Sandra Bullock out in neighbor poll

Updated at 1200 PST Tuesday, December 28, 2010

NEW YORK: Americans would most like to live next door to actress Sandra Bullock in 2011, but the cast of the reality show "Jersey Shore" made the most undesirable neighbors, according to a poll released on Tuesday.

Bullock, who has won huge audiences with her All-American, girl-next-door image, earned more than a quarter of the vote in the annual poll on the most desirable celebrity neighbors, conducted by online real estate marketplace Zillow website.

She was followed by conservative Republican politician, Sarah Palin. That may bode well for people in Arizona as on Monday, headlines trumpeted the news that her daughter, Bristol Palin, had bought a home in the state.

President Barack Obama, his wife Michelle and daughters Malia and Sasha dropped three places to No. 4 on the list after coming out on top last year. They were proceeded by talk show hosts Ellen DeGeneres and wife Portia DeRossi at No. 3. Rounding out the top five was talk show host Conan O'Brien.

But the extroverted Italian-American cast of "Jersey Shore," which has scored impressive TV ratings and won fans with their fist pumps and tans, were voted the worst neighbors for 2010, followed again by the Obamas at No. 2 and Sarah Palin at No. 3.

"It was voyeuristic fun getting to know the 'Jersey Shore' crew as they partied and fist-pumped week after week on reality television, but do we want to live 'up close and personal' next door? Americans said 'no way,'" according to Zillow Vice President of Marketing and Communications Amy Bohutinsky.

Kanye West and Mel Gibson rounded up the top five worst neighbors in the No. 4 and No. 5 spots, respectively.

The survey asked U.S. adults which celebrities and politicians they would most like to be their neighbor, and with whom they wouldn't want to share a fence.

2,800 dancers set Guinness record

Updated at 1435 PST Tuesday, December 28, 2010

HYDERABAD (India): Over 2,800 Kuchipudi dancers performed the classical Indian dance at Hyderabad’s G M C Balayogi Stadium on Sunday, which created a new Guinness world record for the assembly of the largest number of such artistes.

President Pratibha Patil witnessed the mega event. Representative of the ‘Guinness Book of World Records’ announced the new world record has been created by over 2,800 Kuchipudi dancers, most of them children.

Dance was performed in ‘hindola raga’ for over 11minutes. The participants came from about 15 countries and from every town of Andhra Pradesh. Show was choreographed by veteran Kuchipudi exponent and Padma Bhushan recipient Vempati China Satyam.

Prominent Kuchipudi dancers Yamini Krishna Muthy, Sobha Naidu, and Raja and Radha Reddy were also involved in the event.

Polanski's ‘Ghost Writer’ tops Europe film awards

Updated at 1205 PST Sunday, December 05, 2010

LONDON: French-Polish director Roman Polanski's political thriller "The Ghost Writer" swept the European Film Awards on Saturday, picking up six prizes including best movie, director, actor and screenplay.

The annual awards, held this year in the Estonian capital Tallinn, also honoured Israeli war drama "Lebanon", shot almost entirely from inside a tank. Lebanon won the coveted Golden Lion at the Venice film festival in 2009.

Polanski, who spent several months this year under house arrest in Switzerland but avoided extradition to the United States in connection with a 1977 sex crime, did not attend the prize ceremony but appeared via Skype from his Paris home.

Polanski was named best director, the movie -- with a lead role loosely based on former British prime minister Tony Blair -- was best European film, its star Ewan McGregor picked up the best actor award and Polanski and Robert Harris won the best script writer category.

Following is a list of the main winners:

Best film - The Ghost Writer

Best director - Roman Polanski/The Ghost Writer

Best actress - Sylvie Testud/Lourdes

Best actor - Ewan McGregor/The Ghost Writer

Best screenwriter - Robert Harris and Roman Polanski/The Ghost Writer

Best cinematographer - Giora Bejach/Lebanon

Best editor - Luc Barnier and Marion Monnier/Carlos

Best production designer - Albrecht Konrad/The Ghost Writer

Best composer - Alexandre Desplat/The Ghost Writer

European discovery - Lebanon

Best documentary - Nostalgia de la Luz

Best animated feature - The Illusionist

Best short film - Hanoi - Warszawa

Lifetime achievement award - Bruno Ganz, actor

Achievement in world cinema - Gabriel Yared, composer

People choice - Mr. Nobody.

