Egypt army given temporary power to arrest civilians

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egypt’s Islamist president has given the army temporary power to arrest civilians during a constitutional referendum he is determined to push through despite the risk of bloodshed between his supporters and opponents accusing him of a power grab.

Seven people were killed and hundreds wounded last week in clashes between the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and their critics besieging Mohamed Mursi’s graffiti-daubed presidential palace. Both sides plan mass rallies on Tuesday.

The elite Republican Guard has yet to use force to keep protesters away from the palace, which it ringed with tanks, barbed wire and concrete barricades after last week’s violence.

Mursi, bruised by calls for his downfall, has rescinded a November 22 decree giving him wide powers but is going ahead with a referendum on Saturday on a constitution seen by his supporters as a triumph for democracy and by many liberals as a betrayal.

A decree issued by Mursi late on Sunday gives the armed forces the power to arrest civilians and refer them to prosecutors until the announcement of the results of the referendum, which the protesters want cancelled.

Despite its limited nature, the edict will revive memories of Hosni Mubarak’s emergency law, also introduced as a temporary expedient, under which military or state security courts tried thousands of political dissidents and Islamist militants.

But a military source stressed that the measure introduced by a civilian government would have a short shelf-life.

“The latest law giving the armed forces the right to arrest anyone involved in illegal actions such as burning buildings or damaging public sites is to ensure security during the referendum only,” the military source said.

Presidential spokesman Yasser Ali said the committee overseeing the vote had requested the army’s assistance.

“The armed forces will work within a legal framework to secure the referendum and will return (to barracks) as soon as the referendum is over,” Ali said.

Protests and violence have racked Egypt since Mursi decreed himself extraordinary powers he said were needed to speed up a troubled transition since Mubarak’s fall 22 months ago.

The Muslim Brotherhood has voiced anger at the Interior Ministry’s failure to prevent protesters setting fire to its headquarters in Cairo and 28 of its offices elsewhere.

Critics say the draft law puts Egypt in a religious straitjacket. Whatever the outcome of the referendum, the crisis has polarized the country and presages more instability at a time when Mursi is trying to steady a fragile economy.

On Monday, he suspended planned tax increases only hours after the measures had been formally decreed, casting doubts on the government’s ability to push through tough economic reforms that form part of a proposed $ 4.8 billion IMF loan agreement.

“VIOLENT CONFRONTATION”

Rejecting the referendum plan, opposition groups have called for mass protests on Tuesday, saying Mursi’s eagerness to push the constitution through could lead to “violent confrontation”.

Islamists have urged their followers to turn out “in millions” the same day in a show of support for the president and for a referendum they feel sure of winning with their loyal base and perhaps with the votes of Egyptians weary of turmoil.

The opposition National Salvation Front, led by liberals such as Mohamed ElBaradei and Amr Moussa, as well as leftist firebrand Hamdeen Sabahy, has yet to call directly for a boycott of the referendum or to urge their supporters to vote “no”.

Instead it is contesting the legitimacy of the vote and of the whole process by which the constitution was drafted in an Islamist-led assembly from which their representatives withdrew.

The opposition says the document fails to embrace the diversity of 83 million Egyptians, a tenth of whom are Christians, and invites Muslim clerics to influence lawmaking.

But debate over the details has largely given way to noisy street protests and megaphone politics, keeping Egypt off balance and ill-equipped to deal with a looming economic crisis.

“Inevitability of referendum deepens divisions,” was the headline in Al-Gomhuriya newspaper on Monday. Al Ahram daily wrote: “Political forces split over referendum and new decree.”

Mursi issued another decree on Saturday to supersede his November 22 measure putting his own decisions beyond legal challenge until a new constitution and parliament are in place.

While he gave up extra powers as a sop to his opponents, the decisions already taken under them, such as the dismissal of a prosecutor-general appointed by Mubarak, remain intact.

“UNWELCOME” CHOICE

Lamia Kamel, a spokeswoman for former Arab League chief Moussa, said the opposition factions were still discussing whether to boycott the referendum or call for a “no” vote.

“Both paths are unwelcome because they really don’t want the referendum at all,” she said, but predicted a clearer opposition line if the plebiscite went ahead as planned.

A spokeswoman for ElBaradei, former head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, said: “We do not acknowledge the referendum. The aim is to change the decision and postpone it.”

