Cycling: British paper sues Armstrong over libel payment

LONDON: British newspaper The Sunday Times said on Sunday that it is suing Lance Armstrong for over £1 million over a libel payment made to the disgraced cyclist in 2006.

The newspaper paid Armstrong £300,000 to settle a libel case after previously suggesting that he may have cheated.

But the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) subsequently found that he had led the "most sophisticated" doping programme in sporting history, leading to a life ban for the Texan, who was also stripped of his seven Tour de France wins.

The Sunday Times is reportedly demanding the return of the original settlement payment, along with interest and legal costs.

In a letter to Armstrong's lawyers, the paper said: "It is clear that the proceedings were baseless and fraudulent. Your representations that you had never taken performance-enhancing drugs were deliberately false."

The newspaper had long questioned Armstrong's achievements and in 2004 it published an article stating that it was appropriate for questions about his success to be "posed and answered".

After Armstrong's lawyers issued a writ, the newspaper settled with him in June 2006.

- AFP/jc

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Haryana politicians, bureaucrats using front men to buy land

NEW DELHI: Haryana politicians and bureaucrats have been allegedly putting their front men to buy property, which are often parts of common land or of panchayats. Haryana IAS officer Ashok Khemka, who hit the headlines after ordering a probe into Robert Vadra's land deals, had exposed this during his brief tenure in the land consolidation department.

Khemka's two orders and a particular noting on the flawed consolidation process accessed by TOI show that he had pointed out the politician-bureaucrat-property dealer nexus to usurp common and non-agriculture land in villages falling under and around Aravalis — Kot (Ballabhgarh), Anangpur (Faridabad), Bandhwari (Sohna) and Rozka-Gujar (Sohna).

On August 27, Khemka noted, "It was observed that some senior public servants misused their position for a favourable exchange for themselves or their relatives or their companies floated for this purpose. Huge investments of black money and ill-gotten money have been made through companies in the purchase of land of some villages in Gurgaon-Faridabad districts to benefit from the consolidation scheme."

These are the villages which have been brought under the Master Plan of Sohna in Gurgaon and Manger in Faridabad. The land ownership changed hands and big players got large chunks within years before the state government came out with new development plans.

The IAS officer had also recommended that huge investments made in the purchase of land in these villages through companies must be investigated to find out their actual owners and interests behind these investing companies. "It seems that huge amounts of black money have been invested in the purchase of land in these villages through companies. Their real owners need to be disclosed through an independent investigation," his note had recommended to the government.

Some of the land records accessed by TOI showed that a Haryana MP bought 20 acres of Gair Mumkin Pahar (uncultivable hill) in Roz-ka-Gujjar, family members of a mining baron owned 860 acres, wife and son of a top ranking police officer bought 16 acres, to mention a few. Moreover, several property dealers have bought huge chunks of land for political families and even serving officers in the state. In the case of Roz-ka-Gujjar village, over 1,685 acres went to influential people and companies.

When TOI contacted Khemka, he said, "Only after observing the trend and after getting enough input I had put my views on record and these are with the department. I won't comment anything on these issues since I have a different responsibility now." The officer has been shifted to the seed development department.

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NRA Chief LaPierre: 'Call Me Crazy'

National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre fired back at his critics today, defending his proposal to put armed guards in every school in the country as a way to prevent future tragedies like the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting that took the lives of 20 children and six adults.

"If it's crazy to call for armed officers in our schools to protect our children, then call me crazy," the head of the powerful gun lobby said today on NBC's "Meet the Press."

LaPierre and the NRA came under harsh criticism this week for their response to the Newtown, Conn., school shooting.

After keeping silent for a week, except for a release announcing that the organization would make "meaningful contributions" to the search for answers to the problem of gun violence, LaPierre held what critics described as a "tone deaf" press conference in which he blamed the media, video games and Hollywood for the recent shootings, and suggested that the answer to gun violence was more guns.

Gun control advocates argue that a federal assault weapons ban is necessary to curbing gun violence. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who helped pass an assault weapons ban in 1996 is renewing efforts to pass similar legislation as the original ban expired in 2004.

