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Chinese officials punished for demolition

Written By Unknown on Sabtu, 08 Desember 2012 | 21.29

CHINESE state media say 17 officials and workers have been punished after two people died during the forced demolition of a building.

The official Xinhua News Agency says a cement board fell from the illegally constructed building as it was being demolished on Friday in Renhuai city in southwest China's Guizhou province, killing two workers and injuring three others.

Xinhua said on Saturday that local residents carried the bodies to the city government building, causing a disturbance.

It said three officials were criminally detained for dereliction of duty, five others were suspended, and nine workers involved in the demolition were detained.

Forced demolition is common in China, as local governments try to remake their cities, but it is rare for officials or demolition workers to be punished.


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Attack planned in Pakistan: Karzai

AFGHAN President Hamid Karzai says a suicide attack that wounded the country's spy chief was planned in neighbouring Pakistan.

Asadullah Khalid, who heads the National Directorate of Security (NDS), was targeted by an attacker with a bomb hidden in his underwear posing as a Taliban peace envoy in Kabul on Thursday.

Karzai said he believed the attacker had come from Pakistan, but he did not blame the Pakistani government over the bombing.

"We know that this man who came in the name of a guest to meet with Asadullah Khalid came from Pakistan. We know that for a fact. That is clear," Karzai told reporters.

"This attack was plotted... from the (southwestern) city of Quetta in Pakistan."

"I will raise this issue with Pakistan," he added.

Khalid was attacked at a spy agency guesthouse and is now being treated at a US-run military hospital outside Kabul where he is in a stable condition, security sources have said.

On Friday, the NDS said that he was "recovering" and in a "satisfactory" condition.


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Gazans mass for Hamas anniversary

MORE than 100,000 Palestinians have gathered in Gaza for a rally marking the 25th anniversary of Hamas to be addressed by the ruling Islamist movement's leader in exile.

Politburo chief Khaled Meshaal crossed from Egypt on Friday on his first ever visit to Gaza and his first to the Palestinian territories since 1975.

His speech was set to be the headline event of the rally.

Meshaal arrived at the main stage in the al-Qitaba complex west of Gaza City which was transformed into a sea of green Hamas flags.

He was accompanied by his deputy Mussa Abu Marzuk and Gaza's Hamas premier Ismail Haniya.

The celebrations come just over two weeks after an Egyptian-brokered truce ended eight days of bloodshed with Israel which left 174 Palestinians dead.

"We used only 10 per cent of our capacity in the fighting," a masked spokesman for Hamas military wing the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades told the crowd.

"If you had escalated (your attacks), so would we have," he told Israel.

"We will cut the hand that extends in aggression against our people and leaders."

A spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Ofir Gendelman, retorted on Twitter that Hamas was celebrating "25 years of murdering Israelis by rockets & suicide bombings, as well as executing Fatah members & violating Pal human rights".

Fatah is the rival Palestinian faction of president Mahmud Abbas and his West Bank-based administration.

Around the rally venue, security forces were out in strength, closing off nearby roads from the early hours.

Dozens of masked members of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades kept watch from surrounding rooftops.

Huge portraits of Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, assassinated by Israel in 2004, and Hamas military commander Ahmed Jaabari, assassinated by Israel on November 14 this year, were on the main stage.

Between the portraits was a model of an M75 rocket of the sort fired at Israeli cities during last month's conflict that began with Jaabari's assassination.

On the backdrop was a model of Jerusalem's golden-domed al-Aqsa mosque, which appears on the Hamas emblem.

Head of Hamas public activity Ashraf Abu Zaed said he expected more than 200,000 people to participate in the anniversary celebrations, which were also being held in other Gaza towns.

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum said that at least 3000 people from Arab and Muslim states had arrived in Gaza in recent days to attend the events.

Founded in 1987 shortly after the start of the first Palestinian intifada, or uprising, Hamas was inspired by Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood.

Its charter calls for the eventual destruction of Israel and the establishment of an Islamic state on the pre-1948 borders of the British Palestine Mandate.

In 2006, Hamas won a landslide general election victory, routing Abbas' long-dominant Fatah.

Some 18 months later, Hamas ousted Fatah forces from Gaza after several weeks of running street battles.

Speaking in Gaza on Friday, Meshaal promised to "walk down the route of reconciliation, bury the division (with Fatah) and empower unity in order to be aligned as one in the face of the Zionist entity," Israel.


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Taiwan finance 'titan' Koo dies at 79

TAIWANESE tycoon Jeffrey L.S. Koo, head of a leading financial group and one of the island's richest men, has died at the age of 79, his company says.

Koo, chairman of Chinatrust Financial Holding Co, died at a hospital in New York on Thursday, his company said without identifying the cause of death.

"Chairman Koo was a titan in Taiwan's economy, trade and diplomacy," President Ma Ying-jeou's office said in a statement.

"Koo had countless friends in the United States, Japan and other Asian countries and he effectively helped the government promote trade and diplomacy... President Ma was deeply saddened by his death."

An influential business leader fluent in English and Japanese, Koo was appointed a presidential adviser in 1996 and an ambassador-at-large in 1998 by former president Lee Teng-hui to help promote Taiwan internationally.

Koo, from one of Taiwan's most prominent and richest families, was credited with helping stabilise ties with Washington when it switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979.

Koo's late uncle Koo Chen-fu had served as Taiwan's top negotiator with China while he accompanied former vice president Lien Chan on a landmark visit to China in 2005 to promote peace with the mainland.

Koo's business empire included petrochemicals, cement, construction and telecommunications.

Koo is survived by his wife Koo Lin Jui-hui, three sons and a daughter.