Mahmoud Ghozlan, the Muslim Brotherhood’s spokesman, said the opposition could stage protests, but should keep the peace.

“They are free to boycott, participate or say no, they can do what they want. The important thing is that it remains in a peaceful context to preserve the country’s safety and security.”

The army stepped into the conflict on Saturday, telling all sides to resolve their disputes via dialogue and warning that it would not allow Egypt to enter a “dark tunnel”.

A military source said the declaration read on state media did not herald a move by the army to retake control of Egypt, which it relinquished in June after managing the transition from Mubarak’s 30 years of military-backed one-man rule.

The draft constitution sets up a national defense council, in which generals will form a majority, and gives civilians some scrutiny over the army – although not enough for critics.

In August Mursi stripped the generals of sweeping powers they had grabbed when he was elected two months earlier, but has since repeatedly paid tribute to the military in public.

So far the army and police have taken a relatively passive role in the protests roiling the most populous Arab nation.

(Additional reporting by Edmund Blair and Yasmine Saleh; editing by Philippa Fletcher)

World News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Jenni Rivera’s family hopes Mexican-American singer still alive

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The family of Mexican-American singer Jenni Rivera said on Monday they are holding onto hope that she may still be alive, although U.S. officials said earlier that she died on Sunday in a plane crash in Mexico.

“In our eyes, we still have faith that our sister will be OK,” Rivera’s brother Juan told reporters outside the family house near Long Beach, California.

“We thank God for the life that he has given … my sister,” said Juan Rivera, also a singer. “For all the triumphs and successes she has had, and we expect that there will be more in the future.”

Rivera, 43, died after the small jet she was traveling in crashed in northern Mexico on Sunday, U.S. officials said. Rivera’s father, Pedro, told Telemundo television on Sunday that everyone on the plane had died. So far, authorities have not announced the recovery of any bodies.

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said it was helping Mexican authorities with the investigation of the crash of the private Learjet LJ25.

The plane crashed at about 3:30 a.m. local time (4.30 a.m. EST) in the municipality of Iturbide some 70 miles south of Monterrey, from which the singer and six others were en route to Mexico City.

Rivera was to perform in the city of Toluca, 40 miles southwest of Mexico city, in central Mexico after a concert in Monterrey on Saturday night.

It is not clear what caused the crash, and the Mexican transportation ministry said the wreckage was strewn so far about that it was difficult to recognize the crash site.

Rivera was born in Long Beach to Mexican immigrants and lived in suburban Los Angeles. She was a giant figure in the Mexican folk nortena and banda genres.

She had sold 15 million albums in her 17-year career and garnered a slew of Latin Grammy nominations.

“The entire Universal Music Group family is deeply saddened by the sudden loss of our dear friend Jenni Rivera,” the singer’s record label said in a statement.

“From her incredibly versatile talent to the way she embraced her fans around the world, Jenni was simply incomparable,” Universal added in the statement. “Her talent will be missed; but her gift of music will be with us always.”

In recent years Rivera had branched out into television with a reality television show and as a judge on the Mexican version of the singing competition “The Voice.”

(Reporting by Eric Kelsey; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Lisa Shumaker)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

FDA OKs J&J prostate cancer drug for pre-chemo use

(Reuters) – U.S. health regulators on Monday expanded the approval of Johnson & Johnson‘s drug Zytiga for advanced prostate cancer to allow its use prior to treatment with chemotherapy.

The widely-expected, expanded Food and Drug Administration approval, which came after the company demonstrated that Zytiga could extend survival if used prior to chemotherapy, is likely to significantly boost sales of the new medicine.

Wells Fargo Securities analyst Larry Biegelsen, in a research note earlier this year, forecast peak Zytiga sales of $ 2.3 billion in 2016, with about 70 percent coming from pre-chemo use.

Zytiga was originally approved in April 2011 for use in combination with the steroid prednisone to treat men whose prostate cancer had progressed following treatment with the chemotherapy drug docetaxel.

The pill, which works by decreasing production of the hormone testosterone that fuels cancer growth, had sales of about $ 800 million in its first year of availability, capturing some 60 percent of the post-chemotherapy market.

That market share is likely to shrink due to new competition in the post-chemotherapy setting from Xtandi, which is sold by Medivation Inc and Astellas Pharma Inc, analysts said. Xtandi is still undergoing late stage trials in patients who have not yet received chemotherapy treatment and the drug could be a year or two away from a similar expanded approval.

