Fergie and husband Duhamel study up on parenting

FILE - This is a Monday May 2, 2011 file photo of singer Fergie and her husband, actor Josh Duhamel, arrive at the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute gala, Monday, May 2, 2011 in New York. Actor Josh Duhamel and his wife, Black Eyed Peas singer Fergie, have already started doing their homework as they prepare to welcome their first child they said Wednesday Feb. 20, 2013. (AP Photos/Peter Kramer, File)

FILE - This is a Monday May 2, 2011 file photo of singer Fergie and her husband, actor Josh Duhamel, arrive at the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute gala, Monday, May 2, 2011 in New York. Actor Josh Duhamel and his wife, Black Eyed Peas singer Fergie, have already started doing their homework as they prepare to welcome their first child they said Wednesday Feb. 20, 2013. (AP Photos/Peter Kramer, File)

LONDON (AP) ? Actor Josh Duhamel and his wife, Black Eyed Peas singer Fergie, have already started doing their homework as they prepare to welcome their first child.

Duhamel tells The Associated Press the couple is "very excited" and that friends and family are passing on pregnancy advice.

He says Fergie is reading "What to Expect When You're Expecting," while he has started "The Expectant Father."

Duhamel adds: "There's not a lot of pictures, though. I like a book with pictures."

Fergie, the 37-year-old whose real name is Stacy Ferguson, married Duhamel in 2009. Their baby is due this summer.

Duhamel, 40, has appeared in the "Transformers" films and can currently be seen in romantic drama "Safe Haven."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-02-20-Britain-People-Fergie-Duhamel/id-8b9ba051c8ca4f2093695958fd3a2288

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High court limits detention powers in searches

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Supreme Court has limited the power of police to detain people who are not at home when their residence is to be searched.

By a 6-3 vote Tuesday, the justices sided with a Long Island, N.Y., man who was picked up about three-quarters of a mile away from his apartment as police searched it for a gun.

Justice Anthony Kennedy said in his opinion for the court's majority that the authority of police to detain people found at home during a search authorized by a warrant is limited to the immediate vicinity of the premises. He said that concern for officer safety diminishes the farther away from the home the detention occurs.

In dissent, Justice Stephen Breyer said he would have upheld lower court rulings in favor of the police "in light of the risks of flight, of evidence destruction, and of human injury present in this and similar cases." Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas joined Breyer's dissent.

The Fourth Amendment usually requires police to strongly suspect an individual has committed a crime before he can be detained. But the court in 1981 ruled in Michigan v. Summers that police could detain people without suspicion during a search to keep them from doing harm to officers, keep them from fleeing and allowing them to, for example, open a door instead of having the police bash it in.

In this case, Chunon Bailey, also known by the alias of Polo, left his basement apartment in Wyandanch, N.Y., shortly before police began their search. Unaware of the impending search, Bailey and another man got into Bailey's black Lexus and drove away, apparently to get the friend home by 10 p.m. to comply with a condition of his parole.

Officers followed in an unmarked car and stopped the Lexus a few minutes later. Bailey and his friend were handcuffed and taken back to the apartment where, by then, police had found a gun and drugs.

Bailey tried and failed to get courts to throw out anything he said to police when he was stopped and also a key to the apartment police found when they patted him down. He was found guilty of cocaine possession and other crimes and sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Kennedy said none of the concerns present in the court's 1981 case justified Bailey's detention. "The categorical authority to detain incident to the execution of a search warrant must be limited to the immediate vicinity of the premises to be searched," he said. To do otherwise gives the police too much discretion, Kennedy said.

But the ruling may not let Bailey off the hook entirely. Kennedy said the government still can argue that another rationale made the decision to stop and detain Bailey legal. The justices ordered the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York to take a new look at Bailey's case.

The case is Bailey v. U.S., 11-770.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-02-19-Supreme%20Court-Search/id-9568b882a11244d1a20ca3ec0a38d0f4

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Nevada's Hispanics Come of Age Politically

Hispanic Business:

More than 125 years ago, after the 1874 elections, Pablo Laveaga became the first Hispanic ever elected to the Nevada Legislature, representing Humboldt County.

The next Hispanic legislator in Nevada came 70 years later. The third was not elected until another 38 years had passed.

Recently, however, thanks to changes in the state's demographics and opportunities that have come from tweaks in the state electoral system, Hispanics have been getting elected at a much faster pace.

Read the whole story at Hispanic Business

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/19/nevadas-hispanics-come-of_n_2715982.html

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'Snooze button' on biological clocks improves cell adaptability

Monday, February 18, 2013

The circadian clocks that control and influence dozens of basic biological processes have an unexpected "snooze button" that helps cells adapt to changes in their environment.

A study by Vanderbilt University researchers published online Feb. 17 by the journal Natureprovides compelling new evidence that at least some species can alter the way that their biological clocks function by using different "synonyms" that exist in the genetic code.

"This provides organisms with a novel and previously unappreciated mechanism for responding to changes in their environment," said Professor of Biological Sciences Carl Johnson. He and Associate Professor of Biological Sciences Antonis Rokas collaborated on the study.

Like many written languages, the genetic code is filled with synonyms: differently spelled "words" that have the same or very similar meanings. For a long time, biologists thought that these synonyms, called synonymous codons, were in fact interchangeable. Recently, they have realized that this is not the case and that differences in synonymous codon usage have a significant impact on cellular processes, so scientists have advanced a wide variety of ideas about the role that these variations play.

The new insight is not only an important advance in understanding evolution at the molecular level, but it also has potential applications in biotechnology, such as biofuel production, and gene therapy.

"While biological clocks are vital to maintaining healthy patterns of sleep, metabolism, physiology and behavior, under certain environmental conditions strict adherence to these rhythms can be disadvantageous," said Michael Sesma of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, which partially funded the work. "This work shows how organisms can ignore the clock under certain circumstances?much like hitting a biological snooze button on the internal timepiece?and enhance their survival in the face of ever-changing circumstances."

The basic letters of the genetic code are a quartet of molecules (nucleic acids) designated A, C, G and U. These are combined into 61 triplets called codons, which are analogous to words. The codons provide the blueprints that the cell's protein-building machinery uses to generate amino acids, which are the basic building blocks that make all the proteins found in living organisms. However, cells only use 20 amino acids. That means a number of amino acids are produced by several different codons. For example, CCA, CCG and CCC are synonymous codons because they all encode for the same amino acid, proline.

It turns out that there is a reason for this redundancy. Some codons are faster and easier for cells to process and assemble into proteins than others. Recognition of this difference led to the concept of optimal codons and the hypothesis that natural selection should drive organisms ? particularly fast growing ones ? to use genes that use optimal codons to make critical proteins that need to be highly abundant or synthesized rapidly in cells.

The problem with this hypothesis was shown by Johnson and Rokas' study of the effect of changing codon usage on the simple biological clock found in single-celled cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) and a similar study of the more complex biological clock found in bread mold performed by a team led by Yi Liu that were published together.