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Pakistani Taliban recruits via Facebook

Written By Unknown on Jumat, 07 Desember 2012 | 21.29

THE Pakistani Taliban has set up a page on Facebook to recruit enthusiasts to write for a quarterly magazine and to edit video, a spokesman confirmed.

The Umar Media TTP page, which has more than 270 likes, appears to have been created in September and has just a handful of messages written in English.

"Umar Media is proud to announce online jobs oppertunities (sic)," says the first post on the networking website, written on October 25.

"Job discription (sic) is video editing, translations, sharing, uploading, downloading and collection of required data," it says, giving an email address and asking readers to "plz spread it. This fb account ma be deleted."

Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan confirmed to AFP by telephone on Friday that the faction was "temporarily" using the page "to fulfil its requirements" before launching its own website.

US-based organisation SITE Intelligence Group says the TTP uses Facebook as "a recruitment centre".

"Through its official media arm, Umar Media, the TTP has taken to Facebook to recruit contributors for their media work and the group's forthcoming publication 'Ayah-E-Khilafat' (Sign of the Caliphate)," it said in a statement.

The TTP Facebook page describes the publication as its "official quarterly magazine" and asks writers to submit articles "on (a) topic of your choice", or on jihadi current affairs, history, Islamic movements or the plight of Muslims.

Last month, the TTP claimed responsibility for planting a bomb under the car of a prominent Pakistani journalist and TV anchorman, Hamid Mir.

Mir had been criticised by the Taliban after the faction claimed responsibility for shooting teenage activist Malala Yousafzai in October.


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Man arrested after Vic stabbing and siege

A MAN who fled during the 10 minutes it took police to cordon off a Melbourne home following a stabbing will face court on Monday.

Police were preparing to storm a house in St Albans where another man, 52, was believed to have been stabbed in the neck.

Inspector Mick Grainger said police had been negotiating with the man, but he was gone when they entered the house in Grant Street.

Insp Grainger said the man may have given police the slip during the 10 minutes it took to cordon off the scene.

"I believe there's a chance he may have left before we managed to put our cordon in place," he told reporters.

"If he did leave in that time, it was in that 10 minutes prior to having that full cordon established."

Police were called to the house about 7.30am (AEDT) on Friday.

A 34-year-old Murrumbeena man was arrested in Sunshine at 4.30pm (AEDT) and later charged with offences including intentionally causing serious injury and possessing a drug of dependence.

He was remanded to appear in the Melbourne Magistrates' Court on Monday.

The injured man was taken to Sunshine Hospital in a serious but non-life threatening condition.

Police said the stabbing happened after a domestic dispute.


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Obama aide shaves mustache for charity

SENIOR adviser to US President Barack Obama David Axelrod shaved his trademark mustache - a rarity in official Washington - live on TV Friday after raising $US1 million for epilepsy research.

"We're cutting it off because there are people who have lost a lot more than a mustache to epilepsy," said Mr Axelrod, as he prepared to loose his lip hair live on the MSNBC news show Morning Joe.

Mr Axelrod, 57, who has had a mustache for 40 years, was saved from a hack job when the TV hosts stepped aside and let a professional barber with a straight razor do the job.

One of the first donations in the challenge came from a surprising source: real estate mogul Donald Trump, a fierce Obama critic.

"We agree this is a good cause," Mr Trump said in a phone call to the show.

Other donors included actors George Clooney, Tom Hanks and millionaire and basketball team owner Mark Cuban.

Just days before the election Axelrod appeared on the Morning Joe show and vowed to shave his iconic mustache if Mr Obama lost the key states of Michigan, Minnesota or Pennsylvania in the November 6 vote.

Mr Obama carried the states, so he later promised to shave for charity.

The money goes to the Citizens United for Research in Epilepsy (CURE), a group headed by Axelrod's wife Susan Landau. Axelrod also has a daughter who suffers from epilepsy.


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US unemployment rate falls to 7.7 pc

THE US economy added a solid 146,000 jobs in November and the unemployment rate fell to 7.7 per cent, the lowest since December 2008.

The US government said Superstorm Sandy had only a minimal effect on the figures.

The US Labour Department report offered a mixed picture for the economy.

Hiring remained steady during the storm and in the face of looming tax increases.

But the government said employers added 49,000 fewer jobs in October and September than initially estimated. And the unemployment rate fell from 7.9 per cent in October mostly because more people stopped looking for work and weren't counted as unemployed.

Still, there were signs that the storm disrupted economic activity. Construction employment dropped 20,000. And weather prevented 369,000 people from getting to work. They were still counted as employed.


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ECB holds rates, holds off on more easing

Written By Unknown on Kamis, 06 Desember 2012 | 21.29

THE European Central Bank (ECB) has left its key interest rate unchanged at a record low, holding off on further stimulus even as the economy across the 17 European Union countries that use the euro limps through a recession.

The bank's 22-member governing council on Thursday kept the refinancing rate unchanged at 0.75 per cent. The rate determines what private-sector banks are charged for borrowing from the ECB, and through that what rate the banks set for their businesses and consumer clients.

Markets are now waiting for a news conference by President Mario Draghi, who is expected to announce the bank is cutting its growth forecast for next year.

A rate reduction in theory could stimulate the eurozone's economy by making it easier to borrow, spend and invest. But rates are already low, and borrowing remains weak. There are only a few early signs that previous rate cuts and stimulus measures are finally trickling through to the wider economy.

The eurozone economy shrank 0.1 per cent in the third quarter and is expected to fall further in the last three months of the year. Market analysts expect the ECB to cut its growth forecast for next year to around zero from 0.5 per cent in September, bringing its outlook in line with 0.1 per cent predicted by the European Union's executive arm, the Commission.

