Berlusconi fraud trial delayed until after election






ROME: An Italian court on Friday ruled to postpone Silvio Berlusconi's appeal against a tax fraud conviction until after the election on February 24-25 following a request from lawyers for the scandal-tainted former premier.

Prosecutors will present their final arguments against the business tycoon at a hearing on March 1 and the final verdict is expected on March 23.

Berlusconi, who is running for a parliamentary seat in the vote, was convicted in October last year for fraud linked to his business empire Mediaset.

He was sentenced to one year prison and given a five-year ban from holding public office.

The sentence has been suspended pending his appeal.

Berlusconi's lawyers said their client planned to make a speech at the hearing on March 1.

The 76-year-old media tycoon and three-time prime minister, who has been a central figure in Italian politics for two decades, has been involved in dozens of court cases.

All previous convictions against him have either been overturned on appeal or the trials have expired under the statute of limitations.

Berlusconi is also a defendant in another trial for having sex with an underage prostitute and abusing the powers of his office when he was prime minister.

In both trials, Berlusconi's lawyers have argued the court cases should be suspended because he cannot attend hearings during the campaign.

A verdict in the sex trial is expected after the election.

-AFP/fl



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Govt attacks CAG Vinod Rai for criticizing it on foreign soil

CHENNAI: Slamming the CAG for criticizing the government on foreign soil, information and broadcasting minister Manish Tewari on Friday said constitutional authorities should circumscribe by lakshman rekha propriety.

"... it is most unfortunate that C and AG rather than validating the integrity of his numbers (on 2G presumptive loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crore) chooses to criticize the Government on foreign soil and at a foreign fora," Manish Tewari told reporters here.

He was responding to questions about CAG Vinod Rai's remarks at Harvard Kennedy School on Thursday rebutting criticism that he was exceeding the mandate and saying that the auditor was treading a "new path in the belief that the final stakeholder is the public at large".

"... The question is about the integrity of numbers. Our question to Mr C and AG, where is the 1.76 lakh crore (loss), still continues to hang in the air," Tewari said.

He said this was not the first time he (the CAG) had done it (criticizing the government). "And this is not the first time that he has done it, I think constitutional authorities, you know, should circumscribe by the lakshman rekha propriety."

Delivering a lecture at the Harvard Kennedy, Rai, whose reports on various scams had raised hackles of those in government, had said the CAG would endeavour to uncover instances of crony capitalism and counselled the government to support enterprises per se and not entrepreneurs.

"We may not be able to wipe out corruption, but our endeavour is to uncover instances of crony capitalism. Government should be seen to support enterprise per se and not particular entrepreneurs," Rai, who has come under government criticism for reports on various scams like in telecom and coal, said.

Asked about European Union raising the issue of accountability for 2002 Gujarat riots, Tewari said he wondered why chief minister Narendra Modi could not stand up and take responsibility as it happened under his watch rather than India being subjected to these homilies from foreign diplomats." I think, there is a certain ignominy attached to it."

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Southern diet, fried foods, may raise stroke risk


Deep-fried foods may be causing trouble in the Deep South. People whose diets are heavy on them and sugary drinks like sweet tea and soda were more likely to suffer a stroke, a new study finds.


It's the first big look at diet and strokes, and researchers say it might help explain why blacks in the Southeast — the nation's "stroke belt" — suffer more of them.


Blacks were five times more likely than whites to have the Southern dietary pattern linked with the highest stroke risk. And blacks and whites who live in the South were more likely to eat this way than people in other parts of the country were. Diet might explain as much as two-thirds of the excess stroke risk seen in blacks versus whites, researchers concluded.


"We're talking about fried foods, french fries, hamburgers, processed meats, hot dogs," bacon, ham, liver, gizzards and sugary drinks, said the study's leader, Suzanne Judd of the University of Alabama in Birmingham.


People who ate about six meals a week featuring these sorts of foods had a 41 percent higher stroke risk than people who ate that way about once a month, researchers found.


In contrast, people whose diets were high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains and fish had a 29 percent lower stroke risk.


"It's a very big difference," Judd said. "The message for people in the middle is there's a graded risk" — the likelihood of suffering a stroke rises in proportion to each Southern meal in a week.