"What the Liu team found was that optimizing all the codons used by the fungal biological clock knocked the clock out, which was totally unexpected! Those researchers concluded that clock proteins in the fungus are not properly assembled if they are synthesized too rapidly; it's as if the speed of one's writing affected our ability to read the text," Johnson summarized.

In the cyanobacteria, however, the researchers observed a different phenomenon. At Vanderbilt, Research Associate Professor Yao Xu optimized the codons in the cyanobacteria's biological clock. This did not shut the clock down in the algae, but it did have a more subtle, but potentially as profound effect: It significantly reduced cell survival at certain temperatures.

"Xu figured that the biological clock with optimized codons might work better at lower temperatures and it did," Johnson said. However the substitution also modified the biological clock so it ran with a longer, 30-hour period. When forced to operate in a 24-hour daily light/dark cycles, the bacteria with the optimized clock grew significantly slower than "wild-type" cells. "In cyanobacteria, it's as if writing speed changes the meaning," said Rokas.

The potential importance of changes in synonymous codon usage in adapting to environmental factors is magnified by the fact that they can influence the operation of biological clocks, which function as a key adaptation to daily environmental rhythms. Biological clocks control and influence dozens of different basic biological processes, including sleeping and feeding patterns, core body temperature, brain activity, hormone production and cell regeneration.

"It is now clear that variations in codon usage is a fundamental and underappreciated form of gene regulation," said Rokas.

Recognition of the importance of this process has a number of potential applications in biotechnology. For example, "it should be possible to improve the ability of algae to robustly express biofuel-producing proteins from other organisms by optimizing the codons that they use," Johnson said.

###

Vanderbilt University: http://www.exploration.vanderbilt.edu

Thanks to Vanderbilt University for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 56 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/126864/_Snooze_button__on_biological_clocks_improves_cell_adaptability

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McCain claims ?massive cover-up? on Benghazi

(NBC)

While discussing the contentious confirmation hearings for defense secretary nominee Chuck Hagel, things got a bit heated on Sunday's "Meet The Press" when Sen. John McCain referred to the lack of information from the White House surrounding the Sept. 11, 2012 attacks in Benghazi as a "massive cover-up."

"There are so many answers we don't know," McCain told host David Gregory. "We've had two movies about getting bin Laden and we don't even know who the people were who were evacuated from the consulate the day after the [Benghazi] attack. So there are many, many questions. So we've had a massive cover-up on the part of the administration."

Gregory then pressed McCain on what the Arizona senator meant by "a massive cover-up."

"I'm asking you, do you care whether four Americans died?" McCain said. "And shouldn't people be held accountable for the fact that four Americans died?"

"Well, what you said was the cover-up--a cover-up of what?" Gregory asked.

"Of the information concerning the deaths of four brave Americans," McCain replied. "The information has not been forthcoming. You obviously believe that it has. I know that it hasn't. And I'll be glad to send you a list of the questions that have not been answered, including 'What did the president do and who did he talk to the night of the attack on Benghazi?'"

McCain continued: "Why did the president for two weeks, for two weeks during the heat of the campaign continue to say he didn't know whether it was a terrorist attack or not? Is it because it interfered with the line 'Al Qaeda has [been] decimated'? And 'everything's fine in that in that part of the world'? Maybe. We don't know. But we need the answers. Then we'll reach conclusions. But we have not received the answers. And that's a fact."

Earlier, the former Republican presidential nominee said he expects Hagel to be confirmed as defense secretary even though he doesn't plan to vote for him.

"I don't believe he is qualified," McCain said. "But I don't believe that we should hold up his nomination any further."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/mccain-massive-cover-benghazi-193426972--politics.html

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Cypriot conservative chief leads in vote, faces runoff

NICOSIA (Reuters) - Conservative leader Nicos Anastasiades grabbed a commanding lead in Cyprus's presidential election but failed to avoid a run-off next week, in a setback to investor hopes for a swift deal to save the island nation from bankruptcy.

A financial crash in Cyprus could reignite the euro zone debt crisis and investors are keen to see Anastasiades, the strongest advocate of an international rescue deal likely to come with harsh conditions, clinch victory and secure a bailout.

The eastern Mediterranean nation's worst economic crisis in four decades has eclipsed its almost four-decade-old partition as the main issue in this year's election.

Anastasiades, 66, a lawyer who has led the Democratic Rally party since 1997, led with 45.3 percent of the vote after 94 percent of the vote was counted, well ahead of leftist rival Stavros Malas, who took an average of 27.1 percent of the vote.

Exit polls earlier suggested Anastasiades might be able to secure just over 50 percent of the vote, which would have allowed him to avoid the run-off on February 24.

A third contender, independent candidate George Lillikas, took 25 percent of the vote, according to the results so far.

COUNTRY'S SURVIVAL

Anastasiades has pledged a quick agreement with the European Union and International Monetary Fund on a financial rescue, which investors want agreed before the island's woes derail progress in shoring up the rest of the euro zone's periphery.

"It is the survival of our country which is at stake," Anastasiades said earlier on Sunday after voting in the port town of Limassol, accompanied by his three grandchildren.

Nailing down a deal has proven tricky because almost any way of solving the crisis - from restructuring debt to slapping losses on banks - could set a precedent for other troubled states and damage sentiment just as confidence slowly returns to the euro zone.

Fears that Cyprus will never be able to pay back its debt, and German misgivings about its commitment to fighting money laundering, have further complicated talks on a rescue, which have dragged on for eight months.

Cyprus sought financial help last year after its banks suffered huge losses from Greece's sovereign debt restructuring. The island, which has been shut out of international financial markets since May 2011, needs about 17 billion euros in aid - a sum worth as much as its entire economy.

Reuniting Cyprus after its division nearly 40 years ago into a breakaway Turkish Cypriot state in the north and the internationally recognized southern state run by Greek Cypriots has lagged far behind as an election issue.

Cypriots, still coming to grips with a cocktail of pay cuts, tax hikes and benefit cuts imposed last year in preparation for a bailout, have been little impressed by the election rhetoric.

"I hope that things will be better in terms of the economy and jobs, but I doubt it," said Georgios Poullos, a 41-year-old who is unemployed. "It's not in our hands. I think whoever gets in won't change it."

