Afghan government releases over 300 Taliban prisoners

On the third and last day of a cease-fire with the Taliban, the Afghan government on Sunday announced that it had released over 300 prisoners of the militant group in connection with ongoing peace efforts.

Announcing the development, the Office of the National Security Council (ONSC) said in a statement that the government had released 317 more Taliban prisoners from Parwan and other provincial prisons, bringing the total to 4,917.

Prisoner releases will continue until the total reaches 5,100 -- 100 more than required by the US-Taliban peace deal signed in February, it said.

The Taliban vowed to have already completed their part of the prisoners' swap by releasing 1,000 captive security forces.

"While it is a significant step, the Afghan people ask for a permanent cease-fire and imminent start of direct negotiations between the Afghan government and the Taliban," said a statement issued by the president's office. Source: https://www.daily-bangladesh.com/

Read More........ → August 05, 2020

Germany: even the closest friends don’t like to be fooled

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As the saga sparked by Edward Snowden continues to rage, more countries around the globe join the chorus of those outraged by the US spying programs. Even America’s closest allies seemed to be surprised by the “elastic conscience” of its long-standing partner. 

One of the most offended by the NSA eavesdropping was German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Considering that as a child of the former East Germany, Merkel grew up with her phone being tapped, no wonder that Der Spiegel’s report on the American surveillance agency listening to her phone calls, had a special resonance for Merkel. "This contradicts the interest of German people. There are no grounds for spying. Every German citizen is disappointed. The level of trust between the two countries needs to be restored,"Angela Merkel said. But sentiments aside, there are serious political consequences for this credibility gap. On October 24, the US ambassador was asked to come to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Germany because of the reports of phone tapping of the German Chancellor. Soon after that Merkel herself called the US President, Barack Obama asking for an explanation, Obama replied that the surveillance was carried out without his knowledge and was stopped in 2010. On October 28th, Hans-Peter Friedrich, head of the German Ministry of Interior Affairs announced that Germany should send US diplomats out of the country because of the possible wiretapping on Merkel. Jens Stomber, a coordinator for the NSA scandal with the Pirate Party in Germany, predicts it’s not the end of the story, as not only German politicians, but ordinary people have come to realize that the US is not trustworthy anymore. “I think in the past, maybe our government blindly trusted the US and I think from the Snowden leaks we can, of course, learn that you cannot trust the US in an unlimited way. And what is happening now, of course, in Europe if you look at what happened with the Swift agreement, which was suspended yesterday, or at least there was a decision to question it. So, there will be a vote in the European Council as many steps will follow. We are already in a discussion for a new date of protection reform all over Europe, so Europe is clearly taking steps to stand united against US surveillance and protect their citizens, I think so,”Jens Stomber said. Despite the strong words, experts says it's not likely that Germany and other targeted countries would sever relations with the US, but we are likely to witness an impact on the way they do business. Just a couple of weeks ago, the European Parliament suspended the service used to help the US track terrorist bank accounts known as the Terrorist Finance Tracking Program in direct response to the news the NSA monitored the international data-sharing system known as "SWIFT," which is used to transfer money electronically in Europe. Seems like the message that the world sends to the US is clear – even the closest friends don’t like to be fooled. Source: Article,

Read More........ → May 22, 2014

Rupert Murdoch: hall of fame or den of infamy?