Results were reported Thursday at an American Stroke Association conference in Honolulu.


The federally funded study was launched in 2002 to explore regional variations in stroke risks and reasons for them. More than 20,000 people 45 or older — half of them black — from all 48 mainland states filled out food surveys and were sorted into one of five diet styles:


Southern: Fried foods, processed meats (lunchmeat, jerky), red meat, eggs, sweet drinks and whole milk.


—Convenience: Mexican and Chinese food, pizza, pasta.


—Plant-based: Fruits, vegetables, juice, cereal, fish, poultry, yogurt, nuts and whole-grain bread.


—Sweets: Added fats, breads, chocolate, desserts, sweet breakfast foods.


—Alcohol: Beer, wine, liquor, green leafy vegetables, salad dressings, nuts and seeds, coffee.


"They're not mutually exclusive" — for example, hamburgers fall into both convenience and Southern diets, Judd said. Each person got a score for each diet, depending on how many meals leaned that way.


Over more than five years of follow-up, nearly 500 strokes occurred. Researchers saw clear patterns with the Southern and plant-based diets; the other three didn't seem to affect stroke risk.


There were 138 strokes among the 4,977 who ate the most Southern food, compared to 109 strokes among the 5,156 people eating the least of it.


There were 122 strokes among the 5,076 who ate the most plant-based meals, compared to 135 strokes among the 5,056 people who seldom ate that way.


The trends held up after researchers took into account other factors such as age, income, smoking, education, exercise and total calories consumed.


Fried foods tend to be eaten with lots of salt, which raises blood pressure — a known stroke risk factor, Judd said. And sweet drinks can contribute to diabetes, the disease that celebrity chef Paula Deen — the queen of Southern cuisine — revealed she had a year ago.


The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, drugmaker Amgen Inc. and General Mills Inc. funded the study.


"This study does strongly suggest that food does have an influence and people should be trying to avoid these kinds of fatty foods and high sugar content," said an independent expert, Dr. Brian Silver, a Brown University neurologist and stroke center director at Rhode Island Hospital.


"I don't mean to sound like an ogre. I know when I'm in New Orleans I certainly enjoy the food there. But you don't have to make a regular habit of eating all this stuff."


___


Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP


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Door-to-Door Search for Suspected Cop Killer













More than 100 police officers were going door-to-door and searching for new tracks in the snow in hopes of catching suspected cop-killer Christopher Dorner overnight in Big Bear Lake, Calif., before he strikes again, as laid out in his rambling online manifesto.


Police late Thursday night alerted the residents near Big Bear Lake that Dorner was still on the loose after finding his truck burning earlier in the day.


San Bernardino County Sheriff's spokeswoman Cindy Bachman said authorities can't say for certain that he's not in the area. More than half of the 400 homes in the area had been searched by police as of late Thursday. Police traveled in two-man teams.


Bachman urged people in the area not to answer the door, unless they know the person or see a law enforcement officer in uniform.


After discovering Dorner's burning truck near a Bear Mountain ski resort, police discovered tracks in the snow leading away from the vehicle. The truck has been taken to the San Bernardino County Sheriffs' crime lab.


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Bachman would not comment on Dorner's motive for leaving the car or its contents, citing the ongoing investigation. Police are not aware of Dorner's having any ties to others in the area.








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She added that the search in the area would continue as long as the weather cooperates. About three choppers were being used overnight, but weather conditions were deteriorating, according to Bachman.


"He could be anywhere at this point," said San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon, who is expected to address the media later this morning.


Dorner, 33, a former Los Angeles police officer and Navy reservist, is suspected of killing one police officer and injured two others Thursday morning in Riverside, Calif. He was also accused of killing two civilians Sunday. And he allegedly released an angry "manifesto" airing grievances against police and warning of coming violence toward cops.


In the manifesto Dorner published online, he threatened at least 12 people by name, along with their families.
"Your lack of ethics and conspiring to wrong a just individual are over. Suppressing the truth will leave to deadly consequences for you and your family," Dorner wrote in his manifesto.


One passage from the manifesto read, "I will bring unconventional and asymmetrical warfare to those in LAPD uniform whether on or off duty."


"I never had the opportunity to have a family of my own," it read. "I'm terminating yours."


