host cities that still must turn over the venues for next year's tournament. The other six were ready for this year's Confederations Cup.Two stadiums will be delivered more in the region of February than in January or December, FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke said. Curitiba is the one where we are facing the most problems. Clearly, Curitiba will not be delivered before the end of February 2014, so that's a fact.The stadium in Cuiaba also is expected to be ready in February, four months before the World Cup opens on June 12.FIFA said it still doesn't know when it will have the venue in Sao Paulo, where a crane collapse last week killed two workers and damaged part of the stadium. A report on the scale of the damage is expected by the end of the week.We are in a period of time when the opening game of the World Cup will be played in Sao Paulo, Valcke said. We are not in a crisis mood where we are looking for an alternative to Sao Paulo. We are confident they can deliver the stadium on time (for the opener.)The Sao Paulo venue, which will host the opening match, was almost ready when a giant crane buckled while hoisting a 500-ton metal structure that clipped part of the roof and cut through a huge lighting panel that runs across the venue's outer facade.FIFA said it would not tolerate the same kinds of delays that plagued the Confederations Cup, when only two of the six venues were completed by the original deadline.Valcke said FIFA is already rearranging plans for the installation of temporary facilities at the venues that also will not be delivered by the deadline. FIFA President Sepp Blatter downplayed the delays.There are some small delays in construction of stadia, but so small that, with one exception, we can just close our eyes and say everything will be ready, Blatter said.FIFA wants the stadiums ready at least six months in advance mainly so there is time for at least two test events in each host city. It says there is no way of moving games because about 1 million tickets have already been sold for next year's tournament.

North Korea power broker sacked: South Korean spy agency

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SEOUL (AFP) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-Uns uncle, seen as the hardline regimes political regent, has apparently been purged and two associates executed, South Koreas spy agency said Tuesday nearly two years after the young supremo came to power.The National Intelligence Service (NIS) told a parliamentary committee that it believed Jang Song-Thaek had been removed from all posts, including vice chairman of the communist countrys top military body, the National Defence Commission.If confirmed, Jangs ouster would mark the most significant purge at the top of the North Korean leadership since Kim Jong-Un succeeded his late father Kim Jong-Il in December 2011.According to the NIS briefing , Jang was recently ousted from his position and two of his close confidantes -- Ri Yong-Ha and Jang Soo-Kil -- were publicly executed in mid-November, lawmaker Jung Cheong-Rae told reporters.North Korean military personnel had been notified of the executions, Jung said, adding that Jang, 67, had since disappeared.The husband of Kim Jong-Ils powerful sister, Kim Kyong-Hui, Jang was seen as instrumental in cementing Kim Jong-Uns hold on power in the tricky transition period after his fathers death.He was often referred to as the unofficial number two in the hierarchy and the real power behind the throne of Kim, who is aged around 30.I can only guess that the roles played by Jang have caused some tension in the process of consolidating Kim Jong-Uns power, said Kim Yong-Hyun, a professor at Seouls Dongguk University.Jang once visited South Korea and witnessed many aspects of capitalist society, including the changes that have been happening in China.So he was the figure who was most likely to aggressively push for some reforms and opening of the Norths system, Kim said.Several analysts suggested Jang may have lost out in a power struggle with Choe Ryong-Hae, a close Kim Jong-Un confidant who holds the military rank of vice marshal and is director of the Korean Peoples Armys General Political Department.In May, Kim sent Choe as his personal envoy to Beijing to hand-deliver a letter to Chinas new president, Xi Jinping.Palace intrigueJang Song-Thaek has fallen out of favour before. In 2004 he was understood to have undergone re-education as a steel mill labourer because of suspected corruption, but he made a comeback the following year.Jang expanded his influence rapidly after Kim Jong-Il suffered a stroke in 2008 and he was appointed vice chairman of the powerful National Defence Commission in 2010.His wife Kim Kyong-Hui has also long been at the centre of power. She was promoted to four-star general at the same time as Kim Jong-Un in 2010, a sign of her key role in the familys efforts to maintain its six-decade grip on power.In the past year, she has been far less visible, with reports that she was seriously ill and had sought hospital treatment in Singapore on several occasions.Jangs ouster and the public execution of his associates means they had probably formed a significant political clique of their own, said Cheong Seong-Chang of the Sejong Institute think-tank in Seoul.The purge suggests Kim Jong-Un has a very strong grip on power and it will lead to more competition within the leadership to showcase loyalty towards the leader, Cheong said.Last month the North Korean defector-run news website, Daily NK, known for its sources inside North Korea, published a long article about Jangs diminishing political clout.The Seoul-based website quoted multiple sources suggesting Jangs influence in policy-making decisions had waned, and that he appeared to have lost favour.Lawmaker Cho Won-Jin, who also attended the NIS briefing, said North Korea had been putting out the word internally that Jangs executed associates had been found guilty of anti-party activity.Now the regime is trying really hard to close ranks by holding various ideology training sessions, urging unquestioned loyalty to Kim Jong-Un, Cho said.