Charles Laurence: Jude Law's claim that his phone was hacked on US soil haunts Murdoch as he prepares for TV honour. NEW YORK – Has Jude Law rained on Rupert Murdoch’s parade? The 

octogenarian media magnate is due to be inducted into America’s Television Academy Hall of Fame in a Hollywood ceremony six weeks from now. Murdoch will be honoured on 11 March alongside five others including Jay Leno, the talk show host who will have just retired from decades hosting The Tonight Show, and the actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, star of Seinfeld and Veep. Academy chairman Bruce Rosemblum explained the reasoning: "The six individuals being inducted into the Hall of Fame have all made a profound impact on the landscape of television, leaving their own mark within our industry and with audiences around the world. "Their groundbreaking contributions will last for generations, making them true icons who could not be more deserving of the Television Academy's highest honour." Murdoch has without doubt made a “profound impact on the landscape of television” since he followed Columbus over the Atlantic in the early 1970s. Whether he should get an award for it is a matter of contentious debate. On one side, he gets credit for creating Fox TV as America’s fourth television network, muscling his way into the company of the Big Three, CBS, NBC and ABC. This is no mean feat. On the other side, he gets brickbats for creating Fox News, a money-spinner that has gone to the top of the ratings in a manner familiar to British newspaper readers – by pandering to the lowest common denominator. Fox News, the Tea Party trumpet with its astonishingly cynical claim to be “fair and balanced”, has unarguably become a cancer in the American body politic. And Murdoch gets honoured for this? This is where Jude Law comes in. Yesterday, the English movie star appeared at the Old Bailey in London as a prosecution witness in the trial of Rebekah Brooks and other News International employees, charged with misconduct in public office and illegal phone hacking. Law's evidence made the overnight headlines for the shocking revelation that a member of own family had been paid by the News of the World to leak information about his girlfriend Sienna Miller's affair with Bond actor Daniel Craig.  But what will have sounded the alarm for Murdoch in America was Law's claim from the witness box that his phone was accessed on American soil. As the Daily Beast reports, “Law told the court that while he was in the US filming Cold Mountain and Alfie, the phone numbers of his American agent and cell phones he had been given by the film studio appeared in the notebooks of a private investigator working for the News of the World.”  The actor told the court how he had been shown the list of numbers by police officers. "One of the numbers that appeared on the notes was an agent... and several other numbers I'd been loaned," he said. "They were able to follow me not just in this country but abroad as well.” This has special significance for Fox and all Murdoch’s operations on this side of the pond. If it is proved that his companies engaged in illegal activity and that Murdoch can be held responsible for the culture of those companies, there is a chance that Fox could lose its operation licences. All broadcasting in America is regulated through licencing by the Federal Communication Commission, the FCC. Murdoch is no stranger to wrangling with it. One of their rules is that you cannot own a broadcast station and a newspaper in the same “market”. He was forced to sell the New York Post, his beloved tabloid, in order to get Fox on the air in New York, and he never forgave the Democrat majority on the Senate committee that refused to bend the rules for him. But this could be a different level of war altogether. If there are convictions in London, the FCC might be persuaded that Murdoch is not an owner of “good character”, and therefore withdraw all his US licences. Last year, the organisation Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) challenged the renewal of licences for two Murdoch stations in DC and one in Baltimore, Maryland. They argued that as the law demanded owners of “good character” who acted “in the public interest” and spoke with “candour”, News Corp, as the parent company of both Fox and News International, no longer qualified. In its petition CREW stated: “It is well established that News Corp has been involved in one of the biggest media scandals of all time. Its reporters hacked voicemails and bribed public officials while top executives — including Rupert Murdoch — either approved the conduct or turned a blind eye. To say those responsible are not of good character is a colossal understatement – ‘despicable’ and ‘loathsome’ are more apt.” Last May, the FCC turned down the CREW petition and renewed the licences. But as The Wrap reported, the decision left the door wide open by specifying that it could act only after a British court had established that the alleged misconduct had indeed taken place. “Serious questions have been raised regarding non-FCC misconduct by News Corp subsidiaries,” the FCC decision said. A combination of expensive lawyers, company restructuring and a very great deal of power and influence in Washington makes Murdoch a hard man to take down. But the long-running phone-hacking trial will not have concluded by the time he attends the Hall of Fame ceremony on 11 March. The threat of guilty verdicts will hang over his night of glory. Source: The Week UK, Image