"I think that is a phony piece of legislation and I do not believe it will pass for this reason: it's all built on lies," LaPierre said today.

LaPierre and many pro-gun advocates like him argue that assault weapons bans aren't effective and that violent criminals are solely to blame.

PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images

National Rifle Association News Conference Interrupted by Protesters Watch Video

Critics Slam NRA for Proposing Armed School Guards Watch Video

INFOGRAPHIC: Guns in America: By The Numbers

In today's interview, LaPierre pointed out that the Columbine High School shooting occurred after the assault weapons ban passed, but he failed to mention that the shooters obtained the guns they used illegally though a gun show.

He also did not discuss the fact that there was an armed guard on duty at the school when Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 13 people there before killing themselves.

Several senators watching LaPierre's interview had strong reactions.

"He says the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. What about stopping the bad guy from getting the gun in the first place?" said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who was also on the show, said that he open to discussing increased school security but warned against a quick rush to ban assault weapons.

"I don't suggest we ban every movie with a gun in it and every video that's violent and I don't suggest that you take my right buy an AR-15 away from me because I don't think it will work," Graham said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Earlier this week protesters from the group "Code Pink" snuck into the NRA press conference and held up a sign that read "NRA Blood on Your Hand."

Gun-control advocates like the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence have long been critical of the NRA, but some lawmakers who also back more stringent gun control have been reluctant to lash out at the NRA until the recent shootings at Newtown, Conn.

After the Aurora, Colo., movie theater shooting, when a gunman armed with an AR-15, two Glock pistols and a shotgun, killed 12 and wounded 70 others, even Feinstein lamented that it was a "bad time" to press for gun control.

She has since changed her tone, but her previous reluctance to tackle the issue shows just how powerful the NRA is in derailing any opposition gun ownership.

President Obama announced last week that he was creating a task force headed by Vice President Biden to offer workable policy solutions to the problem of gun violence by the end of January.

The president will likely face an uphill battle, as any proposed legislation will have to make its way through the House of Representatives, which is currently controlled by Republicans.

Many lawmakers, the president and the NRA have discussed a holistic solution that includes the examination potential problems with the mental health system in this country.

Mental health services have come under a great strain as local governments are forced to cut their budgets. As a result, the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors has estimated a loss of $4.35 billion to state funded mental health services.

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Pictures: Fungi Get Into the Holiday Spirit

Photograph courtesy Stephanie Mounaud, J. Craig Venter Institute

Mounaud combined different fungi to create a Santa hat and spell out a holiday message.

Different fungal grow at different rates, so Mounaud's artwork rarely lasts for long. There's only a short window of time when they actually look like what they're suppose to.

"You do have to keep that in perspective when you're making these creations," she said.

For example, the A. flavus fungi that she used to write this message from Santa grows very quickly. "The next day, after looking at this plate, it didn't say 'Ho Ho Ho.' It said 'blah blah blah,'" Mounaud said.

The message also eventually turned green, which was the color she was initially after. "It was a really nice green, which is what I was hoping for. But yellow will do," she said.

The hat was particularly challenging. The fungus used to create it "was troubling because at different temperatures it grows differently. The pigment in this one forms at room temperature but this type of growth needed higher temperatures," Mounaud said.

Not all fungus will grow nicely together. For example, in the hat, "N. fischeri [the brim and ball] did not want to play nice with the P. marneffei [red part of hat] ... so they remained slightly separated."

Published December 21, 2012

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History of gun control is cautionary tale for those seeking regulations after Conn. shooting

At 3 a.m. on July 2, 1993, Steve Sposato sat down in his darkened living room to write, by hand, a letter to the president of the United States. His life had just been shattered.

Hours earlier, in the afternoon, a deranged man armed with semi-automatic weapons went on a rampage, slaughtering eight people at an office building in downtown San Francisco. The gunman’s motive would remain forever a mystery. Among the slain: Steve’s wife, 30-year-old Jody Jones Sposato, the mother of his 10-month-old daughter, Meghan.