However, Sanford Bernstein analyst Geoffrey Porges said Xtandi was likely to gain some “off label” use in pre-chemo patients. The term refers to doctors prescribing drugs for none-approved uses.

“Ultimately we are convinced that Xtandi will get a comparable or better label expansion by mid 2014,” he said.

Meanwhile, Zytiga patients starts will get “an immediate boost,” Porges added.

In late stage clinical trials of more than 1,000 patients with advanced prostate cancer who had not been treated with chemotherapy, those who received Zytiga on average lived more than five months longer than those who received a placebo.

“Today’s approval demonstrates the benefit of further evaluating a drug in an earlier disease setting and provides patients and health care providers the option of using Zytiga earlier in the course of treatment,” Richard Pazdur, director of the Office of Oncology Drug Products in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a statement.

The American Cancer Society estimated that more than 28,000 U.S. men will die from prostate cancer in 2012, making it the second leading cause of cancer death behind lung cancer.

J&J shares closed up 15 cents at $ 70.60 on the New York Stock Exchange.

(Reporting by Bill Berkrot and Ransdell Pierson; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick, Nick Zieminski and Andrew Hay)

Diseases/Conditions News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Argentine mom rescues hundreds of sex slaves in search for daughter

LA PLATA, Argentina (AP) — Susana Trimarco was a housewife who fussed over her family and paid scant attention to the news until her daughter left for a doctor's appointment and never came back.

After getting little help from police, Trimarco launched her own investigation into a tip that the 23-year-old was abducted and forced into sex slavery. Soon, Trimarco was visiting brothels seeking clues about her daughter and the search took an additional goal: rescuing sex slaves and helping them start new lives.

What began as a one-woman campaign a decade ago developed into a movement and Trimarco today is a hero to hundreds of women she's rescued from Argentine prostitution rings. She's been honored with the "Women of Courage" award by the U.S. State Department and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize on Nov. 28. Sunday night, President Cristina Fernandez gave her a human rights award before hundreds of thousands of people in the Plaza de Mayo.

But years of exploring the decadent criminal underground haven't led Trimarco to her daughter, Maria de los Angeles "Marita" Veron, who was 23 in 2002 when she disappeared from their hometown in provincial Tucuman, leaving behind her own 3-year-old daughter Micaela.

"I live for this," the 58-year-old Trimarco told The Associated Press of her ongoing quest. "I have no other life, and the truth is, it is a very sad, very grim life that I wouldn't wish on anyone."

Her painful journey has now reached a milestone.

Publicity over Trimarco's efforts prompted Argentine authorities to make a high-profile example of her daughter's case by putting 13 people on trial for allegedly kidnapping Veron and holding her as a sex slave in a family-run operation of illegal brothels. Prostitution is not illegal in Argentina, but the exploitation of women for sex is.

A verdict is expected Tuesday after a nearly yearlong trial.

The seven men and six women have pleaded innocent and their lawyers have said there's no physical proof supporting the charges against them. The alleged ringleaders denied knowing Veron and said that women who work in their brothels do so willingly. Prosecutors have asked for up to 25 years imprisonment for those convicted.

Trimarco was the primary witness during the trial, testifying for six straight days about her search for her daughter.

The road to trial was a long one.

Frustrated by seeming indifference to her daughter's disappearance, Trimarco began her own probe and found a taxi driver who told of delivering Veron to a brothel where she was beaten and forced into prostitution. The driver is among the defendants.

With her husband and granddaughter in tow, Trimarco disguised herself as a recruiter of prostitutes and entered brothel after brothel searching for clues. She soon found herself immersed in the dangerous and grim world of organized crime, gathering evidence against police, politicians and gangsters.

"For the first time, I really understood what was happening to my daughter," she said. "I was with my husband and with Micaela, asleep in the backseat of the car because she was still very small and I had no one to leave her with."

The very first woman Trimarco rescued taught her to be strong, she said.

"It stuck with me forever: She told me not to let them see me cry, because these shameless people who had my daughter would laugh at me, and at my pain," Trimarco said. "Since then I don't cry anymore. I've made myself strong, and when I feel that a tear might drop, I remember these words and I keep my composure."