Read More........ → March 18, 2014

SC refuses to grant more time to Sahara to refund Rs 24,000cr

The last hope of Sahara group to get more time to refund Rs. 24,000 crore to its investors was today dashed in the Supreme Court which dismissed its plea and pulled it up for not complying court’s earlier order to return the money by first week of February. A bench headed by Chief Justice Altamas Kabir, which had earlier extended the deadline to two companies of the group for refunding the money from November end to first week of February, refused to grant more time. “If you have not refunded the amount as per our order then you have no business to come to court,” an angry Chief Justice said adding that it had earlier granted time only to ensure that investors get their money back. Two companies of Sahara group — Sahara India Real Estate Corporation (SIREC) and Sahara Housing Investment Corporation (SHIC) — who along with Sahara chief Subrata Roy are facing contempt proceeding in the apex court before another bench which had on February 6 allowed SEBI to freeze accounts and seize properties of its two companies for defying court orders by not refunding the money to investors. As soon as the matter was taken up for hearing the Supreme Court bar association president M. Krishnamani stood up and objected that the bench headed by the CJI should not hear the case as the order for refunding the amount to investors was passed by another bench. “As a bar leader I have to say keeping with the tradition of this court and this bench should not have heard this matter and the matter should go to the same bench for the modification of the order. Instead of going to hear, the proper recourse would be for the other bench to hear it. I am at pains to hear different types of rumours,” he said. Justice Kabir then got angry and said that he is making statements without knowing anything about the case and asked him to sit. “How do you know what is going to happen in the case. If something happens then you say. Kindly take your seat,” he said. Source: The Asian Age

Read More........ → February 26, 2013

American women win the right to kill and be killed

© Flickr.com/Andrew J Ferguson/cc-by-nc-sa 3.0

According to The Washington Post, US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta who is stepping down soon has
decided to lift the ban for servicewomen to take part in hostilities. This year, women will be allowed to serve in the infantry, artillery, tank troops and special detachments. Boris Volkhonsky from the Russian Institute of Strategic Research gives more details. Nevertheless, army commanders retain the right not to allow women to take part in certain operations. In particular, service in such special detachments as the Navy Seals or Delta will so far remain unavailable to women (at least until 2016). Lifting the ban on women’s service in the combat troops of the US armed forces partially took place last year when the Pentagon announced quite a few activities available to women. Still, the most fervent activists were not satisfied with it. They were eager to play even more active roles. In November last year four servicewomen sued the Pentagon insisting on the ban for women to be involved in hostilities to be recognized as unconstitutional. They were supported by The American Civil Liberties Union. The arguments in favour of a full lift of the ban are, for example, that in countries like Iraq and Afghanistan where there is no definite frontline women actually take part in hostilities, so the existing rules should be adapted to life realities. In addition, as one of the plaintiffs pointed out, the ban on taking certain positions was an obstacle in her career and as a result meant sexual – sorry, I mean gender discrimination. However, we are not as much dealing with judicial subtleties here as with another grimace of contemporary western society where such high and noble things as equality, the absence of discrimination, etc., are completely distorted and turned into a farce. The struggle for the equality of women has brought absolutely abnormal results. In their ambition to outdo men in everything women sometimes violate all laws that seem to have been established by nature itself. Having gained the right to kill their own unborn babies, US women demand further expansion of their right to kill. Let’s remember the scandal about tortures and prisoner abuse in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison. Women were among the cruellest torturers there. At present, women make about 14% in the US 1.4mln-strong armed forces. According to calculations, the lifted ban will open about 230,000 new vacancies. Objections to this decision can hardly be heard among loud approvals. The objections are that the permission for women to serve in small groups in which people are in permanent close contact will give rise to certain psychological, as well as physiological problems. However, after US President Barack Obama allowed open homosexuals to do military service objections about women seem negligible. The founder of the US Center for Military Readiness Elaine Donnelly says that “thirty years of studies, reports and actual experience have shown that in direct ground combat units – the infantry – women do not have an equal opportunity to survive or to help fellow soldiers to survive. The physical aspects of it are only part of the reason.” But this does not confuse women whoinsist on ‘equality’ and US law-makers who support them. Women’s eagerness to hold a rifle and shoot – no matter at whom – overrides all objections. In the 19th century great Russian poet Nikolay Nekrasov wrote in praise of Russian women that they were capable of stopping a horse at full tilt and entering a burning house. Still, the poet believed that women’s main virtue was that they held a baby in their arms and kept a child by the hand. Sadly, today’s feminists seem to have forgotten about women’s primary mission in their trigger-happy mood. Source: Voice of Russia