His anguished letter to the president asked how it was possible for someone to possess rapid-fire weapons with 30-round magazines, seemingly designed to kill as many people as possible as quickly as possible. “Now I’m left to raise my 10-month-old daughter on my own,” he told the president. “How do I find the strength to carry on?”

That letter reached President Bill Clinton. The next year, Sposato stood by Clinton’s side in the Rose Garden as the president demanded that Congress pass a ban on assault weapons, such as the TEC-9s used to kill Sposato’s wife. Sposato testified on the Hill wearing little Meghan on his back in a baby carrier.

With a handful of moderate Republicans joining the Democratic majority, both houses of Congress passed a 10-year ban on the sale of assault weapons and large ammunition magazines. An attempt to extend the ban in 2004 died in Congress amid opposition from the gun lobby.

Now gun control has roared back into the national conversation as the country reels from the horror in Newtown, Conn. President Obama and his fellow Democrats are vowing to pass a new assault weapons ban, along with other new laws to strengthen background checks on gun purchasers and limit the size of ammunition magazines.

But although Newtown has supercharged the conversation on how to stop another massacre, the history of gun control is a cautionary tale for those who push for more regulations. If past is prologue, the legislative fights ahead will be protracted and brutal — and any resulting legislation may well be riddled with loopholes.

There is no uncontested ground here. Few issues in the country are as polarized as gun control.

The ideological chasm was on full display in Washington on Friday when the National Rifle Association’s executive vice president, Wayne LaPierre, held a take-no-prisoners news conference in which he called for a federal program to put armed guards in every school in the country, saying, “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.”

He said laws making schools gun-free zones have backfired: “They tell every insane killer in America that schools are the safest place to inflict maximum mayhem with minimum risk.” LaPierre’s remarks were twice interrupted by protesters; one held a sign saying, “NRA Killing Our Kids.”

The news conference provided a reminder that gun policy is a central feature of what is loosely known as the culture wars. The gun-rights and gun-control camps don’t even speak the same language, with one side arguing that the Second Amendment can’t possibly mean the right to own an assault weapon, while the other side says “assault weapon” is a pejorative invented by an urban elite that wouldn’t know an AR-15 from an AK-47.

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Iran fighting 'smart economic war': Ahmadinejad

TEHRAN: Iran is engaged in a "smart economic war" with Western powers whose sanctions against its nuclear programme are hurting some Iranians, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Saturday.

"Targeted sanctions, which the enemies say are supposed to be crippling, have led to a drop in our oil" sales, Ahmadinejad said in a live interview on state television, referring to an oil embargo imposed by the European Union.

"They do not even let us transfer the oil money," he said. "They thought Iran's economy would break down, but it did not."

"Iran is engaged in a smart economic war with the enemy," he said.

The EU measure, which came into effect in July, ended European purchases of Iranian crude, and has since decreased Tehran's oil exports to its Asian customers from between 10 to 30 per cent.

According to the International Energy Agency, Iranian exports in November were estimated at 1.3 million barrels per day, down from nearly 2.3 million last year.

Ahmadinejad said his government had "so far managed to control" the effects of sanctions on the economy but admitted that "heavy pressure had been exerted on some Iranians because of sanctions."

He did not elaborate on how Iran was fighting off sanctions for fear the methods would be found by Western powers trying to goad Iran back to the negotiating table over its nuclear ambitions.

"I cannot say what heavy pressure the enemy has imposed, and how we are dealing with them."

"We have so far managed to control this blow, and it hasn't turned out the way they predicted," he said.

Ahmadinejad has faced increasingly scrutiny at home for economic woes, including the collapse of the national currency, which lost more than two-thirds of its value in a 20-day span starting in late September.

Iran's economy is struggling to cope with the gradual tightening of sanctions by the United States and the European Union over the past two years.

The sanctions have also targeted Iran's access to the global banking system, slowing its economy, accelerating inflation and boosting the ranks of the jobless.

Ahmadinejad was speaking to report on his government's implementation two years ago of a controversial plan to cut subsidies on food and energy and redistribute it in form of social assistance.