British envoy makes first visit to Iran since 2011

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LONDON (AFP) - Britains new envoy to Tehran visited Iran on Tuesday, becoming the first British diplomat to travel to the country since ties were severed in 2011, the Foreign Office in London said.Ajay Sharma, who is making his first trip in his new role as non-resident charge daffaires, held detailed and constructive talks with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Habibollah-Zadeh and other officials.I had a good first visit back to Tehran today and want to thank the Iranian authorities, particularly my counterpart Mr Habibollahzadeh, for facilitating the trip, Sharma said in a statement issued by the Foreign Office.I held detailed and constructive discussions with the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs about taking forward our bilateral relationship on a step-by-step and reciprocal basis.Sharma said he also visited the British embassy compounds to assess the damage caused in November 2011 when they were stormed by hundreds of Islamist students, prompting Britain to shut the embassy and sever diplomatic ties.The students -- protesting against Western sanctions over Irans disputed nuclear programme -- ransacked the building as well as the British ambassadors residence in north Tehran.The two countries each named a non-resident charge daffaires -- a diplomatic post that is one level below ambassador -- last month.I intend to visit Iran regularly to continue the step by step process of improving relations between our two countries, Sharma said.

Vatican, Oxford put ancient manuscripts online

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VATICAN CITY (AP) - Access to the Gutenberg Bible and other ancient manuscripts has just gotten easier.The Vatican Library and Oxford Universitys Bodleian Library put the first of 1.5 million pages of their precious manuscripts online Tuesday, bringing their collections to a global audience for the first time.The two libraries in 2012 announced a four-year project to digitize some of the most important works in their collections of Hebrew manuscripts, Greek manuscripts and early printed books.The 2 million pound ($3.3 million) project is being funded by the Polonsky Foundation, which aims to democratize access to information.We want everyone who can to see these manuscripts, these great works of humanity, Monsignor Cesare Pasini, the prefect of the Vatican Library, told The Associated Press in an interview Tuesday inside the frescoed library. And we want to conserve them.Among the first works up on the site Tuesday, at http:/bav.bodleian.ox.ac.uk, are the two-volume Gutenberg Bibles from each of the libraries, an illustrated 11th century Greek bible and a beautiful 15th-century German bible, hand-colored and illustrated by woodcuts.The Vatican Library was founded in 1451 and is one of the most important research libraries in the world. It has 180,000 manuscripts, 1.6 million books and 150,000 prints, drawings and engravings. The Bodleian is the largest university library in Britain, with more than 11 million printed works.Pasini said the Vatican was embarking on similar digitization projects with libraries in Azerbaijan and China, among others.