Micaela, now 13, has been by her grandmother's side throughout, contributing to publicity campaigns against human trafficking and keeping her mother's memory alive.

More than 150 witnesses testified in the trial, including a dozen former sex slaves who described brutal conditions in the brothels.

Veron may have been kidnapped twice, with the complicity of the very authorities who should have protected her, according to Julio Fernandez, who now runs a Tucuman police department devoted to investigating human trafficking. He testified that witnesses reported seeing Veron at a bus station three days after she initially disappeared, and that a police officer from La Rioja, Domingo Pascual Andrada, delivered her to a brothel there. Andrada, now among the defendants, denied knowing any of the other defendants, let alone Veron.

Other Tucuman police testified that when they sought permission in 2002 to search La Rioja brothels, a judge made them wait for hours, enabling Veron's captors to move her. That version was supported by a woman who had been a prostitute at the brothel: She testified that Veron was moved just before police arrived. The judge, Daniel Moreno, is not on trial. He denied delaying the raid or having anything to do with the defendants.

Some of the former prostitutes said they had seen Veron drugged and haggard. One testified Veron felt trapped and missed her daughter. Another said she spotted Veron with dyed-blonde hair and an infant boy she was forced to conceive in a rape by a ringleader. A third thought Veron had been sold to a brothel in Spain — a lead reported to Interpol.

Trimarco's campaign to find her daughter led the State Department to provide seed money for a foundation in Veron's name. To date, it has rescued more than 900 women and girls from sex trafficking. The foundation also provides housing, medical and psychological aid, and it helps victims sue former captors.

Argentina outlawed human trafficking in 2008, thanks in large part to the foundation's work. A new force dedicated to combating human trafficking has liberated nearly 3,000 more victims in two years, said Security Minister Nilda Garre, who wrote a newspaper commentary saying the trial's verdict should set an example.

Whatever the verdict, Trimarco's lawyer, Carlos Garmendia, says the case has already made a difference.

"Human trafficking was an invisible problem until the Marita (Veron) case," Garmendia said. "The case has put it on the national agenda."

But Trimarco wants more. "I had hoped they would break down and say what they'd done with Marita," she said.

"I feel here in my breast that she is alive and I'm not going to stop until I find her," Trimarco said. "If she's no longer in this world, I want her body."

Read More..

In giant “garage sale”, Japan’s TV giants hawk $3 billion of assets

TOKYO (Reuters) – Panasonic Corp, Japan‘s struggling maker of Viera brand TVs, owns more than 10 million square meters of office and factory space, dormitories for its workers and sports facilities for its rugby, baseball and women’s athletics teams.

As it battles for Christmas shoppers’ wallets in the year-end holiday season, the sprawling electronics conglomerate is also seeking buyers for some of those properties to trim its fixed costs and improve cashflow at a time of intense competition, particularly from South Korean rivals such as Samsung Electronics Co.

Japan’s other troubled TV makers, Sony Corp and Sharp Corp, are also selling buildings and businesses in a giant ‘garage sale’ that could raise a combined $ 3 billion.

Panasonic plans to raise $ 1.34 billion from offloading property and shares in other Japanese companies by end-March, the group’s chief financial officer Hideaki Kawai told Reuters.

“We have a lot of land and buildings in Japan and overseas,” he said in an interview at the company’s head office in Osaka, in western Japan. He declined to list which properties would go on the block, but said most are in Japan.

Included is a 24-storey central Tokyo block – built in 2003 with more than 47,300 square meters and housing 2,000 Panasonic workers – a source familiar with the plan told Reuters.

Kawai added that Panasonic would raise about a quarter of the sell-off funds by getting rid of shares it owns in other companies – a common practice of cross-shareholdings in Japan.

The proceeds would help bolster free cashflow to 200 billion yen ($ 2.43 billion) for the business year to March, Kawai said, and allow Panasonic to reduce its debt and maintain its crucial research and development effort as it revamps its business portfolio.

It will sell more assets in the year starting in April if cashflow dips below 200 billion yen, Kawai added. Panasonic President Kazuhiro Tsuga has promised to shut or sell businesses operating at below a 5 percent margin. Those sales could start as soon as April.

Panasonic’s fixed assets of $ 21 billion are around 30 percent more than those of Apple Inc, and are almost double the company’s market value. The company, founded almost a century ago as a small electrical extension socket maker, trades at around half its book value – which includes intangible assets such as patents. Sony trades at 39 percent of book, Sharp at 30 percent.