The plan to generate tens of billions of dollars in additional revenues for his government has been criticised by his opponents, who blame it partially for Iran's runaway inflation.

Ahmadinejad said his government had devised schemes to diffuse the effects of Western sanctions in the "long-term."

"We have prepared long-term plans to decrease dependency on the oil-generated money. We will not allow them to use economic measures as a tool for putting pressure on us anymore," he said.

He said without elaborating that Iran was to "increase its non-oil exports."

His remarks came as Western powers engaging Iran to resolve a years-long dispute over its nuclear programme are pressuring Tehran to return to the negotiating table.

Iran has yet to respond to offers of renewed negotiations with the so-called P5+1 group, consisting of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany.

Iran insists its programme of uranium enrichment is for purely peaceful purposes, and denies Western and Israeli allegations that it wants to manufacture nuclear weapons.

In addition to US and EU measures, Iran is also under four rounds of Security Council sanctions.

- AFP/jc

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Village in Veerappan country says no to caste in marriages

COIMBATORE: The only access to Kalithimbam, a village inside the Sathyamangalam Wildlife Sanctuary in western Tamil Nadu, from the nearby Thalavadi town in Erode district is a dirt track that runs through a green patch frequented by elephants and tigers. Few people other than members of the Oorali tribe, who lives here, would risk the walk until a decade ago, since sandalwood smuggler Veerappan lorded over the forest. The trek remains the same though the brigand was shot in 2004. But the social landscape of the village has changed in a radical way since. It's no more Veerappan, but Cupid who lords over the village.

Many households in Kalithimbam, which doesn't have electricity or other modern facilities, have daughter-in-laws from other communities other than the Oorali tribe. Many young men from nearly 300 families in the village travel to cities like Coimbatore and Erode for work and fall in love and marry girls who they meet there. The marriages take place at the local temple with the consent of family and village elders.

Suicides shock villagers into acceptance

Since January this year, nine love marriages have been solemnized in Kalithimbam. The village also has no opposition to their girls marrying outside the tribe though there has been no such alliance yet. At a time when the rest of Tamil Nadu is witnessing a ganging up of non-dalit groups against inter-caste marriages, Kalithimbam takes pride that it has over 40 daughter-in-laws, born in dalit as well as backward communities.

This wasn't so always. The change in mindset came about two years ago after a series of suicides by young men, whose families had opposed their romance with girls outside their tribe. "The suicides shocked our village. Why should we allow our children to die just because they find life partners outside the community? Now the village is conducting each and every marriage with celebration without considering whether the bride is from the tribe,'' says B Geetha, a woman political activist in the village.

All the villagers then took an oath not to oppose "love marriages". If the bride's family opposes the romance, village elders take the responsibility to persuade the girl's family and solemnize the marriage in front of the Perumal temple in the village.

R Ruseeswaran, vice-president, Thalamalai Panchayat which includes Kalithimbam, puts the transformation in perspective. "We have to understand the realities around. After completing education, children move out of the village for jobs and the chances of falling in love with those from other communities are very high. In an age in which mobile phones rule the roost, it would be foolish to oppose love marriages,'' he says.

Mahalakshmi and Maheswari, two women who came to the village as brides, vouch for the change in the village. Mahalakshmi, from Ghermalam, a village in another part of Dhimbam-Thalavadi hills, had met Marimuthu, a truck driver, at a temple festival. Hailing from different communities, they married last year. "My family had opposed the alliance but elders from Kalithimbam convinced them. Now, everyone is happy,'' she says. Maheswari romanced Govindasamy for eight years before getting married. "We promote love and there is no space for hate. Me and my husband are working under the rural employment guarantee scheme and we always help those who are in love and want to get married settle comfortably,'' says Maheswari.

P L Sundaram, a CPI MLA who represents Bhavanisagar constituency which includes Kalithimbam, describes the village as one that "recognises pure love". "The village elders tell the boy and girl to wait if any of them is minor. If the love affair involves a student, the elders put the marriage on hold till he or she completes the course," he says.