(Writing by Deepa Babington; editing by Philippa Fletcher)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cypriot-conservative-chief-leads-vote-faces-runoff-180528763--sector.html

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Review of 2012 and Trends to Watch in 2013 - Stephen's Lighthouse

Review of 2012 and Trends to Watch in 2013 [Caribbean Connector]

http://caribbean-connector.blogspot.ca/2013/01/review-of-2012-and-trends-watch-2013.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+CaribbeanConnector+(Caribbean+Connector)

?Paula Hane?s article in ITI?s newsletter NewsBreaks provides valuable information on important technology trends in 2012 and an insight into what to expect for 2013. Here is a brief overview:

Hot Topics in 2012

• Big Data was the buzzword of the year
• Data analytics
• Smartphone adoption skyrockets (45%? of U.S. adults now own a smartphone)
• Mobile apps
• Blending of offline-online worlds
• Gesture-based computing
• Increased geo-tagging of information
• Watching news on multiple devices simultaneously?TV and (mobile) internet
• Fewer Americans read print newspapers and magazines (some big titles such as? Newsweek move to online only)
• Voice interfaces
• MOOCs?Massive? Open Online Courses
• Increasing business engagement with social media
• Video, video, video? (?Video? is the fastest-growing digital content category; we forecast that more than 90%? of the online population will regularly watch online video by? 2017.?
• Ebook self-publishing market grows (and? is expected to surge in 2013)
• Growing popularity of e-singles (?stories? somewhere between 5,000 and 30,000 words, usually nonfiction, and sold as? inexpensive ebooks?)
• Tablets sales rise, sales growth of dedicated e-readers slows
• Apple maps?big blunder and embarrassment (with iOS 6 Apple dropped Google? Maps)
• Facebook?s botched IPO
• Publisher consolidation
• Web-scale discovery for library collections
• Evolving roles for librarians
• The rise of monograph? e-platforms (Books at JSTOR, University Publishing Online,? University Press Scholarship Online, University Press Content Consortium Book? Collections of Project MUSE )
• Privacy? and security concerns dominate policy discussions
• Government tries to regulate the internet (SOPA and PIPA, ACTA, WCIT)?expect? more battles in 2013
• Progress in Open? Access initiatives

Looking Ahead to 2013

• Apple? versus Google versus Facebook versus Amazon?battling on hardware? and search (?The Lines Between Software and Hardware Continue to Blur?)
• Battle of the mobile devices (Apple iOS, Google?s Android, Microsoft? Windows)
• Intelligent objects?The Internet of Things
• More predictive personalization
• Expansion of peer power
• Growth in open source innovation/problem solving (e.g., more installations? of Solr)
• Expansion of cloud computing and thus a greater need for security and data? center redundancy (outages? are much more a problem than data breaches)
• Work anywhere
• More Big Data (as one search technologies expert? said, ?There?s plenty of hype around big data, but underneath there are? compelling applications to be implemented which combine the best of enterprise? search and business insight technologies.?)
• Publishers will use metadata in more sophisticated ways
• Publishers will still grapple with testing? new business models?library pricing, subscription models, DRM-free? sales, etc.
• Companies will increasingly have to deal with Bring Your Own Device (BYOD)? issues
• Looking forward to Microsoft Surface Pro with full version of Windows 8
• Enterprises may choose to bypass Windows 8 (because of interface issues) and? wait for ?Windows 9?
• Anticipated launch of ?iPad 5? and ?iPhone 6?
• Anticipated next Android launch??Key Lime Pie?
• More sales of near-field-communication (NFC) enabled mobile devices?and? adoption of customizable NFC tags
• Biometric security becoming more prevalent
• T-Mobile targets? AT&T customers
• More publisher consolidation
• Consumers with content stored in the cloud may encounter problems when they? want to move to another provider

Read the full article here ?

Stephen

Source: http://stephenslighthouse.com/2013/02/17/review-of-2012-and-trends-to-watch-in-2013/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=review-of-2012-and-trends-to-watch-in-2013

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Israeli former FM Lieberman pleads not guilty as trial starts

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's former foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, pleaded not guilty on Sunday to charges of fraud and breach of trust at the start of a trial that has put the ultranationalist's political career into doubt.

The allegations led Lieberman, a key ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to resign from cabinet two months ago.

As head of the ultranationalist Yisrael Beitenu faction, he joined forces with Netanyahu's right-wing Likud in last month's general election. The joint list came first in the ballot but with fewer parliamentary seats than forecast.

Netanyahu is trying to put together a governing coalition and it is unclear whether he will hold open the foreign ministry post for Lieberman until a verdict is in.

The charges relate to the promotion of an Israeli diplomat, who admitted in a plea bargain he had illegally given Lieberman details of a police probe against the then-foreign minister.

Under Israeli law, conviction on the fraud and breach of trust charges could disqualify Lieberman from holding a cabinet post but he would be able to return to the government if he is cleared or if he receives a light, non-custodial sentence.

Lieberman remained silent throughout the hearing and did not speak to reporters as he left Jerusalem Magistrates' Court.

The court will reconvene on April 25 to begin hearing evidence.

Lieberman, who lives in a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, has stoked controversy by questioning the loyalties of Israel's 1.5 million Arab citizens.

His comments have drawn accusations of racism but have also brought him a large electoral following beyond his Russian-speaking base.

Born in Moldova, Lieberman immigrated to Israel in 1978. He became administrative head of the Likud in 1993 and ran the prime minister's office from 1996 to 1997 during Netanyahu's first term. He left to form Yisrael Beitenu in 1999.

Lieberman is the latest in a string of Israeli politicians to face corruption charges in recent years. Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert resigned in 2008 after being indicted, though he has since been acquitted of most of the charges against him.

(Editing by Jeffrey Heller and Jason Webb)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-former-fm-lieberman-pleads-not-guilty-trial-143356516.html

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Police track elusive figure in soccer match-fixing

By ANDREW DAMPF and JOHN LEICESTER

AP Sports Writers

Associated Press Sports

updated 10:24 a.m. ET Feb. 15, 2013

ROME (AP) - At 5:45 a.m. on Nov. 4, 2011, when early risers would have been sipping espressos and buttering toast, a man dressed in black disembarked at Milan's Malpensa Airport after a 13-hour trip from Asia aboard a Singapore Airlines flight.

Italian court documents show he stayed in the country just 6 hours and 30 minutes, never left the airport, and then boarded a return flight to Singapore.

Why such a quick hop across the globe?

Italian authorities believe it was to deliver bribe money. They allege the suspected courier, who was under surveillance, delivered information and cash on behalf of a crime syndicate that fixes soccer matches.

---

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story is part of a six-month, multiformat AP examination of how organized crime is corrupting soccer through match-fixing.

---

Italy, a four-time World Cup-winning football power, has become so blighted by match-fixing that Premier Mario Monti has even suggested halting the professional game for two to three years to clean it up.

Italian prosecutors investigating dozens of league and cup games they say were fixed have followed a trail back to a figure who is thought to be in Singapore. In documents laying out their findings, prosecutors alleged that 48-year-old Tan Seet Eng is the boss of a crime syndicate that allegedly made millions betting on rigged Italian games between 2008 and late 2011, through bribing players, referees and club officials.

Italian authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Tan and list him as their No. 1 suspect, but they have been unable to take him into custody.

"Tan Seet Eng, nicknamed Dan, surfaces in all the European investigations examined, including the Italian one, so therefore he constitutes a common thread that links each criminal gang together," prosecutors stated in a 340-page court document detailing their investigation, which has been leaked to Italian news media. "He directs the aforementioned criminal gang."