The fixed assets – buildings, land and machinery – of the three companies that were not so long ago a byword for innovation in household gadgetry total around $ 42 billion, while their combined market value is $ 24 billion.

CASHFLOW IS KING

The three firms have been downgraded by credit ratings agencies, making it tougher to raise funding on capital markets, and making asset sales more urgent.

Selling assets “is good in terms of their credit ratings because, for all three, it will lower fixed costs and they can reduce their capex requirements. Eventually, this could improve operating margins and, more importantly, cashflow,” said Alvin Lim, an analyst at Fitch Ratings in Seoul.

Fitch, which makes its ratings without input from company management, last month cut Panasonic to BB and Sony to BB minus, the first time one of the major agencies has relegated either company to junk status. Sharp is ranked B minus, adding to its borrowing costs.

“We rate Panasonic as investment grade, and it should have various funding options. Selling assets it can do without, to avoid raising additional borrowing, can be an option,” said Osamu Kobayashi, an analyst at Standard & Poor’s.

While Korean rivals have also benefited from a weaker local currency, data from the Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association shows that Japanese production of consumer electronic equipment fell to just above $ 15 billion last year from more than $ 19 billion a decade ago. Output in September was just $ 980 million, half last year’s level.

“The gap with Korean makers seems to be widening. It’s going to be very difficult for them to regain their top-tier position,” said Fitch’s Lim.

As the three Japanese firms, all under new leadership, have sketched out restructuring plans, the cost of insuring their debt against defaulting in 5 years has dropped from spikes just a month ago. Credit default swaps for Sharp and Sony are down to levels last seen 3 months ago, while Panasonic’s have dropped 40 percent in the past month.

THREE PATHS

While Panasonic is looking to revamp its business around batteries, auto parts and household appliances, Sony is doubling down on smartphones, gaming and cameras. Sharp, meanwhile, is focusing on display screens and is forging alliances with the likes of Taiwan’s Hon Hai Precision Industry and U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm Inc.

Sony may also take the real estate sale route to raise much-needed cash, with a possible sale of its 37-storey New York headquarters, dubbed by New Yorkers as the ‘Chippendale’ because of its design that is reminiscent of the period English furniture. Selling that jewel could raise $ 1 billion, media have reported.

The maker of Vaio laptops, PlayStation gaming consoles and Bravia TVs may also sell its battery business, which makes lithium ion power packs for tablets, PCs and mobile phones. The company has been approached by investment banks offering to sell the unit, which employs 2,700 people and has three factories in Japan and two overseas assembly plants. Sony values the business’s fixed assets at $ 636 million.

Potential buyers could include BYD Co Ltd, a Chinese carmaker backed by billionaire investor Warren Buffett, and Taiwan’s Hon Hai – which part owns Sharp’s advanced LCD panel plant in Sakai, western Japan, and is in talks to buy TV assembly plants in China, Malaysia and Mexico for $ 667 million, Japan’s Sankei newspaper has reported.

Sharp has mortgaged nearly all its properties to secure a $ 4.6 billion bailout from Japanese banks and so has few assets to offer in a grand garage sale.

Instead, it’s selling part of the garage.

Qualcomm has agreed to buy a 5 percent stake in Sharp, making it the largest shareholder. Hon Hai, which earlier this year agreed to invest in Sharp – before its stock slumped in the wake of record losses – has said it remains interested in taking a stake.

“Whatever they can get to get through this fiscal period by scaling down their operation is a critical step for them to remain afloat,” said Fitch’s Lim.

($ 1 = 82.4700 Japanese yen)

(Additional reporting by Reiji Murai; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

UK hospital says royal prank call appalling after nurse death

LONDON/PERTH, Australia (Reuters) – The London hospital that treated Prince William‘s pregnant wife Kate condemned on Saturday an Australian radio station that made a prank call seeking information about the duchess, after the apparent suicide of a nurse who answered the phone.

There has been renewed soul-searching over media ethics after Jacintha Saldanha, 46, the nurse who was duped by the station’s call to the King Edward VII hospital, was found dead in staff accommodation nearby on Friday.

The owners of Sydney’s 2DayFM said it had done nothing wrong and no one could have foreseen the tragic outcome of the stunt, but two leading Australian firms suspended their advertising.