Sundaram adds the villagers don't accept dowry. That's quite an achievement for a village, where most of the elders work as farm hands and the youth in cities as drivers and factory workers.

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Urban Advocates Say New Gun Control Talk Overdue

For years, voices have cried in the urban wilderness: We need to talk about gun control.

Yet the guns blazed on.

It took a small-town slaughter for gun control to become a political priority. Now, decades' worth of big-city arguments against easy access to guns are finally being heard, because an unstable young man invaded an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., with a military-style assault rifle and 30-bullet magazines. Twenty young children and six adults were slain.

President Barack Obama called the tragedy a "wake-up call." Vice President Joe Biden met Thursday with Obama's cabinet and law-enforcement officers from around the country to launch a task force on reducing gun violence. Lawmakers who have long resisted gun control are saying something must be done.

Such action is energizing those who have sought to reduce urban gun violence. Donations are up in some places; other leaders have been working overtime due to this unprecedented moment.

The moment also is causing some to reflect on the sudden change of heart. Why now? Why weren't we moved to act by the killing of so many other children, albeit one by one, in urban areas?

Certainly, Newtown is a special case, 6- and 7-year-olds riddled with bullets inside the sanctuary of a classroom. Even in a nation rife with violence, where there have been three other mass slayings since July and millions enjoy virtual killing via video games, the nature of this tragedy is shocking.

Critics Slam NRA for Proposing Armed School Guards Watch Video

Gun Violence Victims, Survivors Share Thoughts After Newtown Massacre Watch Video

But still: "There's a lot of talk now about we have to protect our children. We have to protect all of our children, not just the ones living in the suburbs," said Tammerlin Drummond, a columnist for the Oakland Tribune.

In her column Monday, Drummond wrote about 7-year-old Heaven Sutton of Chicago, who was standing next to her mother selling candy when she was killed in the crossfire of a gang shootout. Also in Chicago, which has been plagued by a recent spike in gun violence: 6-year-old Aaliyah Shell was caught in a drive-by while standing on her front porch; and 13-year-old Tyquan Tyler was killed when a someone in a car shot into a group of youths outside a party.

Wrote Drummond: "It has taken the murders of 20 babies and six adults in an upper-middle class neighborhood in Connecticut to achieve what thousands of gun fatalities in urban communities all over this country could not."

So again: What took so long? The answers are complicated by many factors: resignation to urban violence, even among some of those who live there; the assumption that cities are dangerous and small towns safe; the idea that some urban victims place themselves in harm's way.

In March, the Children's Defense Fund issued a report titled "Protect Children, Not Guns 2012." It analyzed the latest federal data and counted 299 children under age 10 killed by guns in 2008 and 2009. That figure included 173 preschool-age children.

Black children and teens accounted for 45 percent of all child and teen gun deaths, even though they were only 15 percent of the child/teen population.

"Every child's life is sacred and it is long past time that we protect it," said CDF president Marian Wright Edelman in the report.

It got almost no press coverage — until nine months later, when Newtown happened.

Tim Stevens, founder and chairman of the Black Political Empowerment Project in Pittsburgh, has been focusing on urban gun violence since 2007, when he said Pennsylvania was declared the worst state for black-on-black violence.

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Deadly winter storm snarls US holiday travel

CHICAGO: A deadly winter storm blanketed a huge swath of the United States Friday, grounding flights, turning highways into ice rinks and knocking out power to tens of thousands preparing for the Christmas holiday.

At least eight people in five states were killed by the dangerous road conditions since the storm formed near the Rocky Mountains and moved slowly eastward.

The powerful system dumped as much as 60 centimetres of snow in some areas and knocked down trees and power lines with winds gusting as high as 100 kilometres per hour.

Emergency shelters were opened to help those who lost power stay warm as utility crews struggled to reach downed lines on icy and snow-covered roads. Schools and government offices were closed, as were scores of businesses.

After pounding Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, Illinois and Missouri on Thursday, the storm was centred over the Great Lakes and Appalachians on Friday morning and was expected to reach New England on Saturday.