Italian authorities have about 150 people under investigation, including Tan, but have yet to indict any of them, prosecutor Roberto Di Martino told The Associated Press last month. Italian arrest warrants cannot be served on Tan while he is in Asia.

Di Martino, who is leading the investigation from Cremona in northern Italy, said Tan will "almost certainly" go on trial in Italy, but likely in absentia. Italy has no extradition treaty with Singapore, but the Italian Justice Ministry said the Asian city-state could still send over a wanted suspect under "friendly terms" if it chooses. Di Martino said relations with Singapore authorities "have not been great. We had hoped for more."

"At first we actually thought they could be brought to Italy, but that calculation was wrong," Di Martino said. "If Tan Seet Eng goes somewhere else, he could be extradited, as long as there's an extradition treaty with that country."

In Singapore, police spokeswoman Chu Guat Chiew said authorities there are reviewing the information submitted by the Italians before deciding what to do, adding: "So far, Dan Tan Seet Eng has not been charged with any offence in Singapore."

Police have questioned dozens of people in Italy, searched the homes of players and coaches, and descended on the Italian national squad's training camp early one morning in May 2012. But Di Martino said the investigation has turned up only limited information about Tan.

"We don't know much about him. We don't know if he's a legitimate businessman involved in illegal activity, or if he's involved in money laundering," Di Martino said. "We're only interested up until a certain point; then it's Singapore's problem."

Much of what European law enforcement authorities have learned about Tan comes from a former associate, Wilson Raj Perumal. A match fixer, also from Singapore, he was arrested in Finland in February 2011, convicted and sentenced to two years in prison for bribing Finnish league players. To Finnish police, Perumal portrayed the syndicate as a well-oiled and structured business, financed and led from Singapore.

The syndicate mainly places bets in China, Perumal said, according to a transcript of his May 18, 2011, police interview obtained by the AP. He said the group fixed "tens of matches around the world" - in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and the Americas - from 2008 to 2010. He estimated the group's total profits after expenses at "several millions of euros, maybe 5-6 million" - $7 million-$8 million.

The syndicate leader decides which matches to fix and how much to wager, organizes the betting and the drops of bribe money, Perumal said in the transcript. He later identified that leader as Tan, according to the Italian court documents. Italian police traveled to Finland to interview Perumal, Di Martino told the AP. Perumal declined AP requests for an interview.

Perumal told the Finnish police that money was transported from Singapore in couriers' pockets or on their bodies. Italian prosecutors suspect the quick trip to Milan's airport was one such drop. The suspected courier's checked luggage weighed 9 kilograms in Singapore but 8 kilograms when he flew back. They said the suspected courier likely delivered "a sum of money hidden in some sort of container, which was destined to finance the organization's illicit activity."

AP could not contact Tan in Singapore. Five phone numbers identified as his by Italian prosecutors were disconnected. No one answered the door at an apartment the Italians listed as his address. Mail and flyers stuffed under the door and in the door frame suggested no one had been there for a while.

The New Paper in Singapore reported that it spoke to Tan in 2011.

"Why I'm suddenly described as a match-fixer I don't know. I'm innocent," it quoted him as saying. It quoted Tan as saying he was briefly involved in a business venture that Perumal started, "but I took my name out of the company after I smelled something fishy."

"Maybe that's why he had named me to investigators," he continued. "Anybody involved with Wilson gets bad luck. He has a criminal record. It's not good for Singaporeans to do business with him."

Perumal alleged to Italian investigators that Tan places syndicate wagers on fixed games using legal, Asia-based online betting sites - he named three of them - via intermediaries in China. In Shenzhen, a southern China city adjacent to Hong Kong, a 1 million euro wager on a game in Serie A, the top Italian league, can be placed this way in a couple of minutes, he told the Italians. That method matches those described by betting experts.

Investigators say such gambling operations hire workers to rapidly place thousands of small online bets - maybe no more than $1,000 each - on fixed games. The scattershot of small bets, rather than several large ones, can help hide fixes from monitoring companies in Europe that use computer software to look for unusual wagering.

"They employ kids and they employ people in Singapore and Malaysia to do that for them," said Chris Eaton, former head of security for FIFA, soccer's governing body. "They virtually have a sweatshop, if you like, of people with a large number of credit cards and laptop computers, and they punch those things when they are given the green light."

"Dan Tan comes with very good Oriental connections, meaning he's not running as a single financier. He has an organization behind him," said Eaton, now director of sport integrity at the International Centre for Sport Security, a Qatar-backed group funding efforts to research the extent of match-fixing and ways to combat it.

Eaton's successor as FIFA security director, Ralf Mutschke, said last year that the news media have overstated Tan's alleged role in match-fixing, and that he probably isn't "as involved as everyone is thinking" and has only "symbolic importance."

"But you give him a name, so everyone is talking about Dan Tan, and Dan Tan syndicates, and Dan Tan here and Dan Tan there," Mutschke said. "If we kill Dan Tan then you will have no match-fixing? No, I think it's not as easy as this."

---

Leicester reported from Paris. Justin Bergman in Singapore and AP Sports Writer Graham Dunbar in Zurich contributed to this report.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Arsenal stunned out of FA Cup

PST: With their stars on the bench, Arsenal suffered a 1-0 home loss to Blackburn Saturday that knocked them out of the FA Cup.

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/50820716/ns/sports-soccer/

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Should I Stay Or Go? 'The Normal Bar' Reveals Truth Behind Splits

When love does not endure, the inevitable question arises: Is it time to break up? In the United States the divorce rate tells us that about 50% of all married couples at some point do untie the knot. But as anyone who?s ever done it knows, breaking up really is hard to do, which is why so many people lie, cheat, and suffer to avoid it. The Normal Bar confirms this, showing that a quarter of partners are anywhere from unhappy to extremely unhappy in their relationships, yet they continue year after year, telling themselves, ?This is as good as I?m going to get,? or ?This is just the way it is.? These people may be unhappier than they need to be, since even a devitalized or disappointing relationship can be made better?a lot better.

Happiness is not just a matter of luck. It requires desire and careful tending. The Normal Bar shows that happy couples nurture each other, communicate well, and maintain emotional and sexual intimacy. Sure, there are times when relationships are hard work, but that ?work? pays off! Even the smallest of acts and words that foster and maintain intimacy can turn a relationship around. But both partners need to want to create or restore happiness and be willing to redirect their time and energy toward pleasing and understanding each other. When one or both partners refuse to participate in this revitalization process, breaking up may seem like the only way to create a new and better normal.

Who contemplates breaking up more, men or women?
It?s normal to think about breaking up. There?s no differentiation between the sexes here: Men and women are equally matched when it comes to considering other options. More than a third (37%) say they think about breaking up all the time or often, and another 33% say they sometimes think about it. Only 12% say they never think about it and 20% say they rarely do.