Some analysts think the bank may now consider it has done enough to help the economy after a year of drastic measures. The most important was an offer to buy unlimited amounts of bonds issued by of Europe's heavily indebted countries.

The bond purchase plan announced in September has helped stabilise the eurozone debt crisis. The purchases would aim to drive down bond interest rates, which would lower borrowing costs for indebted countries such as Spain and Italy and make it easier for them to carry their debt loads.

Although no bonds have been bought, the mere possibility has influenced the bond market and for now pushed borrowing costs back to sustainable levels for those two countries.

But while governments are breathing easier, that hasn't restarted growth. While some business confidence indicators are beginning to rise and the supply of money in the economy is increasing, consumer spending sagged 1.2 per cent in October.


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Hugh Jackman still eyes 007 role

HUGH Jackman is ready to don a tux and sip a martini with the Aussie screen star joking that he is willing to wait for his chance to play famous fictitious British spy James Bond.

Jackman, 44, said he was too busy playing Wolverine in the X-Men series in 2006 when he was approached to take on the 007 part.

Instead Briton Daniel Craig, 44, got the gun and has now made three Bond films.

"At the time it was wrong for me, but when I saw Daniel in the movie I thought maybe I should have been more interested, because it was great," Jackman told British newspaper The Sun.

"But I am great mates with Daniel. When he was in Australia we caught up and, you know, no one could have played Bond better."

But the Sydneysider has not given up on the chance to serve Her Majesty's secret service and took a swipe at his mate's unflattering physique.

"I will just wait," he quipped. "The good thing about Daniel is he's, what, 62 now, isn't he? He's falling apart at the seams. So I just keep telling him, 'I'm ready, whenever you want to let him (Bond) go, I'm ready.'

"The good thing is I have also got a British passport."


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China car sales on track for record: GM

US car giant General Motors (GM) says its full-year sales in China, the world's biggest auto market, will surpass last year's 2.55 million and set a new record.

In the first 11 months, sales of GM and its ventures in China surged 10.4 per cent from a year earlier to 2.59 million vehicles, more than the total for the whole of last year, GM said in a statement on Thursday.

For November alone, GM sold 260,018 vehicles in China, up 9.7 per cent from 2011.

China's overall auto sales growth slowed last year after the government scrapped purchasing incentives and limited car numbers to ease traffic congestion and cut pollution.

In 2011 sales rose just 2.5 per cent to 18.51 million units, compared with an increase of more than 32 per cent in 2010 but growth has recovered slightly this year.

Nonetheless foreign manufacturers have bucked the slowdown with stronger brand recognition and perceptions of better quality among domestic consumers, although Japanese brands have been hurt by a territorial dispute between Beijing and Tokyo.

GM said last week one of its Chinese joint ventures will invest 6.6 billion yuan ($A1.06 billion) in a new plant to meet growing demand for commercial vehicles.

The venture between GM and Chinese partners SAIC Motor and Wuling Motors aims to open the 400,000-vehicle-a-year plant in the southwestern metropolis of Chongqing in 2015.


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HK leader warns of housing 'talent drain'

HONG Kong's leader says the Chinese city needs to boost its housing supply and create more living space or the "best and the brightest" talents of the next generation will go elsewhere.

Property prices in Hong Kong, one of the world's most densely populated cities, has skyrocketed in recent years after an influx of mainland Chinese buyers, pushing home ownership beyond the reach of many of its seven million people.

Leung Chun-ying said the issue needed to be addressed urgently or the space-starved city, which already competes with Singapore to be Asia's economic powerhouse, will lose its competitiveness.

"If we cannot, within the phase of the next two or three decades, generally increase the space in Hong Kong, the best and the brightest of the next generation will leave us," the 58-year-old former property consultant told the city's Foreign Correspondents' Club.

"We would have lost our competitiveness in attracting and retaining overseas talents, (and) also our competitiveness in retaining our local talents.

"We need to have adequate land supply not just to meet new demand... but also to give people more elbow room in their living space and also in their work space."

Leung has vowed to boost land supply and make housing more affordable since he took office in July after he was elected by a 1200-strong committee packed with pro-Beijing elites.

And the government in October slapped new taxes on foreign buyers and raised stamp duty on resale within three years, in a bid to cool the overheated housing market.

The leader said his government will continue to deepen ties with Beijing, despite opinion polls earlier this year showing anti-Beijing sentiments had surged to a new high since the former British colony was handed back to Chinese rule in 1997.

Leung said he has rolled out a slew of measures to tackle the disenchantment among Hong Kongers toward mainlanders, including a decision to stop mainland Chinese women from giving birth in the semi-autonomous city.


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Coal, gas outburst kills 17 Chinese miners

Written By Unknown on Rabu, 05 Desember 2012 | 21.29

AN accident in a coal mine in southwest China killed 17 miners on Wednesday, while 11 workers were still missing three days after another mine flooded in the northeast, state media reported.

The official Xinhua News Agency said there was an outburst of coal and gas in a shaft in a mine in Fuyuan county in Yunnan province on Wednesday afternoon.

Citing the county government, Xinhua said the other 49 miners underground at the time escaped unharmed.

In a separate report, Xinhua said 11 miners were still missing three days after a coal mine flooded in northeastern Heilongjiang province. A total of 22 miners were working in the mine when it was flooded on Saturday night. Six escaped, two were helped out on Sunday and three miners had been confirmed dead.

China has the world's deadliest coal mine industry, with 1973 miners killed in accidents last year.

Safety improvements have reduced deaths in recent years, but safety rules are often ignored and accidents are still common.


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The Boss is coming back to Australia

BRUCE Springsteen and the E Street Band have announced their first tour of Australia in more than a decade.