Swedish police warn of teenage gang rapes trend

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STOCKHOLM (AFP) - Swedish police have warned of a growing trend of teenage gang rapes, often filmed or photographed on smartphones, as a high-profile case under a new rape law opened in the capital Tuesday.In the case before the Stockholm court, three young men are accused of raping a girl, whose age has not been made public, in a forested area south of the capital.The girl was under the influence of drugs, court documents show, and a judge said she was in a particularly vulnerable situation due to the number of men involved, who were not known to her.The trial is the latest in a series of cases of group sex acts involving young Swedes which has prompted police to raise the alarm about a new trend in gang rapes.Were talking about very young teens, police inspector Moni Winsnes told AFP.They are 14-15 years old. One girl was as young as 12. It goes on in front of their friends, who might even be filming and taking photos.Video footage from smartphones is later used to shame and silence victims, or blackmail them into participating in more group sex acts.It can be five guys and one girl, and she is forced to give them oral sex in public... the girl doesnt dare to say no, she said.This year there have been almost 1,600 cases of sexual assault involving under 18s in Stockholm alone, up from 1301 the previous year, according to official figures.The number of cases that made it to court in the country as a whole where the victims were 15 to 17-years-old almost doubled to 466 from 2011 to 2012.A distorted attitude to sexSweden has one of the highest rates of reported rape in Europe but police say that can be attributed to a greater willingness to report attacks in recent years.However Winsnes and others argue that the figures only reveal part of the picture.They say the attackers often manipulate and threaten younger girls into participating in sex acts and once they are filmed they have control over them.It is very widespread and the majority (of victims) are young girls. Their (perpetrators) attitude to sex, sexual abuse, what is right or not, is unfortunately very distorted, said Sanna Bergendahl at Storasyster, a local group working against sexual violence and abuse.Many have some kind of idea of how a real rape should look like, that it has to be violent to count as rape.Nonetheless, not everyone agrees that Sweden has a growing problem.Per Ullholm, a sex educator at the sexual health association RFSU, said he had not seen any dramatic change in attitudes towards sexual violence among teenagers, but added that it was important to discuss limits and seek consent before sex.Sweden toughened its rape legislation in July to include victims in a particularly vulnerable situation which includes young girls who feel intimidated among a group of boys.The change came too late for an alleged assault which took place earlier in the summer when six teenage boys were aquitted by a court of appeal for having sex with a teenage girl in a locked room at a party.The girl said that she was frozen and did not dare resist.Womens right groups were keeping a close eye on the trial which opened Tuesday, the most high-profile since the new law came into force, hoping that it would set a precedent and send a clear message to young men.They called for Sweden to strengthen rape laws further and join other countries such as the UK, Ireland, Norway and Belgium which require explicit consent before a sexual act.No men are born to be rapists, said Bergendahl. They are shaped by society.

Apple acquires media analytics firm for 200m

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NEW YORK (AFP) - Apple has acquired social media analytics firm Topsy for more than $200 million, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday.The newspaper, citing sources familiar with the deal, said it was unclear how Apple planned to use the firm but that it could be related to Apples new streaming music service.Apple did not specifically comment on the report, but a spokeswoman said in a statement: Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.Topsy, according to the report, is among a handful of Twitter partners which has access to the full range of data from the fast-growing messaging platform.Earlier this year, Topsy said it had created a searchable index of all the publicly available tweets ever made, to be available for marketers and others.Topsy did not respond to a request for comment.Topsy describes itself as a company with the only full-scale index of the public social web, to help its customers instantly analyze any topic, term or hashtag across years of conversations on millions of web sites.The data can be used to analyze the effectiveness of a social media ad campaign, for example.Danny Sullivan, analyst at Search Engine Land, said Topsy is about the only decent third-party Twitter search service to have survived, in recent years.Topsys access to Twitters firehose of tweets and focus on providing search results and analytical tools make it even more robust than Twitters own Twitter Search, for some queries, Sullivan said in a blog post.But Sullivan said its not clear if Twitter will continue to give Topsy a sweetheart deal for access under Apples ownership. He said that Topsy had become the definitive Twitter search engine and was likely sought by Twitter itself.Apple had a music-oriented social network called Ping, but shuttered that last year as it created sharing options through Facebook and Twitter.
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