Not surprisingly, the number is much higher among unhappy couples, where 87% of partners contemplate leaving their relationships. But even 34% of extremely happy partners think about breaking up from time to time. Normal relationships ebb and flow!

Have the media affected your feelings about your relationship to the point where you thought more seriously about leaving?
Given the plentiful research on the impact of media on human relationships, we decided to ask if this influence went so far as to prompt serious thoughts about breaking up. More than a third?37% of females and 36% of males?said it had! This is alarming. When people base major real-life decisions on the illusions of love presented by larger-than-life screen romances, terrible mistakes can be made. No one?s relationship can measure up to the mega-moments of love, sex, and excitement that Hollywood generates?especially not all the time.

If you have contemplated leaving your partner, what scares you most?
The number-one thing that scares men and women about leaving their partners is the possibility that they?d regret it. When asked what most held them back, 37% of women and 27% of men said they?re afraid of living with a lifetime of regret. These people understand that no one can predict the future, and in most cases, a decision to leave cannot be undone.

The second most common breakup fear is of hurting the other partner. This was the reason 18% of men and 12% of women gave for being afraid to leave.

The third scariest thing about leaving is the prospect of being alone. This was the specter named by 11% of men and 14% of women.

Surprisingly, kids and money did not rank in the top three choices of separation anxieties. Money may be less of an issue since so many women now earn enough to support themselves, but the lack of concern about children is surprising given the stereotype?often backed up by historical practice?of couples ?staying together for the sake of the children.?

Perhaps the norm is shifting as people conclude that their own happiness is more in their children?s best interests than staying in a troubled and unsatisfying marriage.

When do you know it?s time to break up?
Thinking of leaving is one thing, but telling your partner it?s over is another. If the relationship is emotionally or physically violent, leaving may be decided by one screaming fight or slamming door too many. If it?s a relationship that is limping along, however, and only one person is truly miserable enough to want out, the last straw can be difficult to identify, much less explain. This is why people may know that the love is gone for years without even broaching the subject of leaving.

While breakups can appear sudden and inexplicable to outsiders, the Normal Bar data show that most people in terminal relationships torture themselves about leaving, and stay together a lot longer than they should. Even when one is sure that leaving is the right thing to do, it still takes fortitude, and sometimes courage, to do the deed. For the person who is being left, reactions may vary from relief to immeasurable pain. For all involved, the consequences are grave enough that the person leaving needs to be sure the relationship truly is over. One key signal is the realization that leaving is easier than staying. Here are some others:

?I left my husband after he tried to throw me out of a moving car when we were in a big fight.? ?female, 41, married 11 years, with kids

?When she told me that she thought there was somebody better out there for her. As soon as I heard that, I was done.? ?male, 44, married 15 years, with kids

?I left him because I noticed that he doesn?t love me anymore.?
?female, 34, in a 6?year committed relationship

?She had an online relationship with somebody she never met for over a year, and I couldn?t bring myself to trust her again.? ?male, 38, married 6 years

?I knew I was done when my husband drove with our kids in the car while he was drunk.? ?female, 43, married 16 years

Check out the slideshow below for signs that you need to break up, according to the Twitterverse.

Also on HuffPost:

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/16/should-i-stay-or-go-the-n_n_2696934.html

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'Take away the guns,' women tell UN envoy | Morocco World News

By Jocelyne Sambria

February 15, 2013

Imagine being charged $100 for a medical certificate issued by a doctor proving that you have been raped before you can go after the culprit ? and then during his trial having to feed the man who raped you.

Recounting such stories, Zainab Bangura, the UN Secretary-General?s special representative on sexual violence, allows a glimpse of the passion and energy she is known for. Up until 2002, women and girls in her country, Sierra Leone, were subjected to widespread and systematic sexual violence, including rape and sexual slavery. As a women?s rights campaigner and activist, she documented, reported and monitored such crimes and other human rights violations. When the Special Court for Sierra Leone set up jointly by the Government and the United Nations opened, to try those responsible for crimes during the civil war, she testified as an expert witness.

Ms. Bangura?s resume is impressive: She has worked as an international civil servant, was responsible for the peacebuilding commission in her country and served as foreign minister and health minister.

?I come into this job? at the UN, she told?Africa Renewal, ?with both perspectives ? being an activist on one side, knowing what the real experience is on the ground, and at the same time I have been a government minister and the voice of the government in the international arena.?

Gathering evidence

Ms. Bangura is the second person to hold the post. Her Swedish predecessor, Margot Wallstr?m, ended her two-year term in May 2012. During Ms. Wallstr?m?s stint, the office was able to push for a so-called ?naming and shaming? list through a UN resolution that authorizes the publication of detailed information on perpetrators. The resolution also gives the Security Council the option to enforce sanctions on groups or nations in order to stop ongoing sexual crimes.

Ms. Wallstr?m also pushed for legal reforms, convincing military courts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to try cases of sexual violence. She got 250 prosecutions. ?I am extremely lucky my predecessor laid down a very good foundation for me,? says Ms. Bangura, ?and I have extremely capable staff.?

Engaging governments

The UN envoy already has her hands full with the escalating crises in the Central African Republic, DRC, Syria and Mali, where there are reports of increases in sexual violence against women and girls. With a small staff and limited resources, she is actively enlisting the help of UN agencies.

But for Ms. Bangura, sexual violence in conflict is not just a UN issue. The UK recently pledged $1.6 million to support the activities of her office. More broadly, she says, ?member states have the primary responsibility to protect the people.? So she works with governments and regional organizations on a regular basis to address the problem. ?You need to work with the government to be able to have a very strong and constructive dialogue on the issue and to be able to make sure they provide the political leadership at the national level.? She adds: ?It?s only government that will be able to take action to put an end? to sexual crimes.

Biggest perpetrators are in uniform

Ms. Bangura is also trying to establish dialogues with national armed forces and armed groups. Her first fact-finding mission was to the Central African Republic (CAR), a country that has experienced years of political violence and instability and where scores of women and girls are under the control of armed groups. She described the CAR as ?one of the worst countries? she has experienced, with very few resources and international actors focusing on the issue. ?If we can make a difference in the CAR,? she explains, ?I think it will be much easier in the other countries.?

Ms. Bangura?s visit was timely. The recent peace agreements drafted by the main parties to the conflict had a glaring omission: There was no mention of human rights or sexual violence. So she negotiated with the two sides. As a result, ?We had an agreement both from the government?s side and the armed groups that they will mainstream the issue of sexual violence. We?ve asked for very specific actions that we expect from them.? She also insisted that sexual crimes be investigated and that commanders send a message to their troops that sexual violence must stop.

The police force is also often guilty of such crimes, Ms. Bangura notes. ?We have a lot of evidence where prisoners are sexually violated when they?re arrested and detained, and when they?re being forced to give evidence, or confess. The biggest perpetrators are people in uniform.?