WikiLeaks memos no divine revelations: Qaira

Updated at 130 PST Sunday, December 05, 2010

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information Qamar Zaman Kaira, devaluing importance of US’s diplomatic cables leaked by WikiLeaks, has said the leaked documents are not sacred scriptures or divine revelations that those should be believed, Geo News reported.

Speaking to special children on the occasion of Disable People Day, Kaira said, “Relations of countries stand on ground realities instead of propositions.”

He was sure of keeping the ties with friendly countries on track despite disclosure of secret diplomatic cables of US.

The minister said government firmly believes to take N-League under confidence over RGST issue.

Karzai says WikiLeaks help ties with Pakistan

Updated at 0800 PST Sunday, December 05, 2010

KABUL: Leaked U.S. government cables critical of Afghanistan and Pakistan have helped bring the two nations together, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Saturday, dismissing their content as lies.

Karzai also hinted, at a joint news conference with visiting Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani, that outside agents may be working to destabilise the neighbours.

"Whatever the intention was of the WikiLeaks, they helped relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan, so in that sense the Wikileaks were good for us," Karzai said, without detailing how damaging allegations in the cables might have brought them together.

Karzai, who has recently been publicly critical of Western tactics in the fight against the Taliban, said ties with Islamabad were solid. "I can assure you that there is no trust deficit between Afghanistan and Pakistan," he told journalists.

Relations between the two countries have often been strained, particularly over links between Pakistan's intelligence service and the Afghan Taliban, and the involvement of Pakistan-based militants in the Afghan insurgency.

Karzai said both countries may be struggling against malign outside influences, questioning why U.S.-led foreign forces who helped topple the Taliban in 2001 were now struggling to make progress against insurgents.

"We have seen that terrorist attacks have increased in Afghanistan," he said. "Is it that all the (violent) activities carried out in Afghanistan are coming from Pakistan, or a broader conspiracy is working to destabilise both Pakistan and Afghanistan?"

Gilani also said the two nations had to work together.

"We are also suffering as Afghanistan is suffering. That means we should not go for a blame game; rather we should sit together and think about what should be the strategy," he said.

Karzai brushed off cables from WikiLeaks detailing widespread corruption in Afghanistan and harsh personal criticism from within his own cabinet, saying they were empty lies designed to undermine him.

Finance Minister Omar Zakhilwal described Karzai as an "extremely weak man," one cable dated February this year said.

"Negative words about me are not something new," Karzai said when asked about the cables. "They are defaming Zakhilwal."

Other cables released by WikiLeaks highlighted U.S. concerns over militancy in Pakistan and the safety of its nuclear weapons.

Four Pakistani Hajj pilgrims die in road mishap

Updated at 1050 PST Saturday, December 04, 2010

MADINA: At least four Pakistani Hajj pilgrims have reportedly died and 11 others injured when their bus collided with a trailer some 80km far from Madina, Geo News reported.

The victims identified as Muhammad Rehman, Iqbalan Bibi, Dil Khoban and Khaistani Bibi died on the spot. Eleven injured namely Imtiyaz Khan, Umer Khan, Shabnawaz Khan, Syed Khalil, Nasreen Bibi, Gul Azad, Awal Khanan, Sir Anjam Khan, Dilawar Janan and Dildari were rushed to King Fahad Hospital.

The driver of the bus, hailing from Egypt, was also seriously injured.

Iran losing ‘control' in Sistan-Balochistan province

Updated at 1310 PST Saturday, December 04, 2010

TEHRAN: Iran faces increased unrest in one of its southeastern provinces, U.S. diplomats in Azerbaijan reported in a cable disclosed by the website WikiLeaks.

A rail line connecting Iran and Pakistan "has recently been repeatedly subject to rocket attacks and other disruption" by tribes in Sistan-Balochistan province, according to a June 2009 cable from the U.S. Embassy in Baku.

