France drops terror charges against rocker

French prosecutors have dropped terror charges against Norwegian neo-Nazi musician Varg Vikernes. Source: AAP

FRENCH prosecutors say they have dropped terror charges against a Norwegian musician and freed him from custody, but still want him to go to court for allegedly inciting racial hatred.

The prosecutor's office said on Friday that Varg Vikernes was freed on Thursday night after three days of questioning by police in the central French city of Brive-la-Gaillarde, near his farmhouse.

His French wife was freed on Wednesday. Her recent purchase of four firearms raised suspicions of French authorities although she had a permit.

Vikernes, a neo-Nazi black metal rocker, gained notoriety in the 1990s after being convicted in Norway of manslaughter in the stabbing death of a fellow band member and for arson attacks on three churches.

Prosecutors say they still want him to answer in court for his alleged anti-Semitic and xenophobic messages.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Bomb in Iraq Sunni mosque kills 20

A SUICIDE bomber has struck a crowded Sunni mosque north of Baghdad, killing 20 people, police say, as Iraq struggles to contain the worst violence since 2008.

The bomber detonated explosives in the Abu Bakr al-Sadiq Mosque as the imam gave the Friday sermon in the town of Al-Wajihiyah, east of Baquba, the capital of Diyala province, a police colonel said.

The attack also wounded 40 people. A doctor confirmed the toll.

Areas near Baquba have been hit by a number of attacks in recent days, including a bombing on Tuesday that targeted worshippers leaving a Sunni mosque in Muqdadiyah, northeast of the city, killing four people and wounding 15.

The latest unrest brings the number of people killed in attacks in July to more than 450, and upwards of 2700 since the beginning of the year.

Iraq has faced years of attacks by militants, but analysts say widespread discontent among members of its Sunni Arab minority, which the Shi'ite-led government has failed to address, has fuelled this year's surge in unrest.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Thyroid cancer risk for Fukushima workers

AROUND 2000 people who have worked at Japan's wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant face a heightened risk of thyroid cancer, its operator says.

Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) said on Friday that 1973 people - around 10 per cent of those employed in emergency crews involved in the clean-up since the meltdowns - were believed to have been exposed to enough radiation to cause potential problems.

The figure is a 10-fold increase on TEPCO's previous estimate of the number of possible thyroid cancer victims and comes after the utility was told its figures were too conservative.

Each worker in this group was exposed to at least 100 millisieverts of radiation, projections show.

Although little is known about the exact health effects of radiation on the human body, the level is considered by doctors to be a possible threshold for increased cancer risk.

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant became the site of the worst nuclear disaster in a generation after the massive tsunami of March 2011 destroyed its cooling systems.

The plant's reactors went through meltdowns that caused explosions in the buildings housing them, spewing radioactive materials into the air, sea and soil.

Tens of thousands of people were forced from their homes in a large area around the plant, where crews continue to clear debris and cool the reactors.

The fragility of the wrecked plant was brought into sharp relief again on Thursday with the discovery of steam in the roofless building around Reactor 3.

TEPCO said on Friday it still did not know exactly where the steam was coming from, although readings showed it was no more radioactive than expected and suggested it could have been accumulated rainwater.

The huge utility, which has faced frequent criticism for downplaying dangers and not being forthcoming about problems at the site, revised its method of estimating the level of radiation exposure among workers earlier this month.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Iran's Ahmadinejad visits Iraq

IRANIAN President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in southern Iraq to visit two of the holiest cities for Shi'ite Muslims amid tight security on the second day of his two-day visit to the country.

The outgoing Iranian president waved to worshippers and smiled on Friday morning as he entered the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf, a city 160km south of Baghdad.

Security forces were deployed along the route from Najaf airport to the gold-domed shrine, one of the holiest sites in Shi'ite Islam.

Ahmadinejad's convoy then plans to head to the city of Karbala, home to the shrine of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad.

This is Ahmadinejad's second visit to Iraq while in office. On Thursday, he met Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other officials.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Nokia sales fall by 24% in quarter

NOKIA Corp says its net loss narrowed in the second quarter to 227 million euros ($A324.8 million) compared to a net loss of 1.41 billion euros a year earlier.

The struggling Finnish mobile phone maker said sales fell by 24 per cent to 5.7 billion euros from 7.5 billion in the second quarter last year.

Sales of the company's flagship Lumia phones increased by 32 per cent compared to the first quarter to 7.4 million handsets.

The results, however, were weaker than analysts had expected.

The company's share price fell three per cent to 2.99 euros at the Helsinki Stock Exchange.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Navalny: ambitious crusader against Putin

Russia's protest leader Alexei Navalny has been sentenced to five years in a prison colony. Source: AAP

RUSSIA'S charismatic protest leader Alexei Navalny, sentenced to five years in a prison colony, has galvanised the opposition with lacerating attacks on President Vladimir Putin and the Russian elite.

Navalny is a new breed of Russian protest leader who wants to become a player in mainstream politics after building up a huge internet following with sharply written blogs and corruption exposes.