Read More........ → January 25, 2013

Massive fraud by Dutch psychologist shows weak side of scientific method

The credibility of the field of social psychology is at risk, a Dutch panel  has found  after  reviewing  massive misconduct by a researcher who published dozens of articles based on fraudulent data in 15 years at three universities. Diederik Stapel was a psychologist with a long list of publications and a stellar career. He had an eye for media-friendly research topics – meat eaters are more selfish than vegetarians, for example. But in 2011, whistleblowers alerted authorities at Tilburg University about irregularities in his published papers. His reputation unravelled quickly. Stapel has admitted that he had fiddled his data and fabricated research results and has returned his PhD. In a sombre assessment of the case, three panels chaired by Willem Levelt found fundamental flaws in the scientific process both in the Netherlands and internationally. “Virtually nothing of all the impossibilities, peculiarities and sloppiness mentioned in this report was observed by all these local, national and international members of the field, and no suspicion of fraud whatsoever arose… from the bottom to the top there was a general neglect of fundamental scientific standards and methodological requirements.” They also criticised the editors and reviewers of leading international journals. “Not infrequently reviews were strongly in favour of telling an interesting, elegant, concise and compelling story, possibly at the expense of the necessary scientific diligence.” For social psychologists, the conclusion of the report is damning, almost apocalyptic: “A ‘byproduct’ of the Committees’ inquiries is the conclusion that, far more than was originally assumed, there are certain aspects of the discipline itself that should be deemed undesirable or even incorrect from the perspective of academic standards and scientific integrity.” Predictably, the Executive Committee of the European Association of Social Psychology attacked the report’s conclusions as “slanderous”. This is not just a local disaster, but one which will ripple internationally. “I see a train wreck looming,” wrote Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman in an open email to psychologists who work in social priming, one of Stapel’s areas: “your field is now the poster child for doubts about the integrity of psychological research”. The journal Perspectives on Psychological Science last month had a special issue on the field’s crisis of confidence. It focused on the key issue of replicability.John P. A. Ioannidis, of Stanford University, points out that the authority of science depends upon its ability to self-correct errors. But as the Levelt report revealed, reproducing the results of other researchers is uncommon. Researchers are far more interested in startling new results which will attract more funding. “The self-correcting paradigm … seems to be very uncommon,” Ioannidis writes. Source: Bioedge

Read More........ → January 17, 2013

Everything You Need To Know: The Economic Collapse for Dummies *Micro Documentary*

This latest micro-documentary from Future Money Trends, narrated by founder and chief strategist Daniel Ameduri, highlights the inevitably of a collapse in the global financial and economic systems. Taking into consideration key data points likedemographics, consumer consumption, unemployment trends, government debt, monetary policy, and widespread manipulation, a frightening end-game scenario begins to emerge. With rampant fraud throughout the financial system and price fixing of unprecedented proportions in global stocks, commodities, interest rates, business loans, mortgages and personal loans, it is only a matter of time – perhaps one to four years according to Ameduri – before all of the machinations engaged in by governments, central banks and their financial industry cohorts to stabilize the system does exactly the opposite. The panic of 1929 will be a walk in the park compared to the utter pandemonium we will witness as the entire way of life we have come to know over the last three decades crumbles before our eyes. As Zero Hedge notes, The Economic Collapse for Dummies is “everything you wanted to know about the inevitability of a major economic collapse but were afraid to ask.”Source: The Coming Depression