In addition, one source told U.S. diplomats, Tehran was "rife with rumors" that police were leaving their posts empty at night "due to the increased danger of attack."

It added, "According to one source, the Iranian security forces may be losing effective control over growing areas in the countryside."

The document is among the vast cache of U.S. State Department papers that WikiLeaks, a website known for leaking official secrets, began releasing Sunday to widespread condemnation from the United States and its allies.

The cable cited another source who said the government of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad aggravated the situation by harassing Sunnis and appointing a "stupid, brutal" ally as governor until 2008.

"He claimed that these practices, combined with high unemployment, perceived discrimination and few government services, has increased anger among Balochis, and identification of the central government as an 'enemy,'" the cable states.

WikiLeaks website shut on US pressure

Updated at: 0915 PST, Thursday, December 02, 2010 WASHINGTON: The US struck its first blow against WikiLeaks after Amazon.com pulled the plug on hosting the whistleblowing website in reaction to heavy political pressure.

The company announced it was cutting WikiLeaks off yesterday only 24 hours after being contacted by the staff of Joe Lieberman, chairman of the Senate's committee on homeland security.

WikiLeaks expressed disappointment with Amazon, and insisted it was a breach of freedom of speech as enshrined in the US constitution's first amendment. The organisation, in a message sent via Twitter, said if Amazon was "so uncomfortable with the first amendment, they should get out of the business of selling books."

Russia forms world’s first nuclear fuel bank

Thursday, December 02, 2010

MOSCOW: Russia announced on Wednesday that it had created the world’s first international atomic fuel bank as part of a global effort to curb the spread of nuclear arms. The Rosatom state atomic energy corporation said the Siberian fuel reserve — which will operate under the auspices of the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) nuclear watchdog — will have enough material to refuel two civilian nuclear power plants. The Angarsk facility now stores 120 tonnes of low-enriched uranium (LEU) that has been enriched to between two and 4.95 per cent. Rosatom said one-third of the fuel was processed to the higher level. The fuel is considered safe because the weapons-grade uranium desired by nations seeking to build nuclear weapons must be enriched to at least 90 per cent. The IAEA approved the Russian reserve’s creation at a historic two-day meeting in November. It is meant to ensure stable fuel supplies to partner nations in case of disruptions of the international uranium enrichment services market. The type of fuel stored in Angarsk is used by most of today’s civilian nuclear power plants. The bank’s creation was first proposed in September 2007 by Russia amid Moscow fears that nuclear fuel supply cut-offs could used by developed nations for political purposes.

Airports closed as Europe shivers in fresh snowfalls

Thursday, December 02, 2010

LONDON: More heavy snowfalls forced the closure of some of Europe’s busiest airports and chaos on the roads on Wednesday as forecasters warned there would be no let-up in the freezing temperatures until next week. Temperatures dropped to as low as minus 18 degrees Celsius (minus 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit) in some parts of Germany, while driving rain in Italy triggered the collapse of two Roman walls in Pompeii and flooding in Venice. Britain, shivering in the earliest widespread snowfalls of winter since 1993, was one of the countries worst affected with two of its major transport hubs scrapping all flights. London’s Gatwick Airport, Europe’s eighth busiest passenger air hub, was shut until at least 0600 GMT on Thursday as staff worked to clear the two runways. Edinburgh Airport, Scotland’s busiest was also shut due to heavy snow showers. A spokeswoman for Gatwick said they had about six inches (15 centimetres) of snow to clear. “We brought in extra people to try to clear the runway.

