News that Matters - 11th August 2003

Journal MonTemplar's Journal: News that Matters - 11th August 2003 7

Journal by MonTemplar on Monday August 11, 2003 @06:36AM

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Looks like I spoke too soon yesterday - the official hottest place in the UK was Gravesend, in Kent, at 38.1C. Regardless, the bookies finally had to pay out on all the weather bets placed last week!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
TODAY'S HEADLINES :

The Big Political Story in the UK gets started...

Bali bomb suspect 'happy to die'

Pupils 'could bypass GCSEs'

R.I.P - Gregory Hines, actor, 1946-2003

The man who can pick his nose with his toes...

Calcutta prostitutes turn to Kama Sutra to promote safe sex

The Nuremburg Trials, coming soon to the World Wide Web

Cut off toes to fit your shoes

On This Day, in 1982 - Krays let out for mother's funeral

Heide Fleiss does an Iron Mike on her ex-boyfried...

Steven Seagal's former business partner admits Mafia extortion plot

Japan-China talks marred by reminders of World War II
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Big Political Story in the UK gets started...
from BBC News Online

The inquiry into the events surrounding the death of the weapons expert David Kelly is due to begin taking evidence.
Dr Kelly apparently committed suicide after being named as the source of a BBC report claiming the government had exaggerated a dossier on Iraq's weapons capability before the war.
A friend and colleague of Dr Kelly, Terence Taylor will be the first to give evidence at the Royal Courts of Justice in London.
Other witnesses due to give evidence to the inquiry this week include officials from the Ministry of Defence, the Cabinet Office, Foreign Office and key figures within the BBC, including Andrew Gilligan, the defence correspondent whose story is at the centre of the affair.
Mr Taylor, from the Institute for Strategic Studies in Washington, worked with Dr Kelly as a UN weapons inspector in Iraq.
He is likely to be asked about his friend's expertise and about a conversation he had with him a few days before he died.
He will be followed by Richard Hatfield, personnel director at the Ministry of Defence and Dr Kelly's line manager.
It is likely Mr Hatfield will be asked to give greater details about the extent of Dr Kelly's role in drawing up last September's dossier on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction.
He is expected to be questioned on the way Dr Kelly was treated after he admitted meeting BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan.
Mr Gilligan will be one of the first week's key witnesses.
Government officials - some closely involved in assessing intelligence information - will also give their accounts.
Eleven witnesses have been called to give evidence over the next four days.
They will be questioned only by counsel to the inquiry, but some might be recalled later for cross-examination.
Ahead of the inquiry, Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith called for Tony Blair to apologise for comments made by his spokesman about Dr Kelly.
Last week Downing Street spokesman Tom Kelly admitted comparing Dr Kelly to fictional fantasist Walter Mitty.
The spokesman apologised unreservedly for his remarks, made off-the-record to journalists, but Mr Duncan Smith said that was not enough.
Lord Hutton has ruled the inquiry will not be televised, following an appeal from broadcasters Sky and ITN.
The 59-year-old's body was found in woods at Harrowdown Hill, Longworth, on 18 July.
An inquest into his death was opened and adjourned three days later at Oxfordshire Coroner's Court.
His funeral was held last Wednesday close to his Oxfordshire home.

Even without the spectre of live TV coverage of ministers being interrogated, this inquiry could seriously damage the Government, and Tony Blair in particular. There was another off-the-record remark made at the weekend from a 'senior source within Westminster', claiming that the Defence Secretary, Geoff Hoon, is to be made the sacrificial victim for this inquiry, but the opposition parties are saying that if anyone goes, it should really be the Prime Minister...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bali bomb suspect 'happy to die'
from BBC News Online