The Boss will play across Australia's east coast in March, with shows in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, along with an outdoor show at Victoria's iconic Hanging Rock.

The Wrecking Ball tour, named after last year's album, has already stopped in 18 countries and played more than 80 shows, including several of the longest performances of Springsteen's career.

The legendary rockers are currently finishing up their North American leg of dates and will play a star-studded benefit for Hurricane Sandy relief on December 12 in New York.

The shows are the first since saxophonist Clarence Clemons died last year, with nephew Jake Clemons taking his uncle's place in a five-piece horn section.

Tickets to the Australian tour are available through a pre-sale to Frontier Touring members from noon on Wednesday, December 12.

General tickets are available from 9am on Friday, December 14.


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Spate of violence hits Nigerian city

ATTACKERS have thrown homemade bombs at a bus, a blast went off near a police station and two policemen have been shot dead in a spate of attacks in the Nigerian city of Kano, officials say.

It was not clear who was behind the violence which began on Tuesday in Kano, the largest city in Nigeria's mainly Muslim north, though Islamist extremist group Boko Haram has carried out scores of such attacks.

It was not clear if the three incidents were connected. At least three people were also wounded.

Two men hurled homemade explosives at a bus said to be loaded with passengers, wounding two people and damaging the vehicle, a military spokesman said on Wednesday.

"Two IEDs were thrown at the bus which exploded and injured the driver and one other person in the vehicle," Lieutenant Iweha Ikedichi told AFP.

He said windows in the bus were shattered and one of its wheels burst, adding that no arrest has been made.

Later Tuesday near the scene of the bus attack, gunmen shot dead two policemen directing traffic at a roundabout.

"We lost two mobile policemen in an attack by some gunmen," a senior security source told AFP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak on the incident, adding that the assailants later fled.

A medical source at the Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital near the scene of the attack said two dead bodies in mobile police uniforms had been brought to the morgue.

Residents also reported an explosion early Wednesday outside a police station in the city which injured at least one civilian.

They said the explosion across the road from a police station caused panic in the area as policemen on duty fired shots to fend off further attacks.

An AFP reporter said the area had been cordoned off by troops. An ambulance was also seen leaving the scene carrying one person with a bloodied face.

Kano was the scene of Boko Haram's deadliest attack yet in January, when at least 185 people were killed in coordinated bombings and shootings.

Violence linked to the Boko Haram insurgency is believed to have left some 3,000 people dead in Nigeria since 2009, including killings by the security forces.


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Britain slashes economic growth forecasts

THE British economy is heading for shrinkage of 0.1 per cent in 2012 and would grow by less than expected in coming years, official government figures show.

The revised 2012 forecast, issued by the coalition's fiscal watchdog, compared with a prior growth estimate of 0.8 per cent that was given by the government in March.

The Office for Budget Responsibility watchdog said on Wednesday that British gross domestic product (GDP) was forecast to grow by 1.2 per cent in 2013, by 2.0 per cent in 2014 and by 2.3 per cent in 2015.

Previous guidance had been for expansion of 2.0 per cent in 2013, 2.7 per cent in 2014 and 3.0 per cent in 2015.

Britain sank into the first phase of a double-dip recession in 2008 as a result of the devastating global financial crisis that sparked a number of vast bailouts of banks.

The economy rebounded in late 2009 but struggled to stage a convincing recovery and fell back into a second downturn in late 2011, which lasted for three quarters.

Recent official data showed Britain had escaped from its double-dip recession in the third quarter of 2012, with its economy growing 1.0 per cent.

However this was due to one-off factors such as the London Olympics and rebounding activity after public holidays in the second quarter of the year.


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Ship sinks off Istanbul; 12 crew missing

Written By Unknown on Selasa, 04 Desember 2012 | 21.29

TURKISH rescuers are searching for the crew of a cargo ship that has sunk in a storm in the Black Sea while a second ship is in danger of being overturned by high waves, officials say.

The St Kitts and Nevis-flagged ship, Volgo Balt 199, with 11 Ukrainians and one Russian crew member aboard, was sailing to the Turkish port of Antalya from Russia when it sank off the coast of Istanbul, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported. The vessel was carrying coal.

The head of the Coastal Safety Directorate, Salih Orakci, told private NTV television that rescue boats and a helicopter were searching for Volgo Balt 199's missing crew, while tug boats had been dispatched to try and help the second ship, the Antigua and Barbuda-flagged BBC Adriatic, further west off the coast of Istanbul.

NTV television footage showed the second ship with 14 crew members being battered in the stormy waters.

"The sea conditions are very rough which is making the rescue operation very difficult," Orakci said of the BBC Adriatic. "(But) God willing, we will save that ship."

Orakci said the Volgo Balt 199 had not sent any distress signals and disappeared off the radar on Tuesday.


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Parents' decision to go public: Telegraph

PRINCE William and his wife Catherine made the decision to go public with news of a royal pregnancy and scrambled to tell family and friends before the story broke on social media, say reports in London.

Even the Queen, 86, who receives daily briefings on international affairs of the upmost secrecy, was kept in the dark until Monday when the whole world also learnt the Cambridges are expecting their first child.

Officials were forced to go public because of fears Catherine's hospitalisation would fuel concerns over her health, The Guardian newspaper reported.

However British broadsheet The Daily Telegraph told a different story: "royal aides said the decision to go public 'was very much driven by the Duke and Duchess'.

"It's a very hard thing to go public at such an early stage, but they wanted to be open with people as much as possible."

So read the first of more than five pages in Tuesday's edition dedicated to the baby, its possible name, its path to the throne, the effect he or she will have on British tourism, and of course, details of the morning sickness which has landed Catherine in hospital.