Iran ready for N-talks

Thursday, December 02, 2010

KUWAIT CITY/TEHRAN: Iran is ready to negotiate its nuclear programme with Western powers, but will refuse to make any concessions, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on Wednesday. “We support talks, negotiations and dialogue,” Mottaki told a news conference in Kuwait City when asked about the resumption of talks on Tehran’s sensitive nuclear programme. “But this does not mean that we will make concessions or retreat from our principled position,” he said ahead of the resumption of the talks after a one-year hiatus, and following a fresh set of UN sanctions against Iran. The Geneva talks are aimed at allaying long-standing Western concerns that Iran’s nuclear programme masks a weapons drive under the guise of a civilian programme, something Tehran denies. “Developments in the international arena require negotiations and the Islamic republic is prepared to participate in those talks,” said Mottaki. “We hope to see a serious will for constructive talks... Undoubtedly, one of the issues to be discussed is the agenda” of talks, he added. The United States, Europe and Israel fear that Iran wants to use nuclear technology to build a bomb but Tehran insists that its programme is a peaceful drive to produce civilian energy. Iran is under four sets of UN sanctions over its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, the sensitive process which can be used to make nuclear fuel or, in highly extended form, the fissile core of an atom bomb. Mottaki said, however, the sanctions have in fact benefitted Iran. He said that five years ago before the sanctions, Iran was importing 70 per cent of spare parts for its key oil and gas sectors. Now, it is importing only 30 per cent and manufacturing the rest. Non-oil exports were worth just eight billion dollars before the sanctions, and today they are worth 30 billion dollars a year. Mottaki added that foreign investment in Iran reached unprecedented levels last year, without providing any figures. Sanctions notably ban investments in oil, gas and petrochemicals while also targeting banks, insurance, financial transactions and shipping — all of which Tehran has brushed off as having no impact. Meanwhile, Iranian atomic energy chief Ali Akbar Salehi said earlier on Wednesday that the assassination of a top nuclear scientist was a warning from the West ahead of new talks on Tehran’s programme. “These wicked people wanted to show their hideous side which demonstrates their carrot and stick policy in the run-up to the new nuclear talks,” state television’s website quoted Salehi as saying. He was speaking at the funeral of Majid Shahriari, the scientist who was killed by unidentified bombers in Tehran on Monday. Salehi did not specify the country he held responsible for the murder but other officials have pointed the finger at Iran’s arch-foes Israel and the United States. Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, who is to head his country’s delegation to the talks with the major powers in Geneva next week, hit out at Western governments as he joined the mourners. “They used all the capabilities at their disposal, like passing resolutions, imposing sanctions and piling on political pressure but they did not gain anything,” state television’s website quoted him as saying.

UK snow: roads and schools closed as more Arctic weather forecast

Heavy snow has caused transport disruption across the country, with commuters warned that further flurries will close roads and delay trains this afternoon.


By Nick Collins 12:10PM GMT 30 Nov 2010
16 Comments
Hundreds of schools were closed from Cornwall to Lincolnshire, as the Met Office issued severe weather and icy road warnings for most of Britain.
Drivers have been advised to take extra care after the bad weather was linked to a series of accidents, with one man killed and two injured in a collision off the M18 in South Yorkshire.
London also saw its first snow of the season as the blizzards moved south, causing delays on a number of train lines into the capital

Tuition fee protests: flares thrown as pupils as young as 13 march through London

Pupils as young as 13 have joined university students in another national day of action against tuition fee increases.

By Nick Collins 1:54PM GMT 30 Nov 2010

School and higher education students have gone on strike across the country, with demonstrations in cities including Sheffield, Leeds, Brighton, Birmingham, Glasgow and Edinburgh.

At the main protest in London, several thousand young people gathered for a rally in Trafalgar Square before marching towards the Palace of Westminster.

The march left its planned route after police tried to kettle protesters on Whitehall and at Parliament Square. Traffic was brought to a standstill demonstrators marched down Piccadilly towards Regent Street.

Medvedev: arms race will erupt if Russia cannot agree with West about missile defence

A new arms race will erupt if Russia cannot agree with the West about a joint European missile defence program, according to Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian President.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Photo: AFP

12:32PM GMT 30 Nov 2010

A Nato summit this month proposed an alliance missile-shield plan and invited Russia to participate. Questions remain about possible joint command of such a system.

"In the next 10 years, the following alternatives await us – either we reach agreement on missile defence and create a full joint co-operation mechanism, or, if we don't go into a constructive agreement, a new phase of the arms race will begin. And we will have to make a decision on deploying new means of attack," Mr Medvedev said in his annual state address.