A key Bali bomb suspect has begun his defence plea in an Indonesian court by thanking prosecutors for demanding a death sentence for him.
Imam Samudra - accused by police of being the mastermind of last year's attack which killed 202 people - said death would bring him closer to God.
Last week, another key suspect, Amrozi, was convicted and sentenced to execution by firing squad for his part in the Bali attack.
Amrozi's lawyers are expected to lodge their appeal against the verdict later on Monday.
Dressed in a pristine white shirt and Muslim cap, Imam Samudra entered the courtroom, shouting "God is great" in Arabic.
Imam Samudra, a 33-year-old computer expert, than began his statement by reciting verses from the Koran in front of the five-judge panel.
"I'd like to say thank you to the prosecutor team, which has demanded the death sentence. Because in death we live peacefully, and in death we draw near to God," he told the court.
Then speaking in the local Balinese language, Imam Samudra apologised to the people of Bali.
"If I've made mistakes I'm sorry. If the victims of the bombs were Indonesians and Muslims, I'm sorry," he said.
"But if the victims came from countries which are allies of the United States, then I'm pleased."
Imam Samudra has admitted involvement in the Bali bombing, but has denied masterminding the plot.
He is accused of planning the bombings, picking the targets and assigning Amrozi to buy bomb-making chemicals and a van to carry a bomb.

I have to wonder, after reading this, if the guy is really serious about defending himself against the charges, given his reaction towards the proposed punishment? I daresay his defence lawyer must be thinking the same thing...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Pupils 'could bypass GCSEs'
from BBC News Online

Pupils should not take GCSEs if schools think they are a waste of time, the government's exam watchdog has said.
Head teachers should decide if students go straight to AS exams as part of A-level courses, said Dr Ken Boston, head of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA).
Education Secretary Charles Clarke has asked former chief inspector of schools Mike Tomlinson to review qualifications for 14- to 19-year-olds.
Pupils take too many exams between 16 and 18 with GCSEs, AS-levels and A-levels, Dr Boston told the Times.
"If a school wants to offer only a few GCSEs or not take them at all and go straight to A-level and AS then that is perfectly open to them," he said.
He said he did not believe young people should have to take three examinations in three consecutive years.
"It is a matter for schools to determine."
His comments come days before this year's results are due to be published.
An education department spokesman said: "GCSEs continue to prove their worth and any reform must build on their success."
But teachers' leader David Hart said it signalled the end of the GCSE in the long term.
Schools where pass rates at 16 are close to 100% could ditch GCSEs in favour of A-levels, said Mr Hart, leader of the National Association of Head Teachers.
"Although A-levels are very much regarded as being an examination system of high quality, it is not in our view delivering the goods and it certainly is not producing students with a well-rounded education," he said.
The Conservatives meanwhile have said they would make the QCA independent from government.
Shadow education secretary Damian Green told the Daily Telegraph the change was needed to restore confidence after last year's A-level marking fiasco.
The then Education Secretary Estelle Morris sacked QCA chief William Stubbs.
Mr Green told the paper: "When you get to a stage where schools with highly academic pupils are saying that the main exams they take are a waste of time, it is no exaggeration to say that confidence has collapsed."
He was speaking after it emerged university applications could be delayed until after students receive A-level results.
Government adviser Professor Steven Schwart believes this would help less confident pupils whose schools do not encourage them to aim high.
And Sir William Stubbs said on Monday: "The delaying of application until actual results and the making of the application on the basis of marks rather than grades would be a huge step forward."
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he was less confident about removing GCSEs, as more than half of young people leave school at the age of 16, meaning they had no external assessment.
"That [change] would be a very big step and I think any secretary of state would think very carefully and very long and hard about that."