Hours after the extensive manhunt dragged police to Big Bear Lake, CNN's Anderson Cooper said Dorner had sent him a package at his New York office that arrived Feb. 1, although Cooper said he never knew about the package until Thursday. It contained a DVD of court testimony, with a Post-It note signed by Dorner claiming, "I never lied! Here is my vindication."


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It also contained a keepsake coin bearing the name of former Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton that came wrapped in duct tape, Cooper said. The duct tape bore the note, "Thanks, but no thanks Will Bratton."


Bratton told Cooper on his program, "Anderson Cooper 360," that he believed he gave Dorner the coin as he was headed overseas for the Navy, Bratton's practice when officers got deployed abroad. Though a picture has surfaced of Bratton, in uniform, and Dorner, in fatigues, shaking hands, Bratton told Cooper he didn't recall Dorner or the meeting.






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Khamenei rejects offer of direct talks with U.S.


DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran's highest authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on Thursday rejected an offer of direct talks made by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden this week, saying they would not solve the problems between them, Iranian media reported.


"Some naive people like the idea of negotiating with America, however, negotiations will not solve the problems," Khamenei said in a speech to officials and members of Iran's aerospace force, IRIB reported.


"If some people want American rule to be established again in Iran, the nation will rise up to face them," he said.


"American policy in the Middle East has been destroyed and Americans now need to play a new card. That card is dragging Iran into negotiations."


Khamenei made his comments just days after Joe Biden said the United States was prepared to meet bilaterally with the Iranian leadership. "That offer stands but it must be real and tangible," Biden said in a speech in Munich.


Relations between Iran and the United States were severed in 1979 after the overthrow of Iran's pro-western monarchy and diplomatic meetings between officials have since been very rare.


Currently U.S.-Iran contact is limited to talks between Tehran and a so-called P5+1 group of powers on Iran's disputed nuclear program which are to resume on February 26 in Kazakhstan.


Many believe no deal on settling the nuclear issue is possible without a U.S.-Iranian thaw. But any rapprochement would require direct talks addressing many sources of mutual mistrust that have lingered since Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution and the subsequent U.S. embassy hostage crisis in Tehran.


Moreover, although his re-election last November may give President Barack Obama a freer hand to pursue direct negotiations, analysts say Iran's own presidential election in June may prove an additional obstacle to progress being made.


(Reporting By Marcus George; Editing by Jon Boyle)



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WP's call to freeze foreign manpower growth will hurt S'poreans: Tan Chuan-Jin






SINGAPORE: Acting Manpower Minister Tan Chuan-Jin has said that the opposition Workers' Party's proposal for a zero-foreign manpower growth in this decade, when put in practice, will hurt Singaporeans.

Speaking in Parliament on Thursday on the Population White Paper, Mr Tan noted that in fact, the strategies outlined in the paper has opted for slower growth and a significant reduction in the foreign labour force numbers.

He noted Singapore cannot continue on the same growth trajectory as before but what it needs to decide on is the pace of growth that will bring benefits to citizens.

And in achieving this, he said the country will need to transit carefully.

Mr Tan said the Workers' Party's decision to freeze the foreign labour force growth rate immediately is an "alarming" one.

He also asked for details on how the opposition party proposes to keep the foreign workforce growth rate at 1 per cent for the next decade, especially when there are limits to how much the resident labour force participation rate can grow, with an ageing population.

Mr Tan also rejected the Workers' Party's proposal that the government could dip into the country's reserves to help fund the productivity efforts of businesses.

He said the government needs to be careful when dealing with the reserves and that this "is not a rainy day".

"Singaporeans have also indicated a desire to slow down because they feel that pace of growth, because we have crossed that physical and social threshold. We cannot continue on as before. We can't.

"And we are also at a stage, from a profile perspective, different stage of economic development. This is where we need to change in terms of the direction we are going. So the White Paper is the product of this desire to get it right and chart the course for the future," Mr Tan said.

- CNA/ck



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DMK leader Kushboo's house in Chennai attacked by party workers

CHENNAI: Actor-turned politician Kushboo's house was attacked by her own partymen after a Tamil magazine, which carried her remarks about party's heir-apparent and DMK treasurer MK Stalin, hit the stands on Thursday.