Although pregnant for less than 12 weeks, the common point at which expectant mothers share their news, Catherine and William feared the information would leak and be repeated on social networking sites such as Twitter.

There would have been no way of avoiding suspicion once the Duchess was forced to cancel upcoming official engagements, as she did on Monday.

After spending the weekend with Catherine's parents Michael and Carole Middleton at their country estate where the Duchess was reportedly ill, William drove his wife to hospital in London on Monday.

But before the palace released news of the royal pregnancy to the world late in the afternoon, the couple had to word-up family.

The Queen and Prince Philip, along with Prince Charles - who was visiting flood-affected areas of Wales on Monday - learnt the happy news before press officers went to work.

Prince Harry, 28, on duty in Afghanistan as an army Apache helicopter pilot, was told the news and is apparently overjoyed despite the being pushed down the royal ladder to fourth-in-line to the throne by his new niece or nephew.

For the Queen, already twice a great-grandmother to the children of Princess Anne's son Peter Phillips, the Cambridge birth will be an historic event.

For the first time in almost 120 years, a serving monarch will experience the birth of a great-grandchild in direct succession to the throne, The Guardian reported.

In 1894, Queen Victoria, who reigned until 1901, became great-grandmother to Edward VIII, who later abdicated the throne, making way for the current Queen's father, George VI.

Catherine is expected to remain in hospital for several days as she is treated for hyperemesis gravidarum, an acute form of morning sickness.

William was seen arriving at the hospital mid-morning on Tuesday.


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Fish-luring devices divide tuna meeting

PACIFIC nations have argued at a key meeting in Manila over how best to regulate devices that attract tuna amid growing concern over depleted stocks.

A call to extend an annual ban on fish aggregating devices (FADs) to four months was among the most contentious issues at the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission meeting on Tuesday.

An annual July-September ban on FADS is already in place in waters that account for half the world's tuna catch, and a four-month ban would hurt small Pacific nations the most, said Palau fishing official Nanette Malsol.

"We don't want to put any disproportionate burden on smaller countries," said Malsol, who chairs Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PAN), a coalition of small Pacific island nations.

She said her group opposed the extension of the so-called "closed period" unless smaller nations were compensated.

FADs are made of buoys tethered to the ocean floor.

They can attract huge numbers of fish, allowing boats to haul them in quickly rather than spending time and fuel searching for schools of tuna.

Critics say fishing with FADs means juvenile fish are snared, as well as bycatch that includes threatened species like sharks, rays and sea turtles.

About a dozen Greenpeace delegates staged a protest at the venue, calling for a total FADs ban to allow tuna stocks to recover.

"FADs must be banned if we want to see our tuna stocks survive," the environmental campaign group's delegation head Lagi Toribau said.

"Not only does it contribute to the rapid decline of fish stocks, it also results in a large amount of unwanted bycatch."

Other delegates said none of the 30 member-nations and territories attending, including the US, China, Japan and Australia, favoured a total FADs ban, but many of them recognised the need to limit their use.

However, they said they disagreed on how this should be done.

Malsol said the American delegation opposed compensation for smaller nations.

US-based Pew Environment Group, which also sent delegates to the meeting, estimates between 47,000 and 105,000 FADs are in use worldwide.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has previously warned that global tuna stocks are fast reaching the limits of sustainability due to a lack of comprehensive catch-limits.


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China's Xi vows to rule by law

CHINA'S newly appointed leader Xi Jinping pledged on Tuesday to implement rule of law, in comments that appeared aimed at rising social discontent over government corruption and police brutality.

In a speech at the Great Hall of the People that marked the 30th anniversary of China's 1982 constitution, Xi spoke of curbing the near-dictatorial powers of the ruling party.

His comments appeared to be the strongest yet by a Chinese leader on the need for legal restraints on the party and come amid a series of graft scandals and reports of the unbridled wealth of China's top communist families.

"We must firmly establish throughout society the authority of the constitution and the law and allow the overwhelming masses to fully believe in the law," Xi said in comments carried by China Central Television.

"To fully implement the constitution needs to be the sole task and the basic work in building a socialist nation ruled by law."

Xi was last month named as the head of the ruling Communist Party and is slated to take over the state presidency from current President Hu Jintao in March as part of China's once-a-decade leadership transition.

This year's transition was badly rocked by the case of disgraced politician Bo Xilai, whose wife was convicted in August of murdering a British businessman, in a scandal that has revealed rampant graft and lawlessness at the pinnacle of political power.

Bo is awaiting trial for corruption and abuse of power after allegedly using police in Chongqing city where he ruled to remove political opponents and dissidents, practices that are routine in China.

Since becoming party head, Xi has repeatedly pledged to fight graft and on Tuesday he further vowed to rein in China's top leaders.

"We must establish mechanisms to restrain and supervise power, power must be made responsible, power must be supervised, violations of law must be investigated," he said.

"We must ensure that the power bestowed by the people is constantly used for the interest of the people."

"No organisation or individual has the special rights to overstep the constitution and law, any violation of the constitution and the law must be investigated."

China's current constitution has enshrined the basic freedoms of speech, press, religious belief and association, but such rights are routinely sanctioned and violated, rights groups say.

Xi also appeared to address such alleged rights violations.

"To ensure the implementation of the constitution, is to ensure the realisation of the basic rights of the people," he said.

"By defending the dignity for the law, we are defending the will of the party and the people for dignity."


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Sender of first text message 'amazed'

Written By Unknown on Senin, 03 Desember 2012 | 21.29

THE British software engineer who sent the world's first text message 20 years ago said on Monday that he is amazed at how the technology has developed.