Oh great, yet more changes to the education system. Given that AS- and A-Level courses are supposed to be more rigorous that their GCSE equivalents, will this mean that brighter students risk getting burned by the pressure to get good results at an earlier age? This is a very real possibility, since the plans to delay university applications until after A-Level results are known will require a rething of the entire UCAS course placement system, and the universities are, reportedly, not too keen on the idea...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
R.I.P - Gregory Hines, actor, 1946-2003
from BBC News Online

Actor Gregory Hines, who starred in films such as White Nights and The Cotton Club, has died of cancer at the age of 57.
Hines, who was also a Tony-winning tap dancer, died on Saturday in Los Angeles, his publicist announced.
He was best known for his roles in films such as The Cotton Club (1984), based around the seminal 1920s New York jazz club, in which he played Sandman Williams.
He was also cast alongside Mikhail Baryshnikov in the thriller White Nights (1985), and alongside Billy Crystal in the comic cop thriller Running Scared (1986).
Hines was an accomplished dancer whose roles in 1980s films often featured his dancing. He was also a respected choreographer.
In 1992 he won a Tony, US theatre's equivalents of the Oscars, for his part in the musical Jelly's Last Jam.
Hines began his entertainment career in the tap dancing act Hines, Hines and Dad, alongside his brother Maurice and his father.
Born in New York in 1946, his mother had urged him to become a tap dancer as a way of getting out of poverty. He started tap as a toddler, learning the dance moves his older brother had been taught in dance class.
At the age of six, he was performing at the Apollo Theatre for two weeks with Maurice.
"I don't remember not dancing," Hines said in a 2001 interview. "When I realised I was alive and these were my parents, and I could walk and talk, I could dance."
The two brothers danced in the musical revue Eubie! in 1978. The brothers later performed together in Broadway's Sophisticated Ladies, and then in The Cotton Club. Dozens of film and TV roles followed.
He had his own TV show, The Gregory Hines Show, in 1997, and was also a regular guest star on comedy Will and Grace.

Now you have no excuse for saying 'Who?', as most people of Fark were yesterday...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The man who can pick his nose with his toes...
from BBC News Online

A keen angler has had two toes transplanted onto his hand by plastic surgeons, so that he can carry on fishing after an horrific accident.
Colin Thomas, 58, from Swansea, south Wales, lost all eight fingers when both his hands were caught in a roller at a steel plant.
He feared his fishing days were over because he could not hold a rod, nor could he reel in his catch, without fingers.
But surgeons came to the rescue in a 13-hour operation to take a toe from each foot to transplant onto his right hand.
Colin is absolutely delighted with the result. "I'm just so thrilled that the surgeons were able to give me the chance to go fishing again," he said.
"I just love the sport - but it is impossible without fingers. The toe transplant means I can be out there with my rod again.
"I never dreamed surgeons could do something like this. The doctors were just amazing. "It means I can bait the line, grip the rod and reel in the catch."
Colin, from Cockett, has bought a boat from the £100,00 compensation he got from steel giant Corus for the accident.
His hands were trapped in a roller, and he lost all his fingers but kept both thumbs.
The father-of-two was in hospital for seven weeks recovering from his terrible injuries and had to have more than 20 operations.
Plastic surgeons Philip Sykes and Hamish Laing amputated the toes next to the big toes on each foot and transplanted them into his right hand.
Doctors told him he was the first person in Britain to have two toes transplanted onto his hand.
Toe-to-hand surgery is one of the most technically demanding microsurgical operations - and the blood vessels were joined up with 12 tiny stitches using fibres narrower than human hair.
Colin, a keen angler since he was nine-years-old now goes out fishing almost every day in his new £20,000 boat called Chorus Girl, fishing mainly for bass just off the Gower coast.
He is able to hold the rod steady with his left hand even though he has no fingers on it.
He has made a kind of a glove which attaches to a Velcro pad on the rod, allowing him to keep control, while the thumb and two toes on his right hand give him enough control to bring in the catch.
"I'm enjoying my fishing again but I always need one of my mates to go out with me," Colin explained. "I couldn't cope with the boat on my own if there was an emergency. "People stare at me but I've got used to that - and I always joke that I'm the only man who can pick his nose with his toes."
Wife Lynne, 54, said: "He was in deep despair after the accident but the transplant operation went so well that he has been given a new lease of life." Fishing friend Roger Gore said: "When I spoke to him soon after the accident he said he didn't think he would pull anchor for me again.
"Now all his mates think he is fantastic for overcoming this terrible injury and start fishing again."
Plastic surgeon Mr Laing said: "We were pleased we were able to perform this transplant and enable Colin to get on with his life.
"It was good team work by the operating team and Colin was a very good patient."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Calcutta prostitutes turn to Kama Sutra to promote safe sex
from BBC News Online