In countries where military and police personnel are seconded to work with the UN, Ms. Bangura believes they should be trained to ?detect when and where sexual violence is taking place to prevent it. But also so they do not commit sexual violence when they are in a peacekeeping mission.?

Breaking the culture of silence

Prevailing cultural norms are often an obstacle to addressing issues of sexual violence. Most women in war zones find it difficult to say they have been sexually abused. In these often ?traditional societies,? silence prevails, says the UN representative. Women are frequently stigmatized, even threatened. In Libya a law obliges a rapist to marry his victim in order to ?save her honour.? Often, Ms. Bangura believes, ?culture just wants to forget about it and not deal with it.?

Working amid continued insecurity is also challenging. She says that she cannot stress enough that ?insecurity breeds sexual violence.? When a state apparatus collapses, she says, armed elements become the law and use rape as a war tactic.

Ms. Bangura is adamant: One cannot deal with sexual violence without peace or security. So women in war zones often give her a similar message to share with world leaders: ?Tell them to take the guns from the armed groups. We don?t feel safe. We are not secure.?

Source: Africa Renewal

Source: http://www.moroccoworldnews.com/2013/02/78542/take-away-the-guns-women-tell-un-envoy/

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Passengers slog home after 'horrible' Gulf cruise

MOBILE, Ala. (AP) ? Passengers who finally escaped the disabled Carnival cruise ship Triumph were on the move early Friday, some checked into the comfort of hotels, others on buses or headed to charter flights home after five numbing days at sea on a ship paralyzed by an engine-room fire.

The vacation ship carrying some 4,200 people docked late Thursday in Mobile after a painfully slow approach that took most of the day. Passengers raucously cheered after days of what they described as overflowing toilets, food shortages and foul odors.

"Sweet Home Alabama!" read one of the homemade signs passengers affixed alongside the 14-story ship as many celebrated at deck rails lining several levels of the stricken ship. The ship's horn loudly blasted several times as four tugboats pulled the crippled ship to shore at about 9:15 p.m. CST. Some gave a thumbs-up sign and flashes from cameras and cellphones lit the night.

"It was horrible, just horrible" said Maria Hernandez, 28, of Angleton, Texas, tears welling in her eyes as she talked about waking up to smoke in her lower-level room Sunday from the engine-room fire and the days of heat and stench that followed. She was on a "girls trip" with friends.

It took about four hours for all passengers to disembark.

Carnival spokesman Vance Gulliksen said passengers had three options: take a bus straight to Galveston, Texas, to retrieve cars parked at the ship's departure port, take a bus to New Orleans to stay at a hotel before a charter flight home or have family or friends pick them up in Mobile.

Gulliksen said up to 20 charter flights would leave New Orleans later Friday to take guests who stayed in hotels there to their final destinations.

Nearly 2,000 passengers arrived at a New Orleans Hilton in the wee hour of the morning, and by dawn many were headed out again to fly by chartered plane to Houston. They would then have to get a connecting flight home or take a chartered bus back to their cars in Galveston.

"It just feels so good to be on land again and to feel like I have options," said Tracey Farmer of Tulsa, Okla. "I'm just ready to see my family. It's been harder on them than us I think because they've been so worried about us. It's been extremely stressful for them."

For some, once they get to Galveston to their cars, they still face long drives getting home.

"It's going to be a very long day," said Dwayne McAbee, who says he'll drive from Galveston to his home in Fort Worth, Texas, a roughly six to seven hour drive.

It wasn't long after the ship pulled into the Port of Mobile that passengers began streaming down the gang plank, some in wheelchairs and others pulling carry-on luggage. An ambulance pulled up to a gate and pulled away, lights flashing.

For 24-year-old Brittany Ferguson of Texas, not knowing how long passengers had to endure their time aboard was the worst part.

"I'm feeling awesome just to see land and buildings," said Ferguson, who was in a white robe given to her aboard to weather the cold nights. "The scariest part was just not knowing when we'd get back."

As the ship pulled up, some aboard shouted, "Hello, Mobile!" Some danced in celebration on one of the balconies. "Happy V-Day" read one of the homemade signs made for the Valentine's Day arrival and another, more starkly: "The ship's afloat, so is the sewage."

A few dozen relatives on the top floor of the parking deck of the terminal were waving lights at the ship as it carefully made its way alongside.

Taxis were lined up waiting for people, and motorists on Interstate 10 stopped to watch the exodus of passengers from the cruise ship.

Some still aboard chanted, "Let me off, let me off!"

It took six grueling hours navigating the 30-odd-mile ship channel to dock, guided by at least four towboats. Nearly 900 feet in length, it was the largest cruise ship ever to dock at Mobile.

In texts and flitting cellphone calls, the ship's passengers described miserable conditions while at sea.

Galveston is the home port of the ill-fated ship, which lost power in an engine-room fire Sunday some 150 miles off Mexico's Yucatan peninsula. It was the end of a cruise that wasn't anything like what a brochure might describe.

Carnival CEO Gerry Cahill apologized at a news conference and later on the public address system as people were disembarking.

"I appreciate the patience of our guests and their ability to cope with the situation. And I'd like to reiterate the apology I made earlier. I know the conditions on board were very poor," he said. "We pride ourselves on providing our guests with a great vacation experience, and clearly we failed in this particular case."

Passenger Ferguson said crew members tried to make the situation bearable.

"They did their best to keep our spirits up," she said.

Joseph and Cecilia Alvarez of San Antonio said some passengers passed the time by forming a Bible study group.

"It was awesome," he said. "It lifted up our souls and gave us hope that we would get back."

The company disputed the accounts of passengers who described the ship as filthy, saying employees were doing everything to ensure people were comfortable.

In a text message, Kalin Hill, of Houston, described deplorable conditions over the past few days.

"The lower floors had it the worst, the floors 'squish' when you walk and lots of the lower rooms have flooding from above floors," Hill wrote. "Half the bachelorette party was on two; the smell down there literally chokes you and hurts your eyes."

She said "there's poop and urine all along the floor. The floor is flooded with sewer water ... and we had to poop in bags."

While the passengers are headed home, the Triumph will head to a Mobile shipyard for assessment. Carnival has canceled a dozen more planned voyages aboard the Triumph and acknowledged the crippled ship had been plagued by other mechanical problems in the weeks before the engine-room blaze. The National Transportation Safety Board has opened an investigation.

Passengers were supposed to get a full refund and discounts on future cruises, and Carnival announced Wednesday they would each get an additional $500 in compensation.

"This is my first and last cruise. So if anyone wants my free cruise, look me up," said Kendall Jenkins, 24, of Houston. Bounding off the ship clad in bathrobes, she and her friend Brittany Ferguson immediately kissed the pavement at the Port of Mobile in Alabama.