The hoax, in which the radio hosts – posing as Britain‘s Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles despite Australian accents – successfully inquired after Kate’s medical condition, has made worldwide headlines.

The hospital’s chairman Lord Glenarthur urged the station’s owners to ensure that such an incident could never happen again.

“It was extremely foolish of your presenters even to consider trying to lie their way through to one of our patients, let alone actually make the call,” he said in a letter to Southern Cross Austereo Chairman Max Moore-Wilton.

“Then to discover that, not only had this happened, but that the call had been pre-recorded and the decision to transmit approved by your station’s management, was truly appalling.”

The immediate consequence had been the humiliation of two “dedicated and caring” nurses, he said. “The longer term consequence has been reported around the world and is, frankly, tragic beyond words,” Glenarthur added.

Australians from Prime Minister Julia Gillard to people in the street expressed their sorrow and cringed at how the hoax had crossed the line of acceptability.

Two large companies suspended their advertising from the popular Sydney-based station and a media watchdog said it would speak with 2DayFM’s owners.

The hoax raised concerns about the ethical standards of Australian media, as Britain’s own media scramble to agree a new system of self-regulation and avoid state intervention following a damning inquiry into reporting practices.

Southern Cross Austereo Chief Executive Rhys Holleran told a news conference in Melbourne on Saturday that the company would work with authorities in any investigation. He said he was “very confident” that the radio station had done nothing illegal.

“This is a tragic event that could not have been reasonably foreseen and we are deeply saddened by it. Our primary concern at this stage is for the family of Nurse Saldanha.”

Holleran added that 2DayFM radio hosts Mel Greig and Michael Christian were “completely shattered” by Saldanha’s death. The pair will stay off the air indefinitely, he said.

London detectives have sent a request to Sydney police to question the two presenters, Britain’s Sunday Times said.

“Officers have been in contact with Australian authorities,” a spokesman for London’s Metropolitan Police said.

Two high-profile Australian firms, the Coles supermarket group and phone company Telstra, said they were suspending advertising with the station.

Austereo said all advertising on 2DayFM had been shelved until at least Monday in a mark of respect to advertisers whose Facebook pages were inundated with thousands of hate messages.

The Twitter accounts of Greig and Christian were removed shortly after news of the tragedy in London broke.

SOCIAL MEDIA OUTRAGE

Social media were inundated with angry messages to the radio station in what has become the latest shock radio story to rile the Australian public. Earlier this year 2DayFM was reprimanded by Australia’s independent communications regulator after a radio host talked a 14-year-old girl into revealing on air that she had been raped.

So-called “shock jock” radio announcers are frequently denounced in Australia for their deeply personal and often derogatory attacks on politicians and ordinary citizens.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said that the independent broadcast regulator, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, had received complaints about the hoax.

The media fallout from the tragedy could extend beyond Australia’s shores, said British radio presenter Steve Penk, who has made a career out of prank calls.

“I think it will probably be the death of the wind-up phone call. I think (British media regulator) Ofcom will wrap it in so much red tape that it will make it almost impossible to get these things on the air,” he told Sky News.

Saldanha lived with her husband and two children in the western English city of Bristol. She moved to Britain from India around 10 years ago, British media reports said.

Her husband’s family, who live in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, told news agency Asian News International they would miss their “good-natured and beautiful” relative.

“At eight o’clock in the morning, he (Saldanha’s husband) rang up to say that she is no more, more than that we do not know about what actually happened. She is dead, that’s all,” said Camril Barboza, Saldanha’s mother-in-law.

The British royal family has long had an uneasy relationship with the media, which sank to its lowest after the 1997 death of Prince William’s mother Diana in a Paris car crash.

Palace officials acted swiftly this summer when a French magazine printed topless photos of Kate on holiday, taking legal action to curb republication.

Saldanha’s death threatens to cast a pall over the enthusiastic public welcome given to Kate’s pregnancy, which dominated newspaper front pages this week.

(Writing by Tim Castle and Jeremy Laurence; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Stephen Powell)

Celebrity News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Obama met Boehner on Sunday over fiscal cliff: aides

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama met with Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner on Sunday at the White House to negotiate ways to avoid the “fiscal cliff,” according to White House officials and a congressional aide.