The government in India's West Bengal State is supporting a programme that offers prostitutes an ancient solution to modern concerns about safe sex.
"Kama Sutra has many postures that can give men the highest pleasure without consummation and that is what the prostitutes are being taught.
"They are learning something very useful," says Rajyashree Choudhuri, chief of the Institute of International Social Development (IISD), who designed the project.
Until now, thousands of Calcutta's sex-workers have tried to force customers to use condoms.
Their powerful organisation, Durbar Mahila Samannoy Samity, has decreed that all their members perform safe sex and customers trying to force sex workers to have intercourse without condoms are thrown out of brothels.
But what happens if a customer refuses to use condoms?
The prostitutes lose business, which they can ill afford.
That is a situation the IISD is teaching them to avoid.
In a conference hall in the posh southern locality of Gariahat, the IISD is running its "safe sex" workshop, with backing from the West Bengal Aids Control Society.
Sex-workers from the city's major red light districts are joining up in droves.
"We will back any programme on safe sex. The number of HIV patients in West Bengal is increasing and we want to control it at any cost," says Sachinanda Sarkar, assistant director of the Aids Control Society.
Last year, 1,137 HIV cases were reported in the state. More than 600 cases have been reported this year.
Dozens of prostitutes turn up for the workshop and are taken through the voluminous Kama Sutra, India's most famous ancient treatise on sex.
The training lasts for two to three hours.
"They are specifically taught foreplay and other poses that will give men a high degree of pleasure," said Rajyashree Choudhury.
"We teach the girls the art of ensuring a premature but very satisfying discharge by tactfully avoiding intercourse. The Kama Sutra is a treasure house for all that."
A large percentage of HIV/Aids patients in India acquire the virus through unprotected sex.

Ironic that a text that has long fascinated the Western world is being 'rediscovered' in the land where it was first written...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Nuremburg Trials, coming soon to the World Wide Web
from BBC News Online

One million pages of documents from the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals will be made available on the internet if Boston's Harvard University can find the necessary money.
Harvard's Law School has already posted 7,000 pages on one of its own web sites but it says it needs as much as $7m to make the entire Nuremberg archive available.
The massive project to put the one million pages of transcripts from the Nuremberg trials onto the internet is likely to take 10 years to complete.
The pages have been accessible to the public for the past 50 years though only a few people - academics and hunters of war criminals - have sifted through the mountains of material.
But the papers are now becoming very fragile and the idea to put them onto the internet came about as part of an effort to preserve them.
Seven thousand pages - a volume which covers only a third of the first 13 trials held between 1946 and 1949 - were posted on a Harvard website but then the money to continue ran out.
The university is now looking for financial grants and gifts to continue.
No startling new information about the Holocaust is expected to come to light if the massive internet archive is completed but scholars have welcomed the move.
They say it will make the Holocaust more immediate to readers and will also make the study of areas such as slave labour, the torture of prisoners-of-war and medical experimentation on humans more accessible.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Cut off toes to fit your shoes
from Sydney Herald-Sun