Mr Medvedev has already endorsed the Nato proposal. Experts from both sides are meeting before the end of the year to consider linking Nato's and Russia's separate systems to provide a shield against incoming missiles from rogue nations, and deliver a report to defence ministers in July.

European Commission to probe Google search

Allegations that Google gives preferences to its own services and advertisers in search rankings will be formally investigated by the European Commission
By Matt Warman, Consumer Technology Editor 11:51AM GMT 30 Nov 2010
19 Comments
The European Commission is to investigate whether Google has abused its “dominant position in online search”. It will look into whether advertisers and Google’s own services receive preferential treatment in search rankings.
The Commission said “This initiation of proceedings does not imply that the Commission has proof of any infringements. It only signifies that the Commission will conduct an in-depth investigation of the case as a matter of priority.” A detailed timetable has not yet been laid out.
Allegations have been made by price comparison site foundem.co.uk, by Microsoft’s shopping site Ciao from Bing and French legal search engine ejustice.fr, who all suggest that their sites deserve higher rankings in search results.

Wahab, Kamran, Umar, Imran also involved in spot-fixing: Mazhar

Updated at: 1841 PST, Tuesday, November 30, 2010

KARACHI: Geo News Tuesday received a secret video of bookie Mazhar Majeed in which he disclosed that four more Pakistani cricketers Wahab Riaz, Kamran Akmal, Umar Akmal and Imran Farhat among suspended trio – Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamer – were involved in spot-fixing. The video also revealed Mazhar as saying that Shahid Afridi, Abdul Razzaq, Saeed Ajmal and Younis Khan are not involved in spot-fixing.

Damning Wikileaks secrets threaten Pak-Saudi relations

Monday, November 29, 2010

Called Zardari “a rotten head”; urged America to attack Iran; documents reveal why Pak-Saudi relations were so cold; US tried to take enriched uranium from Pakistan but failed; Saudi donors financing al-Qaeda; White House says leaks may put lives at risk