The engineer, Neil Papworth, was chosen by chance to send the message -- which read "Merry Christmas" -- to a director at British telecommunications giant Vodafone after he had worked on developing the software.

Vodafone wanted to develop the technology as an improvement on paging, Papworth said, and no one realised then how it would change the culture of communication forever -- 150 billion texts were sent in Britain alone last year.

"They thought it would be used as an executive pager so that secretaries could get hold of their bosses while they were out and about and they could send them messages and tell them what to do and where to go," Papworth told BBC radio.

On December 3, 1992, he was 22 and working for a company called Sema Group Telecoms at Vodafone's offices in Newbury, southeast England, developing what was known as a Short Message Service Centre (SMSC).

Mobile phones did not at that point have keyboards so he typed out the message on a computer keyboard.

"I used to go down there every day, help them test the system, hook it up to their network and we did a lot of testing down there over the next few weeks," Papworth said.

"Then it came to a day when they wanted to send this message and I don't remember exactly how it came about, but I was the one who was down there and so I was the one who got to send it in the end.

"The message was 'Merry Christmas'. It was to a man called Richard Jarvis, he was a director at Vodafone at the time who was at the Vodafone Christmas party on the other side of town."

Far from realising he was part of a historic event, Papworth said his overwhelming emotion was one of relief.

"Having this message work was important, so for me when it went through it was more a relief than anything else that our software had been demonstrated to work and it had done its job," he said.

As text messaging quickly gained in popularity, Vodafone ordered more and more equipment to support the system.

"So it was good for business when it took off because we sold more systems, but it was also quite amazing to see how many people use it and the range of applications people have found for it," Papworth said.

Papworth now lives in the French-Canadian city of Montreal with his wife and three children and works as a software architect.


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UK to cut down on corporate tax avoidance

THE British government said on Monday it would spend more money catching tax avoiders, after an MPs' committee accused major multinational companies including Starbucks, Google and Amazon of "immorally" dodging tax.

The companies insisted they operated within the law, although Starbucks announced it is reviewing its British tax practices in a bid to restore public trust.

Treasury chief George Osborne said the government was earmarking an extra STG77 million ($A118.97 million) and hiring 100 new tax investigators to clamp down on "offshore evasion and avoidance by wealthy individuals and by multinationals." He said the investment would bring in an extra STG2 billion ($A3.09 billion) a year.

His announcement came after Parliament's public accounts committee said the government should "get a grip" on multinationals that exploit tax laws to move profits generated in Britain to offshore domains.

"Global companies with huge operations in the UK, generating significant amounts of income, are getting away with paying little or no corporation tax here," said Labour legislator Margaret Hodge, who chairs the all-party committee. "This is outrageous and an insult to British businesses and individuals who pay their fair share."

As the British economy splutters amid Europe's economic crisis, and the government slashes spending in a bid to curb the deficit, public anger has grown against companies that pay little tax while making large profits.

Companies operating in Europe can base themselves in any of the 27 European Union nations, allowing them to take advantage of a particular country's low tax rates.

Google has picked Ireland and Bermuda as its main bases, while coffee chain Starbucks has its European base in The Netherlands and pays British tax only after transferring large sums in royalties to its Dutch headquarters.

The committee said online retailer Amazon paid STG1.8 million ($A2.78 million) in British tax in 2011 on turnover of 207 million pounds.

Hodge said executives from the three companies had been "unconvincing and, in some cases, evasive" when they appeared before the committee last month to explain their tax regimes. And she accused Britain's tax agency of being "way too lenient" in dealing with multinationals.

"All three companies accepted that profits should be taxed in the countries where the economic activity that drives those profits takes place," the MPs' report said.

"However, we were not convinced that their actions, in using the letter of tax laws both nationally and internationally to immorally minimise their tax obligations, are defensible."

Amazon said in a statement that it "pays all applicable taxes in every jurisdiction that it operates within."

"Amazon EU serves tens of millions of customers and sellers throughout Europe from multiple consumer websites in a number of languages dispatching products to all 27 countries in the EU," it said. "We have a single European Headquarters in Luxembourg with hundreds of employees to manage this complex operation."

Google declined to comment Monday, but its British chief, Matt Brittin, said last week that the company "plays by the rules set by politicians."

"The only people who really have choices are politicians who set the tax rates," he told Channel 4 News.

Starbucks, whose outlets have been targeted by the protest group UK Uncut, said in a statement that it had "listened to feedback from our customers and employees, and understand that to maintain and further build public trust we need to do more."

"As part of this we are looking at our tax approach in the UK," said the coffee firm, which has more than 700 outlets in Britain. "The company has been in discussions with (Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs) for some time and is also in talks with the Treasury."


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Students want sex ed sooner: study

HIGH school students want sex education sooner and topics including pregnancy and puberty taught in primary school, a study has found.

But most teachers of grade five and six students are uncomfortable talking about the reproductive system in sex education class, another study by the same researchers has found.

More than half of students in years 7, 8 and 9 thought almost all aspects of sex education topics should be introduced in primary school, according to the survey of about 100 students in the Victorian regional city of Ballarat, Fairfax Media reports.

"Across the board they wanted information much, much earlier than they were getting it," researcher Bernadette Duffy said.

"I think that they should be at least being taught about [puberty] in grade 3 and 4.

"Some of them wanted information so they knew what was being talked about when they got to high school."

The University of Ballarat researchers presented three studies on sex education at an education conference at the University of Sydney on Monday.

The Australian curriculum authority would introduce sex education in grades 5 and 6, but not in grades 3 and 4, as earlier recommended, Fairfax Media reported in October.


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News Corp announces end of The Daily

NEWS Corp has announced a new head of its British newspaper arm and said it was ending publication of its iPad app, The Daily.