SEXY power shoes are an essential female accessory, but they can be torture to wear. So women are resorting to an extreme solution - surgery.
Kelli Richards, 31, spent $US10,000 ($15,300) on a foot operation when she could no longer stand the agony. "I'm fashion-conscious and I want to wear what's out there, but my bunions used to stick out," she said. "My feet ached so much I was having to wear flip-flops instead of dressing up and going out."
Ms Richards, from Philadelphia, is a fashion victim of the cult for Manolo Blahnik and Jimmy Choo shoes that often narrow to a sharp tip. Once strictly for evening wear, they became must-have items for professional women to squeeze into.
The surgeon shortened Ms Richards's second toe by removing a piece of bone, straightened her little toe and cut off a bunion. Her operation took place in February so she could enjoy the summer in peek-a-boo sandals.
Deborah Wilton from New Jersey endured the same. She felt her feet were so ugly she would bury them in the sand on the beach. "When people would see my feet they'd say, 'Oh my God, look at your toes!"' After surgery to shorten her second toe, she rejoiced: "I am wearing open-toed shoes for the first time in my life."
Stephen Smith, a Californian podiatrist, said he turned away at least 50 patients a year who wanted extreme operations. "We have people come in and say: 'My foot is too wide. Can you get rid of my little toe?"'
Suzanne Levine, who operated on Richards, is known as the "foot facelift doctor". She performs about 300 foot operations a year, a phenomenon she ascribes to the reluctance of women to accept middle age.
Foot surgery often draws the same clients as plastic surgery. "I've had people ask for toe liposuction. I tell them to go see a therapist," she said.

Expect a child foot-binding revival any day now....
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On This Day, in 1982 - Krays let out for mother's funeral
from BBC News Online

The notorious east End gangsters Ronnie and Reggie Kray have been allowed out of prison for the funeral of their mother.
Violet Kray, 72, died of cancer last week.
It was the first time the Krays, 49, had been seen in public since being sentenced to life imprisonment for murder in 1969.
Security was tight for the funeral service in east London.
The brothers arrived separately - both were handcuffed to a prison guard and flanked by police officers.
Ronnie Kray was brought from Broadmoor Hospital for the criminally insane in Berkshire where he has spent the last four years.
His brother travelled from Parkhurst Prison in the Isle of Wight where he is still held as a maximum security Category 'A' prisoner.
The service was attended by a number of celebrities and underworld figures known to the twins from the days when they ran one of London's biggest criminal operations.
Among them was actress Diana Dors who arrived wearing a black dress and sunglasses and carrying a bouquet.
The brothers were not allowed to attend the graveside service at Chingford Mount cemetery in Essex where their mother was interred in the family burial plot.

For those of you about to say 'Who?' again, here's the background...

Ronnie and Reggie Kray graduated from juvenile crime in London's east End to running one of the capital's biggest crime rackets with their elder brother, Charlie.
They were jailed for the murders of George Cornell who called Ronnie 'a fat poof' and that of Jack 'The Hat' McVitie a year later.
A film about their lives in 1990 fuelled a campaign to get them released.
But successive home secretaries refused to free them.
Ronnie died of a heart attack in prison in 1995.
However, Reggie was released on compassionate grounds a month before his death from cancer in October 2000.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Heide Fleiss does an Iron Mike on her ex-boyfried...
from The Daily Mirror (UK)

FORMER Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss tried to bite off the ear of her Black Hawk Down star boyfriend Tom Sizemore, a court has heard.
Sizemore, who was also in Saving Private Ryan, denies charges of domestic violence.
Boogie Nights actor Thomas Jane told the Los Angeles court how he saw a fight between the couple while at his friend Sizemore's Hollywood Hills home.
He said: "Heidi burst in screaming. She ran and jumped on him, trying to beat him up.
"Tom said, `She's biting my ear'. He stood up and threw her off his back. She fell on the drive, hitting her head.
"I put some ice on her head and mopped up the blood. Tom screamed, `Get that bitch out of my house'.
"She didn't want to leave, she was acting so irrational and I had to chase her around my car to get her in."
Fleiss, 37 - who used to organise call girls for the stars - claimed the row broke out after she confronted Sizemore with claims that he cheated on her with prostitutes.
Earlier tapes were played of Sizemore, 41, threatening to kill Fleiss and put her in jail.
The trial continues.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Steven Seagal's former business partner admits Mafia extortion plot
from BBC News Online