Read More........ → January 06, 2013

Post-nude photo scandal, Harry deployed in Afghanistan

Prince Harry, third in line to the British throne, returned to Afghanistan today to begin a four-month combat tour as a frontline Apache helicopter pilot. 27-year-old Harry, known as Captain Wales in the British military, was in news last month when he was photographed nude during a wild party in a Las Vegas hotel. He arrived at Camp Bastion in Helmand province, four-year after he had to cut short his previous deployment in the troubled nation. In 2008, Harry had to leave Afghanistan after a news blackout surrounding his deployment was broken. Harry will be working as part of the Joint Aviation Group (JAG) which provides helicopter support to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and Afghan forces operating throughout Regional Command (South West), the Ministry of Defence said in a statement here. Based in Bastion, the largest coalition military base in Afghanistan, his squadron will provide surveillance, deterrence and, when required, close combat attack capabilities as well as escort duties for other aircraft, the statement added. Captain Wales qualified as a co-pilot gunner in February this year and was posted to 3 Regiment Army Air Corps, part of 16 Air Assault Brigade, to gain further flying experience and to operate the aircraft on a number of exercises. He has been trained to fly in the front seat as the mission commander, a role that equips the operative to fly the aircraft from the back seat but the majority of the time involves operating the Apache's sights, sensors and weapons systems. The Deputy Commander of the JAG and Commanding Officer of 3 Regiment Army Air Corps in the UK, Lieutenant Colonel Tom de la Rue, said: "Captain Wales is a serving soldier and a qualified Apache pilot having completed the Apache Conversion to Role course earlier this year. As such, and after further flying experience, he has deployed along with the rest of the squadron as part of a long-planned and scheduled deployment to provide support to ISAF and Afghan forces operating in Helmand". The ministry statement said as with all operational deployments, Captain Wales's deployment had been long-planned and the threat to him and others around him thoroughly assessed. The Apache AH Mk1 fleet consists of 67 aircraft that have seen service in Afghanistan and in Libya. They are designed to hunt and destroy armoured vehicles and can operate in all weathers, day and night, the statement said. The fleet can also detect, classify and prioritise up to 256 targets in seconds through their fire control radar, and carry a mix of weapons, including rockets, Hellfire missiles and a 30mm chain gun, the statement added. Source: Indian Express

Read More........ → September 08, 2012

Russian lawmakers bring Magnitsky case to Washington

By Roman Mamonov, A delegation of Russian lawmakers from the upper house of parliament, the Federation Council, has presented the outcome of the parliamentary investigation into the Magnitsky case in Washington. Their major task was to talk the US out of adopting the Magnitsky Law that envisages sanctions against Russian officials allegedly linked to the death of the Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in a pretrial detention center.At first, Russia was losing a media war around the case but, recently has taken revenge. Russian delegates at the Monaco OSCE session have brought individuals allegedly linked to the death of the lawyer and now four Russian lawmakers are in Washington. Their findings claim that Magnitsky's arrest was legal as the lawyer was guilty of financial fraud. His death was caused by the lack of medical care in the pretrial detention. The documents were presented to Wendy R. Sherman , Under Secretary for Political Affairs, the House of Representatives members and the anti-Russian Congressman John McCain, Valery Shnyakin from the Russian delegation said in an exclusive interview with the VoR. Source: Voice of Russia. 