The Chennai police said about 25 DMK youth wing cadres gathered in front of Kushboo's residence in Santhome in the city and raised slogans against her.

Later they threw stones at her house, damaging the window panes and a car parked in the portico.

At the time of the attack, the actor and her husband Sundar were not in the house. She was away in Trichy to attend the marriage function of DMK Rajya Sabha MP Siva's daughter. Some cadres also protested in front of the Trichy hotel where she was staying.

"We cannot say who is responsible for the attack now. Only after police investigation, we can say definitely who is behind the attack," Kushboo told reporters in Trichy.

In an interview to a Tamil weekly, Kushboo, when asked about Stalin's possible elevation within the DMK, said the party general council will choose a successor and just because DMK chief M Karunanidhi announced Stalin as his successor, it cannot be taken as the final word.

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New whooping cough strain in US raises questions


NEW YORK (AP) — Researchers have discovered the first U.S. cases of whooping cough caused by a germ that may be resistant to the vaccine.


Health officials are looking into whether cases like the dozen found in Philadelphia might be one reason the nation just had its worst year for whooping cough in six decades. The new bug was previously reported in Japan, France and Finland.


"It's quite intriguing. It's the first time we've seen this here," said Dr. Tom Clark of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.


The U.S. cases are detailed in a brief report from the CDC and other researchers in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.


Whooping cough is a highly contagious disease that can strike people of any age but is most dangerous to children. It was once common, but cases in the U.S. dropped after a vaccine was introduced in the 1940s.


An increase in illnesses in recent years has been partially blamed on a version of the vaccine used since the 1990s, which doesn't last as long. Last year, the CDC received reports of 41,880 cases, according to a preliminary count. That included 18 deaths.


The new study suggests that the new whooping cough strain may be why more people have been getting sick. Experts don't think it's more deadly, but the shots may not work as well against it.


In a small, soon-to-be published study, French researchers found the vaccine seemed to lower the risk of severe disease from the new strain in infants. But it didn't prevent illness completely, said Nicole Guiso of the Pasteur Institute, one of the researchers.


The new germ was first identified in France, where more extensive testing is routinely done for whooping cough. The strain now accounts for 14 percent of cases there, Guiso said.


In the United States, doctors usually rely on a rapid test to help make a diagnosis. The extra lab work isn't done often enough to give health officials a good idea how common the new type is here, experts said.


"We definitely need some more information about this before we can draw any conclusions," the CDC's Clark said.


The U.S. cases were found in the past two years in patients at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children in Philadelphia. One of the study's researchers works for a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, which makes a version of the old whooping cough vaccine that is sold in other countries.


___


JournaL: http://www.nejm.org


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Chris Christie's Struggle and the Politics of Weight













New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's weight is back in the spotlight this week. On Monday he joined in on the fat jokes with David Letterman, even munching on a doughnut; on Tuesday he seriously addressed his struggles at a press conference.


The usually tough-talking 50-year-old Republican openly acknowledged that he may have good health right now, but his "doctor continues to warn me that my luck is going to run out relatively soon, so believe me, it's something I'm very conscious of."


"If you talk to anybody in this room who has struggled with their weight, what they will tell you is that every month, every year there's a plan … and so the idea that somehow I don't care about this, of course I care about it, and I'm making the best effort I can and sometimes I'm successful and other times I'm not," Christie said at a firehouse Tuesday in Union Beach, N.J.


And with those honest words, an issue that was in the public eye as he contemplated a presidential run in 2012 came roaring back into the spotlight. His communications office even tweeted out the clip from his official @GovChristie Twitter account.


Despite what he claims is good health, he did spend several hours in the hospital in July 2011 after an asthma attack, which he blamed on humidity and high temperatures.








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Christie is far from the only politician who's dealt with a weight issue. Former Arkansas governor and presidential candidate, now-Fox News host Mike Huckabee lost over 100 pounds before he ran for president, talking openly and even writing a book about how he went from "zero exercise" to running marathons. President Bill Clinton lost weight in office, but dramatically slimmed down after his heart surgery in 2004, even becoming vegan before his daughter Chelsea's 2010 wedding. Former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour once said that it would be clear he was running for president if he lost 40 pounds. Even Dr. Regina Benjamin, President Obama's pick for surgeon general, had to endure criticism that, despite her experience and credentials, she was too overweight for the job.