The two sides declined to provide further details about the unannounced meeting. Obama and Boehner aides used the same language to describe it.

“This afternoon, the president and Speaker Boehner met at the White House to discuss efforts to resolve the fiscal cliff,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

“We’re not reading out details of the conversation, but the lines of communication remain open,” he said.

An aide to Boehner emailed an identical quote.

The two sides are trying to reach an agreement that would stop automatic spending cuts and tax increases from going into effect at the beginning of the year. Analysts say if that so-called “fiscal cliff” occurs, the U.S. economy could swing back into a recession.

Obama has made clear he will not accept a deal unless tax rates for the wealthiest Americans rise. Boehner and many of his fellow Republicans say any tax increases would hurt a still fragile economy.

Last week Boehner and Obama spoke by phone, a conversation that the Republican leader described as pleasant but unproductive.

The common language used by both men’s aides suggests an agreement to keep details about their discussions private, which could help both of them sell less politically palatable aspects of an eventual deal to lawmakers in their respective parties.

(additional reporting by Rachelle Younglai; editing by Stacey Joyce)

Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Obama, Boehner meet face-to-face on 'fiscal cliff'

For the first time in more than three weeks, President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner met face-to-face today at the White House to talk about avoiding the fiscal cliff.

White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest would offer no details saying only, "The lines of communication remain open."

Erskine Bowles, the co-creator of a debt reducing plan, who was pessimistic a couple weeks ago, said he likes what he's hearing.

"Any time you have two guys in there tangoing, you have a chance to get it done," Bowles said on CBS's "Face the Nation."

The White House afternoon talks, conducted without cameras or any announcement until they were over, came as some Republicans were showing more flexibility about approving higher tax rates for the wealthy, one of the president's demands to keep the country from the so-called fiscal cliff -- a mixture of across-the-board tax increases and spending cuts that many economists say would send the country back into recession.

"Let's face it. He does have the upper hand on taxes. You have to pass something to keep it from happening," Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee said on "FOX News Sunday."

This comes after the White House moderated one of its demands about tax rate increases for the wealthy.

The administration was demanding the rate return to its former level of 39.6 percent on income above $250,000. The so-called Bush tax cut set that rate at 35 percent. But Friday, Vice President Joe Biden signaled that rate could be negotiable, somewhere between the two.

"So will I accept a tax increase as a part of a deal to actually solve our problems? Yes," said Oklahoma Republican Tom Coburn on ABC's "This Week."

The problems the senator was referring to are the country's entitlement programs. And there was some progress on that front, too.

A leading Democrat said means testing for Medicare recipients could be a way to cut costs to the government health insurance program. Those who make more money would be required to pay more for Medicare.

"I do believe there should be means testing, and those of us with higher income and retirement should pay more. That could be part of the solution," Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

But Durbin said he would not favor raising the eligibility age from 65 years old to 67 years old, as many Republicans have suggested.

The White House and the speaker's office released the exact same statement about the negotiating session. Some will see that as a sign of progress, that neither side is talking about what was said behind closed doors.

Also Read

Read More..

Anger at Australian radio station over royal hoax

LONDON (AP) — It started out as a joke, but ended in tragedy.

The sudden death of a nurse who unwittingly accepted a prank call to a London hospital about Prince William‘s pregnant wife Kate has shocked Britain and Australia, and sparked an angry backlash Saturday from some who argue the DJs who carried out the hoax should be held responsible.

At first, the call by two irreverent Australian DJs posing as royals was picked up by news outlets around the world as an amusing anecdote about the royal pregnancy. Some complained about the invasion of privacy, the hospital was embarrassed, and the radio presenters sheepishly apologized.

But the prank took a dark twist Friday with the death of nurse Jacintha Saldanha, a 46-year-old mother of two, three days after she took the hoax call. Police have not yet determined Saldanha‘s cause of death, but people from London to Sydney have been making the assumption that she died because of stress from the call.

King Edward VII’s Hospital, where the former Kate Middleton was being treated for acute morning sickness this week, wrote a strongly-worded letter to the 2DayFM radio station’s parent company Southern Cross Austereo, condemning the “truly appalling” hoax and urging it to take steps to ensure such an incident would never happen again.

“The immediate consequence of these premeditated and ill-considered actions was the humiliation of two dedicated and caring nurses who were simply doing their job tending to their patients,” the letter read. “The longer term consequence has been reported around the world and is, frankly, tragic beyond words.”