___

Associated Press writers Ramit Plushnick-Masti in Houston, Stacey Plaisance in New Orleans, Bob Johnson in Montgomery, Ala., and Melissa Nelson-Gabriel in Mobile, Ala., contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/passengers-slog-home-horrible-gulf-cruise-143426179.html

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David Ayer Has Fury

End of Watch writer/director David Ayer has made quite the sale for his spec script Fury.? Deadline reports that QED International has paid $1 million for Ayer?s script, with the filmmaker attached to direct the World War II actioner.? The story ?takes place in 1945 as the Nazi regime collapses and the five man crew of an American tank called Fury battles a desperate German army.? Ayer is hoping to begin production later this fall, and his goal with the film is ?to bring tank combat to life in a way that lands with a modern audience.? ?I?m not entirely sure what, specifically, modern audiences crave out of a tank warfare movie, but I believe the answer is massive explosions and dubstep.

Ayer is best known for his gritty cop dramas like Harsh Times and Training Day, but he picked up considerable critical acclaim for last year?s End of Watch and most recently wrapped a thriller take on the Agatha Christie story Ten Little Indians called Ten, which stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sam Worthington, and Terrence Howard.? QED also teamed up with Ayer on Ten, which opens next January, so they must be liking what they?re seeing from that film thus far.

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1926852/news/1926852/

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Mark Zuckerberg Chris Christie Fundraiser Draws Protest In Palo Alto (PHOTOS)

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Dozens of demonstrators gathered outside the home of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg Wednesday night to protest the Internet prodigy's first political event -- a fundraiser for New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

Demonstrators claimed the Republican governor is anti-women and included nurses, women's rights advocates, progressive network CREDO Action and the infamous Raging Grannies, objecting to Zuckerberg's affiliation with the politician who led $7.5 million in budget cuts for Planned Parenthood and women's health care in New Jersey.

"Hey, Facebook, shame on you!" shouted protesters. "Christie hurts women and now you do, too." Others carried signs featuring Facebook's signature "like" button in the thumbs-down position.

The funds in question were part of a Christie's sweeping 2010 cuts to close a multibillion-dollar gap in the state budget. Democrats vehemently opposed the plan, arguing that it fell largely on the poor. Christie argued that the plan promoted "a smaller government that lives within its means" and that tax increases would likely "kill a job market already on life support."

Wednesday's protesters were unsympathetic.

"Chris Christie has built his political reputation by attacking Planned Parenthood, which provides all kinds of health services to women and men," Greg Miller, a retired nurse with the California Nurses Association, told The Huffington Post. "And we think that Mark Zuckerberg is contaminating himself by supporting that."

"Mark and [wife] Priscilla [Chan] are smart people, but we're wondering if they thought this through," said CREDO political director Becky Bond. "Clearly he's starting to think about how to spend his billions to help political causes. But by funding Chris Christie, he's funding the war on women."

Bond said she worried that Zuckerberg and his supporters may not know details of Christie's political history.

"People have seen Christie on the news supporting Hurricane Sandy victims and I think they don't know that this is also the guy who defunded Planned Parenthood and shut down six women's clinics," Bond said. "We want them to see what their dollars are supporting."

Confused valets and Facebook employees shepherded guests through the front entrance of Zuckerberg's estate, while Christie slipped past protesters through a back entrance.

Condoleezza Rice wasn't so lucky. Dressed in a smart pantsuit, the former secretary of state walked through a line of protesters shouting, "Shame on Condi" and "torturer." (See video below.)

Guests, mostly young and well dressed, arrived in town cars, SUVs and limousines. Zuckerberg asked each to donate $3,800 to Christie.

Zuckerberg did not comment on the demonstration, but his communication team offered a prepared statement:

Mark and Priscilla have worked closely with Governor Christie on education reform in the Newark school system. They admire his leadership on education reform and other issues and look forward to continuing their important work together on behalf of Newark's school children.

Zuckerberg donated $100 million to the Newark, N.J., school system in 2010.

Christie, running for reelection as governor this year and frequently mentioned as a possible Republican presidential contender in 2016, has been a polarizing figure in California. He aggravated Californians further by calling Gov. Jerry Brown (D) an "old retread" at last summer's Republican National Convention.

See photos of the protest at Mark Zuckerberg's Chris Christie fundraiser and video of Condoleezza Rice arriving in the slideshow below:

Video shot by Becky Bond on a CREDO Mobile phone.

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/14/mark-zuckerberg-chris-christie_n_2683074.html

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G20 wrangles on forex, deficits at Moscow talks

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Group of 20 major economies struggled on Friday to find common ground on currencies and borrowing, exposing rifts between advocates of a dash for growth and supporters of more austerity to revive the world economy.

A meeting in Moscow of finance officials from the G20 nations, which account for 90 percent of the world's gross domestic product and two-thirds of its population, looked likely to be dominated by sparring over Japan's expansive policies that have driven down the value of the yen.

A row was also brewing between Europe and the United States over extending a promise to reduce budget deficits beyond 2016. A pact struck in Toronto in 2010 will expire this year if leaders fail to agree at a G20 summit in St Petersburg in September.

The G20 forum, which put together a huge financial backstop to halt a market meltdown in 2009, is back in the spotlight after a week in which the Group of Seven rich nations tried, and spectacularly failed, to speak with one voice on currencies.

The G7 has long been the powerhouse of financial diplomacy. But tension between Washington and Tokyo has risen over new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's drive to end two decades of deflation.

The G7 issued a joint statement on Tuesday reaffirming "our longstanding commitment to market determined exchange rates". Yet the show of unity was quickly undermined by off-the-record briefings critical of Japan.

An apparently frustrated European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said in Moscow that loose talk on currencies was "inappropriate, fruitless and self-defeating".

Policies of central banks in most of the leading developed economies to pump money into their banking systems have raised the prospect of "competitive devaluations" as each country tries to boost its exports by engineering a weaker currency.

Draghi declined - in line with policy - to say whether the euro's exchange rate was appropriate but noted it was in line with long-term averages in nominal and real terms.

He was joined by two German ECB policymakers in pushing back against political pressure to target the euro's exchange rate.

French President Francois Hollande last week raised the possibility of political interference in exchange rate policy when he called for a medium-term target for the euro's value, a move to counter its recent appreciation.

"I fear a politicization of the exchange rate," ECB policymaker Jens Weidmann, who also heads the German central bank, told Bloomberg in an interview.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, in a radio interview before flying to Moscow, said he expected the G20 to back the G7's position on currencies.

Host Russia's finance "sherpa", Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak, said the drafting discussion was proving difficult, but the final text would not single out Japan for criticism.

"There is no competitive devaluation, there are no currency wars," Storchak told reporters. "What's happening is market reaction to exclusively internal decision making."

When the G20 last met in November, its statement contained a call to "refrain from competitive devaluation of currencies" that was omitted by the G7 this week in what Tokyo took to mean its policies had won a free pass.

Indonesia, one of the rising Asia-Pacific economies, said it was less concerned about the exchange rate of the yen than about Japanese growth. "If the Japanese increase their domestic demand it will help Indonesia, especially from the export side," said Hartadi Sarwono, deputy central bank governor.