The media conglomerate said Mike Darcy, a former chief operating officer of BSkyB, will replace Tom Mockridge as CEO of News International. Mockridge leaves the company at the end of the year.

At the same time, News Corp said it will cease publication of The Daily iPad app on December 15. Its founding editor-in-chief, Jesse Angelo, was named publisher of the New York Post.

"From its launch, The Daily was a bold experiment in digital publishing and an amazing vehicle for innovation," News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch said.

"Unfortunately, our experience was that we could not find a large enough audience quickly enough to convince us the business model was sustainable in the long-term," he said.


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Chinese court wants apology

Written By Unknown on Minggu, 02 Desember 2012 | 21.29

A CHINESE court wants an apology from a newspaper which said it jailed 10 "interceptors" who held people trying to complain about the government.

The state-run Beijing Youth Daily reported overnight that 10 were imprisoned for illegally detaining people from the central province of Henan who had travelled to Beijing to complain about local government abuses.

The widely-circulated report struck a chord among many Chinese dissatisfied with the age-old "petitioning" system, which allows citizens to request the central government to investigate disputes such as land grabs and unpaid wages.

Officials, eager to protect their reputations, often employ "interceptors" to catch petitioners and detain them in secret facilities known as "black jails" to prevent them from lodging complaints.

The newspaper said a Beijing court handed down sentences ranging from several months to a year-and-a-half in prison for "illegal imprisonment", the first time such workers have been sentenced in the capital.

But a court spokeswoman branded the report, which was carried by most major Chinese news websites and widely spread on Chinese social networking websites, as "fake news", another state-run newspaper, the China Daily, reported.

The spokeswoman, who was not named, "confirmed a case involving city officials from Henan had been heard", but "denied judges had handed down any verdict", the paper said.

Beijing's Chaoyang District Court, which reportedly handed down the verdict, is "in negotiations with Beijing Youth Daily over the printing of an apology and explanation", the paper said.

The China Daily's website appeared to remove the report later on Sunday, but the official microblog account of the People's Daily, the mouthpiece of China's ruling communist party, also issued a denial of the Beijing Youth Daily story.

"A People's Daily reporter understood from the Beijing high court that there has not been a verdict on the case, and the news was inaccurate," a post on the microblog said.

Users of Sina Weibo, a microblogging website similar to Twitter, expressed disappointment that the interceptors, who are widely reviled figures in China, had not been jailed.

"This news made people so happy, how could it turn out to be fake?" one user wrote.

"I look forward to this news really coming true," wrote another.

Calls to the Chaoyang District Court went unanswered overnight.

Petitioners said their interceptors wore badges showing their affiliation with the Henan government and detained them in a facility run by Henan officials in Beijing, where they were also beaten, according to the Beijing Youth Daily report.

Despite years of calls for China to shut down its "black jails", including from Chinese media, rights groups continue to report frequent cases of petitioners being illegally detained and physically assaulted.


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Productivity in mining a disaster: BIS

THE mining sector's labour productivity is a disaster that will block much future job growth in the industry, says a new report.

Pressure from lower commodity prices, high and rising costs and the lowest labour productivity in a generation had ignited a new war on costs within the mining sector, said economic forecasters BIS Shrapnel in their Mining in Australia 2012-2027 report.

However, that would not threaten a forecast boom in mining production over the next decade, the report says.

Growth in employment will not keep pace with the expansion in production as miners seek to restore productivity lost during the furious race to invest in new capacity since the mid-2000s, said BIS infrastructure and mining unit senior manager Adrian Hart.

Mining only represents about two per cent of the Australian workforce.

While employment in mining had doubled since the mid-2000s, lower levels of construction and increased productivity through the next five years are forecast to see it peak at 315,000 jobs by 2016 before a decline, the report said.

"Labour productivity in the mining sector is an absolute disaster," Mr Hart said in the report.

"It is now 60 per cent off its peak in 2000/01 - when miners had to respond to the Asian financial crisis and then a global downturn - and is at its weakest level since 1987.

The productivity "war" has led to a blame game between miners, governments and unions about whether management, workers or the Fair Work Act were to blame for inefficiencies in output.

Mining services industry contractors are already feeling the heat, with Boart Longyear and MacMahon Holdings cutting earnings, suffering share price slides and recently replacing their chief executives.

Miners were taking a tough approach with contractors, suppliers and governments to reduce costs, improve productivity and restore competitiveness, said BIS.

The bigger miners were striking tougher bargains contractors, bringing work in-house and shelving projects.

It was not all bad news, Mr Hart said.

"Miners will ramp up production from new mines and expansions to offset lower commodity prices," he said.

The report forecast annual average production growth of 7.3 per cent to 2016/17, lifting its share of GDP to 9.1 per cent.

The increase in production is regarded by industry experts as well as the Reserve Bank as the third phase of the mining boom.

The first was the rise in prices, regarded as having peaked in 2011, with the second phase of investment predicted to peak in 2013-14.


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Productivity in mining a disaster: BIS

THE mining sector's labour productivity is a disaster that will block much future job growth in the industry, says a new report.

Pressure from lower commodity prices, high and rising costs and the lowest labour productivity in a generation had ignited a new war on costs within the mining sector, said economic forecasters BIS Shrapnel in their Mining in Australia 2012-2027 report.

However, that would not threaten a forecast boom in mining production over the next decade, the report says.

Growth in employment will not keep pace with the expansion in production as miners seek to restore productivity lost during the furious race to invest in new capacity since the mid-2000s, said BIS infrastructure and mining unit senior manager Adrian Hart.

Mining only represents about two per cent of the Australian workforce.