He emerged as the key figure in the mass opposition protests that rocked Russia in the winter of 2011-2012 ahead of Putin's return for a third Kremlin term last May.

But his sentence on Thursday in a controversial embezzlement case, which supporters denounced as ordered by the Kremlin to eliminate a dangerous foe, will disqualify him from taking part in politics.

His sometimes volcanic rhetoric inspired supporters in a way never seen before in post-Soviet Russia, provocatively declaring at a rally in December 2011 that he could muster enough protesters to take the Kremlin.

He has boldly stated an ambition to become president in 2018 polls and "change the country" and also registered to run for mayor of Moscow in September elections.

But both ambitions will be in tatters if the verdict is confirmed on appeal.

Twice jailed briefly for administrative offences during the protests, he is no stranger to tough street talk and told a policeman who roughly arrested him last May that he would prosecute him afterwards.

Navalny has vowed that should he win power he will put in prison his enemies, a pledge that has troubled some liberals who fear a cycle of revenge justice.

"I am sure that sooner or later I will have them jailed," he told Moscow Echo radio in an interview ahead of the verdict hearing.

Since Putin's return for a third presidential term, Navalny has toned down his role in mass rallies and has turned his focus on exposing sleaze among top lawmakers in the ruling United Russia party.

Defiant to the last, just days before the verdict he published a detailed report accusing one of Putin's closest confidants, the head of Russian Railways Vladimir Yakunin, of possessing a vast undeclared business and property portfolio.

It was Navalny who dreamt up the infectious slogan calling United Russia "the party of swindlers and thieves", which it has not managed to shake off.

But held back by the lack of coverage on state television, he has yet to make an impact in the regions beyond his Moscow powerbase and many Russians have no clue who he is.

Even in the Russian capital, just eight per cent said they would vote for him in the mayoral elections and just 32 per cent were even aware of his candidacy.

Navalny, 37, began his anti-corruption crusade in 2007, buying up shares in state-controlled companies and grilling management at their annual general meetings.

Realising the power of the internet well before the Russian elite, he published reports alleging corruption and mass embezzlement at giant enterprises on his Rospil website (Rospil.info), which built up a loyal following.

In his last Live Journal blog post before the verdict, he called on Russians to keep up the fight.

"Simply understand this: there's no one else but you," he wrote. "If you are reading this, then you are the resistance."

Navalny makes astute use of the colloquial forms of the Russian language - where plays on words are hugely popular - in a way never dreamt of by any Kremlin official.

Seeking to present himself as an ordinary guy, Navalny lives with his wife Yulia - who has become an increasingly visible presence at his side - in a humdrum and otherwise unremarkable Moscow suburb called Maryino.

"Navalny is someone like you - he is not someone backed by oligarchs and bureaucrats," says his campaign literature for the mayoral elections. "Let's change Russia, starting with Moscow."

Nevertheless, his views on ethnic relations trouble liberals, in particular in such a multi-cultural country like Russia which is home to an estimated 20 million Muslims.

He coined the slogan "it's time to stop feeding" Russia's volatile North Caucasus and has spoken at the ultra-right Russian Marches, behaviour that earlier led to his expulsion from the liberal Yabloko party.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Pig brain cells to treat Parkinson's

Brain cells from a rare New Zealand pig will be used in a new trial to cure Parkinson's disease. Source: AAP

BRAIN cells from a rare New Zealand pig will be used in an attempt to regrow dying human brain cells in Parkinson's patients.

The world first trial on four New Zealanders with Parkinson's disease will take brain cells from the Auckland Island species of pig and inject them into the human brains.

The cells will be directed towards the damaged parts of the patients' brains.

Parkinson's disease causes tremors, loss of movement and cognitive impairment and occurs when nerve cells in the brain die or are damaged.

Scientists hope a growth factor hormone released by the pig brain cells will cause the dying human cells to grow back and reconnect to existing cells.

The Auckland Island species has been selected for the trial because it is free of viruses usually carried by pigs.

Neurologist Dr Barry Snow says animal studies have shown the "remarkable regrowth" of damaged cells.

The human trial will kick off in September with the first patient, while the other three will be injected at a later date.

There is currently no cure for Parkinson's disease and treatments become ineffective after a few years.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Kerry visits Syrian refugee camp in Jordan

US Secretary of State John Kerry has visited the sprawling Zaatari camp for Syrian refugees. Source: AAP

US Secretary of State John Kerry has visited the sprawling Zaatari camp home to tens of thousands of Syrian refugees to see at first-hand the tragedy of the conflict.

Kerry first overflew the vast camp by helicopter, surveying hundreds of tents and trailers lined up on the desert sand about 20 kilometres from the Syrian border.

Kerry said his visit had "put a real human face" on the situation, describing his conversations with refugees and officials at the camp as "searing and unforgettable".

He met with half dozen refugees, two men and four women, for 40 minutes.

They expressed anger and repeatedly asked Kerry to establish buffer and no-fly zones in Syria.

"Where is the international community? What are you waiting for? We hope that you will not go back to the United States before you find a solution to the crisis. At least impose a no-fly zone or an embargo," said a refugee woman who did not give her name.