The hospital did not comment when asked whether it believed the prank call had directly caused Saldanha’s death, only saying that the protest letter spoke for itself.

DJs Mel Grieg and Michael Christian, who apologized for the prank on Tuesday, took down their Twitter accounts after they were bombarded by thousands of abusive comments. Rhys Holleran, CEO of Southern Cross Austereo, said the pair have been offered counseling and were taken off the air indefinitely.

No one could have foreseen the tragic consequences of the prank, he stressed.

“I spoke to both presenters early this morning and it’s fair to say they’re completely shattered,” Holleran told reporters on Saturday.

“These people aren’t machines, they’re human beings,” he said. “We’re all affected by this.”

Details about Saldanha have been trickling out since the duty nurse’s body was found at apartments provided by the private hospital, which has treated a line of royals before, including Prince Philip, who was hospitalized there for a bladder infection in June.

The nurse, who was originally from India, had lived with her partner Benedict Barboza and a teenage son and daughter in Bristol, in southwestern England, for the past nine years. The hospital praised her as a “first-class nurse” who was well-respected and popular among colleagues during her four years working there.

Just before dawn on Tuesday, Saldanha was looking after her patients when the phone rang. A woman pretending to be Queen Elizabeth II asked to speak to the duchess, and, believing the caller, Saldanha transferred the call to a fellow nurse caring for the duchess, who spoke to the two DJs about Kate’s condition live on air.

During the call — which was put online and later broadcast on news channels worldwide — Grieg mimicked the Britain’s monarch’s voice and asked about the duchess’ health. She was told Kate “hasn’t had any retching with me and she’s been sleeping on and off.” Grieg and Christian, who pretended to be Prince Charles, also discussed with the nurse when they could travel to the hospital to check in on Kate.

Three days later, officers responding to reports that a woman was found unconscious discovered Saldanha, who was pronounced dead at the scene. Police didn’t release a cause of death, but said they didn’t find anything suspicious. A coroner will make a determination on the cause.

In the aftermath of Saldanha’s death, some speculated about whether the nurse was subject to pressure to resign or about to be punished for the mistake. Royal officials said Prince William and Kate were “deeply saddened,” but insisted that the palace had not complained about the hoax. King Edward VII’s Hospital also maintained that it did not reprimand Saldanha.

“We did not discipline the nurse in question. There were no plans to discipline her,” a hospital spokesman said. He declined to provide further details, and did not respond to questions about the second nurse’s condition.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority, which regulates radio broadcasting, said it has received complaints about the prank and is discussing the matter with the Sydney-based station, which yanked its Facebook page after it received thousands of angry comments.

Holleran, the radio executive, would not say who came up with the idea for the call. He only said that “these things are often done collaboratively.” He said 2DayFM would work with authorities, but was confident the station hadn’t broken any laws, noting that prank calls in radio have been happening “for decades.”

The station has a history of controversy, including a series of “Heartless Hotline” shows in which disadvantage people were offered a prize that could be taken away from them by listeners.

Saldanha’s family asked for privacy in a brief statement issued through London police.

Flowers were left outside the hospital’s nurse’s apartments, with one note reading: “Dear Jacintha, our thoughts are with you and your family. From all your fellow nurses, we bless your soul. God bless.”

Officials from St. James’s Palace have said the duchess is not yet 12 weeks pregnant. The child would be the first for her and William.

Europe News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Synacor partners with Zynga to bring social games to pay TV

(Reuters) – Synacor Inc, partly owned by Intel Corp, said it partnered with Zynga Inc to allow pay TV and broadband providers offer social games to their customers.

Zynga shares rose about 3 percent to $ 2.30 in premarket trading, while Synacor shares were up about 5 percent at $ 6.60.

Synacor said certain pay-TV subscribers will get in-game currency each month as part of their subscription that can be redeemed for popular Zynga games such as Zynga Poker and FarmVille2.

The partnership comes days after Zynga revised its pact with Facebook Inc to lower its dependence on the social network.

Synacor, which debuted on the Nasdaq in February, offers authentication and management services to companies offering on-demand content, primarily cable and telecom service providers and consumer electronics brands.

(Reporting by Chandni Doulatramani in Bangalore; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)

Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..