While employment in mining had doubled since the mid-2000s, lower levels of construction and increased productivity through the next five years are forecast to see it peak at 315,000 jobs by 2016 before a decline, the report said.

"Labour productivity in the mining sector is an absolute disaster," Mr Hart said in the report.

"It is now 60 per cent off its peak in 2000/01 - when miners had to respond to the Asian financial crisis and then a global downturn - and is at its weakest level since 1987.

The productivity "war" has led to a blame game between miners, governments and unions about whether management, workers or the Fair Work Act were to blame for inefficiencies in output.

Mining services industry contractors are already feeling the heat, with Boart Longyear and MacMahon Holdings cutting earnings, suffering share price slides and recently replacing their chief executives.

Miners were taking a tough approach with contractors, suppliers and governments to reduce costs, improve productivity and restore competitiveness, said BIS.

The bigger miners were striking tougher bargains contractors, bringing work in-house and shelving projects.

It was not all bad news, Mr Hart said.

"Miners will ramp up production from new mines and expansions to offset lower commodity prices," he said.

The report forecast annual average production growth of 7.3 per cent to 2016/17, lifting its share of GDP to 9.1 per cent.

The increase in production is regarded by industry experts as well as the Reserve Bank as the third phase of the mining boom.

The first was the rise in prices, regarded as having peaked in 2011, with the second phase of investment predicted to peak in 2013-14.


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Geithner invites Republican counter-offer

US PRESIDENT Barack Obama is ready for tough concessions to reach a deficit deal, but Republicans must commit to higher tax rates on the rich.

That was the view of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner who made appearances on five Sunday talk shows to call on Republicans to specify what additional spending cuts they want in a deal to avoid the looming "fiscal cliff."

"The ball really is with them now," Mr Geithner, one of the White House's chief negotiators with Capitol Hill, said.

Mr Geithner presented congressional leaders on Thursday with Mr Obama's postelection blueprint for averting the combination of hundreds of billions in tax increases and spending cuts that will take effect beginning in January if Washington doesn't act to stop it.

But Republican House Speaker John Boehner dismissed the plan as "not serious," merely a Democratic wish list that couldn't pass his chamber.

As outlined by administration officials, the plan calls for nearly $US1.6 trillion ($A1.5 trillion) in new tax revenue over the next decade, while making $US600 billion in spending cuts, including $US350 billion from Medicare and other health programs. But it also contains $US200 billion in new spending on jobless benefits, public works and aid for struggling homeowners - and would make it virtually impossible for Congress to block Mr Obama's ability to raise the debt ceiling.

"I was just flabbergasted," Mr Boehner said, describing his meeting with Mr Geithner. "I looked at him and I said, 'You can't be serious?" The speaker, noting the short time between the November 6 election and the new year, said time has been lost so far "with this nonsense."

With the George W. Bush-era tax cuts expiring and across-the-board spending cuts hitting in under a month, Mr Boehner said, "I would say we're nowhere, period." He said "there's clearly a chance" of going over the cliff.

But Mr Geithner, also in interviews that were taped on Friday, offered a somewhat rosier view. "I think we're far apart still, but I think we're moving closer together," he said.

He called the back-and-forth "normal political theater," voicing confidence a bargain can be struck in time, and said all that's blocking it is GOP acceptance of higher tax rates on the wealthy.

"It's welcome that they're recognizing that revenues are going to have to go up. But they haven't told us anything about how far rates should go up ... (and) who should pay higher taxes?" Mr Geithner said.

He said so far, Republican proposals demonstrate "political math, not real math."

Republican leaders have said they accept higher tax revenue overall, but only through what they call tax reform - closing loopholes and limiting deductions - and only coupled with tough measures to curb the explosive growth of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

But Mr Geithner insisted that there's "no path to an agreement (without) Republicans acknowledging that rates have to go up for the wealthiest Americans." He also said the administration would only discuss changes to Social Security "in a separate process," not in talks on the fiscal cliff.

As to spending, Mr Geithner said if Republicans don't think Mr Obama's cutting enough spending, they should make a counter-proposal. "They might want to do some different things. But they have to tell us what those things are," he said.

Republicans have also rejected Mr Obama's debt ceiling proposal. Mr Geithner noted it was Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell who first suggested it, as a temporary measure in the summer 2011 deficit deal. The administration would make it permanent. "It was a very smart way by a senator with impeccable Republican credentials to ... lift this ... periodic threat of default," Mr Geithner said. "And that's an essential thing for us."

Mr Geithner voiced sympathy for Republicans leaders, saying they're caught between the voters' endorsement of higher taxes on the rich and a House Republican caucus that thinks all tax increases are job-killers.

"They really are in a difficult position," he said. "And they're going to have to figure out their politics of what they do next."

In the past week, Mr Obama has held a series of campaign-style appearances - including one in a swing district in Pennsylvania - urging lawmakers to accept a Senate-passed measure extending tax cuts for all but the top 2 per cent of wage-earners. He'll continue the effort when he meets with governors on Tuesday and speaks to the Business Roundtable on Wednesday.

Republican leaders contend letting top-end tax cuts run out would hit small businesses and cost jobs.

Still, Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, said his party colleagues will "hold our nose and raise some revenues" if the result is a deal that reins in runaway debt. But he said the onus is on Mr Obama to knuckle down to talks.

"I'm ready for the president to get off the campaign trail, and get in the White House and get a result," Mr Alexander told reporters in Nashville on Saturday. "Right now he's got the presidential limousine headed toward the fiscal cliff with his foot on the accelerator."

Mr Geithner appeared on CBS' Face the Nation, NBC's Meet the Press, CNN's State of the Union, ABC's This Week, and Fox News Sunday. Mr Boehner was on Fox, too.


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