By Shaheen Sehbai WASHINGTON: Relations between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, two of the most important Islamic countries, appeared headed towards a serious crisis as secret cables unveiled by Wikileaks on Sunday quoted Saudi King Abdullah calling President Asif Ali Zardari as “the greatest obstacle to Pakistan’s progress”. As part of millions of documents dumped on the Internet, Wikileaks put one cable, which gave details of what King Abdullah really thought about President Zardari.Talking to an Iraqi official about the Iraqi PM Nuri Al-Maliki, King Abdullah said: “You and Iraq are in my heart, but that man is not.” “That man” was Asif Zardari. The king called the Pakistani president as “the greatest obstacle to that country’s progress. “When the head is rotten,” he said, “it affects the whole body.”The scathing remarks by the Saudi King explain why relations between Pakistan and the Saudi kingdom have remained cool and almost frozen during the current rule of the PPP. The reported feelings of the Saudi King about Zardari also explain, to some extent, why a Saudi member of the Royal family sent a scathing letter about corruption in the Pakistani Haj operations. President Zardari has not yet paid an official visit to Saudi Arabia on a Saudi invitation and the only visit he made was to perform Umra in which he also called on the Saudi King although he has visited so many other countries and quietly pays private visits to the UAE during weekends. The leaked cables also show that Pakistan had refused to allow the US to remove enriched Uranium from a research reactor. The documents revealed that since 2007, the US had been pressurising Pakistan to remove the Uranium through a highly secret effort, which had not been successful. In May 2009, US Ambassador Anne W Patterson reported that Pakistan was refusing to schedule a visit by American technical experts because, as a Pakistani official said, “If the local media got word of the fuel removal, ‘they certainly would portray it as the United States taking Pakistan’s nuclear weapons,’ he argued.” The cables revealed that Obama administration was trying to sort out its relations with Pakistan, which were marred by lack of trust. Obama is trying to figure out whether Pakistan was a trusted partner in the war on terror and against al-Qaeda. A cable shows the US was assessing whether a waiting rickshaw driver in Lahore was looking for passengers or conducting surveillance of the road to the American Consulate. Agencies add: Earlier, WikiLeaks unleashed a torrent of more than a quarter million confidential US cables detailing a wide array of potentially explosive diplomatic episodes, the New York Times said. It shows that King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia urged the US to attack Iran to destroy its nuclear programme. The memo showed that the king told the United States to “cut off the head of the snake,” and said that working with Washington to roll back Iranian influence in Iraq was “a strategic priority for the king and his government.” The newspaper reported details of a tense standoff with Pakistan over nuclear fuel, plans to reunite the Korean peninsula after the North’s eventual collapse, bazaar-like bargaining over the repatriation of Guantanamo Bay detainees and a Chinese government bid to hack into Google. The cables detail fresh suspicions about Afghan corruption, Saudi donors financing al-Qaeda, and the US failure to prevent Syria from providing a massive stockpile of weapons to the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon since 2006. US State Department documents released by WikiLeaks provided candid views of foreign leaders and sensitive information on terrorism and nuclear proliferation, the New York Times reported. The documents show Saudi donors remain chief financiers of militant groups like al Qaeda and that Chinese government operatives have waged a coordinated campaign of computer sabotage targeting the United States and its allies, according to a review of the WikiLeaks documents published in the Times. The WikiLeaks documents also show US Defense Secretary Robert Gates believes any military strike on Iran would only delay its pursuit of a nuclear weapon by one to three years, the Times reported on its website on Sunday. The Pentagon immediately condemned WikiLeaks’ “reckless” dump of classified State Department documents and said it was taking steps to bolster security of the US military networks. “The (Defense) Department has undertaken a series of actions to prevent such incidents from occurring in the future,” Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said. The White House angrily attacked the release of diplomatic cables by WikiLeaks as a “reckless and dangerous action” that puts lives at risk around the world. “To be clear — such disclosures put at risk our diplomats, intelligence professionals, and people around the world who come to the United States for assistance in promoting democracy and open government,” White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said in a statement. President Barack Obama “supports responsible, accountable, and open government at home and around the world, but this reckless and dangerous action runs counter to that goal,” he said. “We condemn in the strongest terms the unauthorized disclosure of classified documents and sensitive national security information,” he added. The White House said the leak of the diplomatic cables could compromise private discussions with foreign governments and opposition leaders and may put at risk the lives of named individuals living “under oppressive regimes.” The pending documents release had been widely reported for more than a week and expected on Sunday. The US government, which was informed in advance of the contents, has contacted governments around the world, including in Russia, Europe and the Middle East, to try to limit any damage. Sources familiar with the documents say they include corruption allegations against foreign leaders and governments. WikiLeaks had reported earlier on Sunday that its website was under attack, but said later that media outlets would publish some of the classified documents it had released even if the group’s website crashed. “El Pais, Le Monde, Speigel, Guardian & NYT will publish many US embassy cables tonight, even if WikiLeaks goes down,” the website said in a Twitter posting an hour after it tweeted that its site was under attack. The State Department had warned WikiLeaks that the expected release would endanger countless lives, jeopardize American military operations and hurt international cooperation on global security issues. The department’s top lawyer urged WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in a letter on Saturday to keep classified documents off the website, remove records of them from its database and return any material to the US government.

Saudi King called Zardari greatest obstacle to Pak progress: report

Updated at: 20 PST, Monday, November 29, 2010

NEW YORK: Saudi King Abdullah called President Asif Ali Zardari the greatest obstacle to Pakistan’s progress, according to an online report of New York Times that quoted Wikileaks as saying. The report further quoted King Abdullah as saying: “When the head is rotten, it affects the whole body.” The cables released by Wikileaks, the whistle-blower, disclose that aging monarch of Saudi Arabia, King Abdullah, as speaking scathingly about the leaders of Iraq and Pakistan. Speaking to another Iraqi official about Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, King Abdullah said, “You and Iraq are in my heart, but that man is not.” The king called President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan the greatest obstacle to that country’s progress. “When the head is rotten,” he said, “it affects the whole body.”