U.S. VS EUROPE

The United States, G20 delegation sources said, was blocking attempts to agree on a fresh commitment to cut borrowing, a position that reflects Washington's focus on running expansive policies until unemployment comes down.

The euro zone's largest economy, Germany, and the European Central Bank, want a new borrowing pledge - in line with their own tough medicine for the currency bloc's ailing periphery.

A European Union position paper set out the dispute in stark terms. It said the United States "was not ready to commit to a ... numerical target".

"The EU considers it essential to agree credible and ambitious targets," said the document, obtained by Reuters.

The maneuvering on currencies is reminiscent of the 1980s, when the Plaza and Louvre accords sought to manage first the excessive strengthening, and then weakening, of the U.S. dollar.

But, with the collapse of communism in eastern Europe and China's adoption of its own brand of capitalism, the world has changed. Emerging markets, as exporters and reserve holders, now demand a greater say in global financial management.

One senior G20 source said late on Thursday that there would be no separate statement on currencies. A passage would be inserted into the main communique, but it would not repeat the G7 line that "we will not target exchange rates".

This, the source said, would not be acceptable to China - which is now the world's second-largest economy and holds much of its $3.3 trillion in foreign reserves in U.S. Treasury bonds.

DEFLATION, REFLATION

Japan's embrace of 'Abenomics' entails a huge round of fiscal and monetary expansion aimed at raising the inflation rate to 2 percent.

The yen has fallen by around 20 percent since November, triggering a rally in Japanese stocks that, the government hopes, will kick-start growth by encouraging savers to spend and companies to invest.

With the United States, Britain and euro zone all running ultra-loose monetary policies, some emerging market exporters have sounded the alarm over 'currency wars' that they say will devalue their foreign reserves and hit their competitiveness.

Russian officials note that Japan has not intervened on currency markets to weaken the yen, suggesting that Tokyo would not be singled out as a miscreant.

Before flying to Moscow, Bank of Japan Governor Masaaki Shirakawa defended the monetary expansion, saying it was aimed at reviving the economy - which shrank in the fourth quarter - and not at weakening the yen.

"The BOJ is conducting monetary policy to achieve stability in Japan's economy. It will continue to do so," he said.

(Additional reporting by Lesley Wroughton, Lidia Kelly, Maya Dyakina and Katya Golubkova in Moscow, Leika Kihara and Kaori Kaneko in Tokyo, and Krista Hughes and Michael O'Boyle in Mexico City, Writing by Douglas Busvine, Editing by Timothy Heritage)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/currency-wars-come-moscow-g20-meets-000553776--finance.html

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What killed the dinosaurs? New evidence strengthens asteroid hypothesis.

Evidence for the idea that non-avian dinosaurs were driven to extinction by an asteroid or comet impact is stronger than ever, thanks to a new radiometric analysis.

By Charles Choi,?LiveScience Contributor / February 7, 2013

Artist?s impression of a 6-mile-wide asteroid striking the Earth. Scientists now have fresh evidence that such a cosmic impact ended the age of dinosaurs near what is now the town of Chixculub in Mexico.

Don Davis

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The idea that a cosmic impact ended the age of dinosaurs in what is now Mexico now has fresh new support, researchers say.

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The most recent and most familiar mass extinction is the one that finished the reign of the dinosaurs ? the end-Cretaceous or Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event, often known as K-T. The only survivors among the dinosaurs are the birds.

Currently, the main suspect behind this catastrophe is?a cosmic impact from an asteroid or comet, an idea first proposed by physicist Luis Alvarez and his son geologist Walter Alvarez. Scientists later found that signs of this collision seemed evident near the town of Chicxulub (CHEEK-sheh-loob) in Mexico in the form of a gargantuan crater more than 110 miles (180 kilometers) wide. The explosion, likely caused by an object about 6 miles (10 km) across, would have released as much energy as 100 trillion tons of TNT, more than a billion times more than the atom bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

However, further work suggested?the Chicxulub impact?occurred either 300,000 years before or 180,000 years after the end-Cretaceous mass extinction. As such, researchers have explored other possibilities, including other impact sites, such as the?controversial Shiva crater in India, or even massive volcanic eruptions, such as those creating the Deccan Flats in India.

Timing of an impact

New findings using high-precision radiometric dating analysis of debris kicked up by the impact now suggest the K-T event and the Chicxulub collision happened no more than 33,000 years apart. In radiometric dating, scientists estimate the ages of samples based on the relative proportions of specific radioactive materials within them. [Wipe Out: History's Most Mysterious Mass Extinctions]

"We've shown the impact and the mass extinction coincided as much as one can possibly demonstrate with existing dating techniques," researcher Paul Renne, a geochronologist and director of the Berkeley Geochronology Center in California, told LiveScience.

"It's gratifying to see these results, for those of us who've been arguing a long time that there was an impact at the time of this mass extinction," geologist Walter Alvarez at the University of California at Berkeley, who did not participate in this study, told LiveScience. "This research is just a tour de force, a demonstration of really skillful geochronology to resolve time that well."

The fact the impact and mass extinction may have been virtually simultaneous in time supports the idea that the cosmic impact dealt the age of dinosaurs its deathblow.

"The impact was clearly the final straw that?pushed Earth past the tipping point," Renne said. "We have shown that these events are synchronous to within a gnat's eyebrow, and therefore, the impact clearly played a major role in extinctions, but it probably wasn't just the impact."

The new extinction date is precise to within 11,000 years.

"When I got started in the field, the error bars on these events were plus or minus a million years," added paleontologist William Clemens at the University of California at Berkeley, who did not participate in this research. "It's an exciting time right now, a lot of which we can attribute to the work that Paul and his colleagues are doing in refining the precision of the time scale with which we work."

Final blow

Although the cosmic impact and mass extinction coincided in time, Renne cautioned this does not mean the impact was the only cause of the die-offs. For instance,?dramatic climate swings?in the preceding million years, including long cold snaps in the general hothouse environment of the Cretaceous, probably brought many creatures to the brink of extinction. The volcanic eruptions behind?the Deccan Traps?might be one cause of these climate variations.

"These precursory phenomena made the global ecosystem much more sensitive to even relatively small triggers, so that what otherwise might have been a fairly minor effect shifted the ecosystem into a new state," Renne said.

The cosmic impact then proved the deathblow.

"What we really need to do is to understand better what was going on before the impact ? what was the level of ecological stress that existed that allowed the impact to be the straw that broke the camel's back?" Renne said. "We also need better dates for the massive volcanism at the Deccan Flats to better understand when it first started and how fast it occurred."

The scientists detailed their findings in the Feb. 8 issue of the journal Science.

Follow LiveScience on Twitter?@livescience. We're also on?Facebook?&?Google+.

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Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/x41xdWbyXwU/What-killed-the-dinosaurs-New-evidence-strengthens-asteroid-hypothesis

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