A grim-faced Kerry replied: "A lot of different options are under consideration. I wish it was very simple. As you know, we've been fighting two wars for 12 years.

"We are trying to help in various ways, including helping Syrian opposition fighters have weapons. We are doing new things. There is consideration of buffer zones and other things but it is not as simple as it sounds."

The same woman picked up a pen, waved it in the air and tapped it on the table as she spoke.

"Mr Secretary if the situation remains unchanged until the end of Ramadan this camp will become empty. We will return to Syria and we will fight with knives. You as the US government look to Israel with respect. Cannot you do the same with the children of Syria?" she asked.

The refugees also urged the international community to help put a halt to the flow of weapons from Iran and influx of Lebanese Hezbollah fighters into Syria.

The Red Cross said last week 150,000 Syrian refugees live in Zaatari, a figure backed by Jordanian officials.

Thousands of people flee the fighting across the Jordanian-Syrian border every night and most end up at the camp, built in July 2012.

Nearly 1.8 million people are now registered with the United Nations in countries around Syria and an average of 6000 people a day are fleeing, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said earlier this week.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

Koreas fail to agree on industrial site

NORTH and South Korea have failed again to reach agreement on reopening their jointly-run industrial estate as they wrangled over who was to blame for its shutdown.

A fourth round of talks about the complex ended on Wednesday without agreement, but the two sides will meet again next Monday, said Seoul's chief delegate Kim Ki-Woong.

The Kaesong estate in North Korea, the last remaining symbol of cross-border co-operation, shut down in April as military tensions mounted after the North's February nuclear test and South Korean-US war games.

Dialogue resumed in recent weeks but little progress has been made amid squabbles over which side should take responsibility for the suspension of business there.

Wednesday's discussions appeared to be a repeat of previous rounds, with each side refusing to budge on conditions for resuming operations at the estate, built after a landmark inter-Korean summit in 2000.

The South urged the North to promise not to cause another closure and to take a respectful and constructive position to resolve the issue, according to an official with Seoul's unification ministry.

However, the North reiterated its previous position that operations at the zone should be normalised as soon as possible, the official said.

"There was a big difference" over how to work out a legal framework to prevent a future shutdown, Kim told reporters at the end of Wednesday's talks.

Kaesong was previously a valuable source of hard currency for the impoverished North.

At a meeting earlier this month, the two sides agreed in principle to reopen the estate, where 53,000 North Koreans worked in 123 South-owned factories producing textiles or light industrial goods.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More

FBT changes dominate climate debate

Labor minister Mark Butler (C) says legislation will be drafted for the ETS before the election. Source: AAP

LABOR'S crackdown on work-related benefits to help pay for a shift to an emissions trading scheme (ETS) continues to anger the motor industry after the government said it would mainly impact luxury car owners.

Changes to fringe benefit tax (FBT) arrangements on car leasing and salary sacrifice packaging aim to raise $1.8 billion of the $3.8 billion needed for an early shift from a fixed carbon pricing regime to an ETS in 2014.

The move, which will impact about 320,000 people, has angered automotive groups and the opposition, but the government is determined to push through the measure, even if it means recalling parliament.

"In the event that parliament were to resume before the election, I could take draft legislation to the parliament," Climate Change Minister Mark Butler said on Wednesday.

If rejected, Labor would take it to the election and seek a mandate from voters, he added.

Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey said the surprise change was like taking a baseball bat to an already ailing motor vehicle industry.

"This is poorly thought out, there was no consultation with any stakeholders," he told reporters after meeting with car salesmen in western Sydney.

However, Mr Hockey stopped short of committing the coalition to block the measure, saying "we would not start from yesterday" when asked if he would back the change.

The senior Liberal agreed with car retailers who say they rely on the FBT scheme to keep up sales in an already cut-throat sector.

But Deputy Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said people were "fiddling the system" by buying expensive luxury cars and claiming personal travel as a work-related expense.

"The chances are it's not a Holden Commodore, it's a BMW," he said.

Treasurer Chris Bowen tried to soften the blow, adding that people entitled to dispensation would still be able to get it as long as they could justify their claims.

"If you are not using your car for business, then you don't need a business-use deduction," he said.

The savings from the FBT measure form the single biggest plank of Labor's push to an ETS next year, and neutralise lingering voter antipathy toward imposition of the $24 a tonne carbon tax.

Other savings will come from public service job cuts and the scrapping or winding back of some clean energy programs.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the ETS push is in line with a promise he made to Australians in 2007 during his first leadership term, and will save the average Australian household $380 in 2014/15.

But industry says changes to the FBT scheme will hit middle-income earners hardest.

"Motorists ... should not be targeted to help minimise the budget impact of other policy decisions," Australian Automobile Association director Andrew McKellar said.

The Australian Greens, who are critical of cuts to environmental programs, are promising to stall any government legislation related to the earlier ETS move in the upper house.

"We won't be moving to the ETS in 2014," said Greens leader Christine Milne.

18.59 | 0 komentar | Read More