This past week is hardly the first time Christie has addressed the issue. Last December, in her "10 Most Fascinating People of 2012? ABC News' Barbara Walters, the governor defended his health when he told Walters, "Well, I've done this job pretty well and I think people watched me for the last couple weeks and during Hurricane Sandy doing 18-hour days and getting right back up the next day and still being just as effective, so I don't really think that would be a problem."


Even during his 2009 run for the New Jersey governorship he had to endure his opponent's trying to use his weight against him. Then Gov. Jon Corzine ran an ad that ended with Christie stepping out of a car in slow-motion. The ad also accused him of "throwing his weight around" to get out of a traffic ticket. It was widely panned and political observers, as well as polling, thought it contributed to Corzine's loss.


But politically speaking, the issue may not be as bad as is widely assumed. Two thirds of Americans struggle with their weight and one third are obese. Also, in 2010 political scientist Beth J. Miller and psychologist Jennifer D. Lundgren, of the University of Missouri in Kansas City, published research showing that being overweight did hurt political candidates, but only female ones.


Obese women were evaluated most negatively, but obese men came out well, doing even better than thinner men.






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Tsunami kills at least five in Solomons after big Pacific quake


(Reuters) - A powerful 8.0 magnitude earthquake set off a tsunami that killed at least five people in a remote part of the Solomon Islands on Wednesday and triggered evacuations across the South Pacific as island nations issued tsunami alerts.


The quake struck 340 km (211 miles) east of Kira Kira in the Solomons, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii said as it issued warnings for the Solomons and other South Pacific nations including Australia and New Zealand. It later canceled the warnings for the outlying regions.


A tsunami measuring 0.9 metres (three feet) hit near the town of Lata on the remote Santa Cruz island, swamping some villages and the town's main airport as people fled to safety on higher ground.


More than three dozen aftershocks up to magnitude 6.6 rocked the region in the hours after the quake, the U.S. Geological Survey said.


Lata hospital's director of nursing, Augustine Pilve, told New Zealand television that five people had been killed, including a boy about 10 years old, adding that more casualties were possible as officials made their way to at least three villages that may have been hit.


"It's more likely that other villages along the coast of Santa Cruz may be affected," he said.


Disaster officials in the Solomon Islands capital Honiara told the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corp. that they believed six people were dead and that five villages had suffered damage.


Solomon Islands Police Commissioner John Lansley said it was too early to fully assess the damage or casualty numbers, and said authorities hoped to send aircraft to the region on Thursday to help determine the extent of the damage.


Luke Taula, a fisheries officer in Lata, said he watched the tsunami as it came in small tidal surges rather than as one large wave.


"We have small waves come in, then go out again, then come back in. The waves have reached the airport terminal," he told Reuters by telephone.


The worst damage was to villages on the western side of a point that protects the main township, he said.


"There are reports that some communities have been badly hit, their houses have been damaged by the waves."


About 5,000 people lived in and around the town, but the area was deserted as people fled to higher ground, Taula said.


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The Solomons, perched on the geologically active "Pacific Ring of Fire", were hit by a devastating tsunami following an 8.1 magnitude quake in 2007. At least 50 people were killed then and dozens left missing and more than 13 villages destroyed.


"It's an area that is very prone to earthquakes," said Jonathan Bathgate, seismologist at Geoscience Australia. "We've had seven 6-plus magnitude earthquakes in this region since January 31, so it has been very active in the past week."


Initial signs were that the tremor was a thrust quake, in which vertical movement in the continental plates generates higher risk of tsunami, Bathgate added.


Authorities in the Solomons, Fiji, Guam and elsewhere had urged residents to higher ground before the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center canceled its alerts.


"The earthquake would have to be quite a bit bigger to make a much more sizeable tsunami," said Brian Shiro, geophysicist for the center in Hawaii.


(Reporting by James Grubel in CANBERRA,; Additional reporting by Michael Perry and Lincoln Feast in SYDNEY and Alex Dobuzinskis in LOS ANGELES)



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