"Strong winds will cause blowing and drifting, causing near blizzard conditions and very dangerous driving conditions," the National Weather service warned.

"Only travel in an emergency."

Smaller systems also snarled travel in California, Nevada and Oregon while high winds grounded and delayed flights in New York.

Thankfully, on Friday, the busiest travel day of the year, skies were clear in Chicago -- where an estimated 266,000 people will pass through the major aviation hub.

More than 600 flights were cancelled Thursday at Chicago's O'Hare and Midway airports as the storm dumped freezing rain and a dusting of snow on runways and whipped up dangerously strong winds.

Hundreds more were cancelled at smaller airports like Detroit, Minneapolis, and Kansas City, according to tracking service FlightAware.

Nearly 500 flights had been cancelled by early afternoon Friday, primarily due to high winds in New York and San Francisco.

"This storm is not as large as some winter storms we've seen in the past that can result in thousands of cancelations in a day, but the impact is significant due to the number of holiday travellers," FlightAware chief Daniel Baker said.

More than 30,000 people remained without power in Wisconsin, where the governor declared a state of emergency and called up the National Guard to help rescue people stranded on snow-covered roads.

Two people were killed when their car slid into the path of a semi-trailer on a highway in Wisconsin's rural Rock County on Thursday, Channel 3000 news reported.

And an ambulance transporting a woman in labour got stuck on a Wisconsin highway at about 12:30 am local time Friday, the state's emergency management centre said. A second ambulance sent to help also got stuck, so a snowplough was sent to drive in front of a third ambulance and get her safely to hospital.

In Iowa, two more people were killed and seven injured in a 25-vehicle pileup after conditions got so bad on a major highway Thursday that people couldn't see the cars and big trucks that had slowed down or stopped ahead of them, the State Patrol there said.

Dozens of people were also trapped in their cars, many for hours. One pileup was so bad emergency crews brought food and water to the stranded motorists while they waited for snow blowers and tow trucks to arrive.

Further west in Utah, one woman died of exposure after her car got stuck on an isolated road on Tuesday and she tried to walk out for help, KSL news reported. A man who was with her in the car was able to walk farther and reach shelter, but by the time rescue crews on snowmobiles found the woman she was dead.

And in Nebraska, two people were killed in separate crashes, KETV news reported. One man died after his car was struck by a big rig when blizzard conditions smothered a Kansas highway, the Dodge City Daily Globe reported.

- AFP/jc

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DGCA violates own rule on pilots

NEW DELHI: In a gross violation of its own rules, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has senior management pilots from airlines working for it as seconded flight operations inspectors (FOIs).

This makes a mockery of a civil aviation requirement of the DGCA (Section 8, Series A, Part III, 6.1) which states that an FOI "shall have no management responsibilities in his airline nor in any way be associated with pilot associations/unions, etc. during his tenure, to avoid clash of interests".

These FOIs are mainly examiners in airlines, having at least 5,000 hours of flying. They're selected by a DGCA panel to help it with inspections of planes, route checks of pilots, etc.

Shockingly, out of the list of 19 seconded FOIs on DGCA's website, many hold managerial positions in airlines, as vice-presidents, general managers or chief pilots, making it a clear case of conflict of interest.

While these FOIs are supposed to inspect planes other than their own airlines, it isn't unusual for them to favour each other and their airlines and turn a Nelson's eye to snags, incidents and flight-time and duty-time limitation violations.

Arun Mishra, the DG of DGCA, claims that when his organization took some of these FOIs, they were non-management examiners but were promoted by the airline later. So why didn't the DGCA remove them then and infuse fresh blood? After all, their deputation is meant for two years. "We will relook this FOI issue," promised Mishra.

The post of seconded FOIs was formed in 2009. The DGCA has five FOIs of its own who are selected from AI and they check both scheduled and non-scheduled flights. But as this number was then grossly inadequate to inspect some 1,600 planes in India, the DGCA asked airlines to pitch in with their personnel. These pilots are paid by the airline and fly for it too. But airlines in a smart move have sent management pilots and can, therefore, do their bidding.

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