The former business partner of action film star Steven Seagal is to admit his part in a mob plot to extort money from the actor, a federal prosecutor has said.
Jules Nasso is to plead guilty to charges that he joined members of the Gambino crime family in demanding more than £100,000 from the star, according to prosecutor Andrew Genser.
Terms of the plea bargain were not disclosed.
Seagal, 50, who starred in Under Siege and Exit Wounds, had testified that he was threatened by the men in a dark upstairs dining room of a Brooklyn restaurant two years ago.
The actor's lawyer, Martin Pollner, said Seagal was "pleased that justice is being pursued and that his name is now clear".
Prosecutors said they had recordings of the mobsters laughing at how scared the actor was during the meeting.
Nasso, who served as a producer on some of Seagal's most popular films, had said he was seeking repayment for a £300,000 loan to the Hollywood star.
Lawyers for the producer, who was set to go to court next month, had repeatedly called Seagal a "pathological liar".
Nasso is expected to formally enter his guilty plea in a New York court next Wednesday.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Japan-China talks marred by reminders of World War II
from CNN.com

(CNN) -- A visit by top Japanese politicians to Beijing to mark the 25th anniversary of a peace treaty between the two nations has been marred by China's deep-rooted resentment over Tokyo's wartime atrocities.
A spate of Japanese ministers have visited Beijing in the past days, not only to commemorate the Treaty of Peace and Friendship, but also to lobby for a bullet train service and help set up talks over North Korea's nuclear ambitions.
But despite moves by Japan to bolster ties, many Chinese are still upset over what they see as Tokyo's refusal to admit to the full extent of its atrocities in China during World War Two, diplomatic analysts say.
The long-standing animosity over Japan's wartime antics was given new fuel this month after 36 Chinese fell ill from chemical weapons left over by the Japanese army in Qiqihar city in Heilongjiang Province.
The poisonous material -- stored in five metal barrels -- was unearthed at a construction site in China's northeast.
China's official media has urged Tokyo to fully compensate the victims as well as their relatives.
That call comes as Beijing falls back on "the lesson of history" to urge Tokyo not to boost its military capacity amid the North Korean nuclear crisis.
During a meeting with Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda in Beijing, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said both countries should "look to the future while drawing lessons from history."
Fukuda arrived in Beijing on Saturday and is set to stay through Monday for talks with Chinese leaders to help defuse the North Korean nuclear crisis.
President Hu Jintao met former Japanese prime ministers Ryutaro Hashimoto and Tomiichi Murayama over the weekend, where he said both countries should be "more aware of the historical responsibilities ... when they review the lessons from history."
In the past year, China's official press has run dozens of stories about the surge of right-wing, "militaristic" sentiments in Japan.
In an article in the Global Times last week, Japan analyst Liu Linli wrote Tokyo was fomenting a "North Korean threat theory" so as to "take advantage of the opportunity to develop nuclear weapons."
Diplomatic analysts have warned that Beijing's concern about Japanese remilitarization might detract from the good will generated as East Asian nations pile pressure on Pyongyang to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction.
Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, who is visiting Japan, is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Monday to talk about the nuclear standoff.
Strong anti-Japanese sentiment is shared among ordinary Chinese. Tens of thousands have signed a Website petition urging their government against using Japanese technology to build a rail link between Beijing and Shanghai.
Japan is anxious to secure the bullet train contract, and sources close to Beijing say that because of its history and lower costs, the Japanese Shinkansen, or bullet train, offers advantages over the magnetic levitation model pushed by the Germans.
Earlier this month, Japan Transport Minister Chikage Ogi traveled to Beijing to lobby for the $20 billion Beijing-Shanghai rail link.
But such moves have set China's Internet chat rooms abuzz, stirring anti-Japanese sentiment among many Chinese.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This discussion was created by MonTemplar (174120) for Friends and Friends of Friends only, but now has been archived. No new comments can be posted.