Read More........ → September 01, 2012

Police officer caused major terror alert after ringing colleagues with a coded ‘bomb threat’ for a joke

A police officer caused a major terrorism alert after ringing a busy port with a hoax bomb threat. PC Hatef Nezami, 48, rang colleagues at the police Special Branch office with a coded message that a device was placed in a busy port. Specialist terrorism staff were so concerned by the call's authentic nature that they started preparing for a full terrorist attack. The constable, who has completed a regional Special Branch terrorism course, said that a bomb was on a Condor ferry based in Poole, Dorset. However at the time of his call, the ferry was actually sailing across the English Channel packed full of people travelling to the Channel Islands. Mr Nezami is believed to have tried to call back to reveal his 'joke' call but was unable to do so for half an hour as staff were engaged on all the available phone lines alerting authorities. Source: The Coming Crisis

Read More........ → August 23, 2012

Olympic scandals rattle London

By Pershkina Anastasiya, Ukraine may go to Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne to dispute the results of the final 16 boxing tournament in which Britain’s Anthony Ogogo was unlawfully awarded victory over Ukraine’s Yevgeny Khytrov. This referee scandal, though the most high-profile at the moment, is not the only cheats scandal that has marred the first week of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. During the gymnastics team scoring competitions the judges offended the Japanese by awarding a low score to the team’s leader. Japan immediately contested the score. As a result, the judges re-jiggered the scores and Japan won the silver medal. That knocked Ukraine to fourth position causing the team’s anger. In the final 16 boxing match the judges declared Britain’s Anthony Ogogo the winner, even though his score was the same as his Ukrainian opponent Yevgeny Khytrov’s and his performance was less spectacular. During a semifinal epee fencing bout the German fencer hit her South Korean opponent four times in the last minute. Even though the unfairness of this was evident, the judges did not bother to mend it. Eurosport.ru observer Igor Zelenitsyn says that these scandals occurred through the judges’ fault. Source: Voice of Russia. 

Read More........ → August 04, 2012

Should Olympic athletes be allowed to use performance-enhancing drugs?

The London Olympics have arrived and with them come familiar controversies over drug cheats. IOC President Jacques Rogge said yesterday that tests had identified more than 100 cheats in the lead-up to the Games. Years of tough restrictions appear to be bearing fruit, with fewer scandals every time the Olympics are held. In Athens in 2004 26 athletes were caught; in Beijing in 2008, only 14 athletes and 6 horses. However, this may mean that athletes are just outsmarting the IOC. The 1980 Games in Moscow have been called the Chemist’s Games because so many athletes were apparently using drugs -- but no one was actually nabbed. Is it worth the effort? This is a question that involves bioethics and as usual, there are fierce controversies. The Bush Administration’s bioethics commission produced a document in 2003 which took a very dim view of drugs in sport. “they are, despite their higher scores and faster times, bad or diminished as sportsmen-not simply because they cheated their opponents, but because they also cheated, undermined, or corrupted themselves and the very athletic activity in which they seem to excel.” However, it is bioethicists who endorse the use of drugs in sports who are in the headlines this week. “If the goal is to protect health, then medically supervised doping is likely to be a better route,” says Andy Miah, a bioethicist at the University of the West of Scotland in Ayr told Nature. “Better yet, the world of sport should complement the World Anti-Doping Agency with a World Pro-Doping Agency, the goal of which is to invest in safer forms of enhancement.” But the leading spokesman for making drugs freely available to athletes is Julian Savulescu, an Australian who teaches at Oxford University. In a very interesting interview in Der Spiegel, he argued that it is impossible to stop athletes from using drugs to get a winning edge. “So we have to go for the second best option, which is having an open market for doping,” he said. Admittedly this is risky, but “Boxers risk severe brain damage. Cyclists careening downhill at speeds exceeding 70 kilometers per hour risk their lives. These dangers are far greater than those connected with controlled and responsible use of drugs -- and we accept them.” As a safeguard, doping should be done under medical supervision by doctors who are obliged to do as they are asked. “I think it is part of the doctors' professional obligation to more broadly protect athletes' health rather than saying ‘no, I won't do it, that's their own problem.’ They have an obligation to provide doping services, like they offer abortion services, even if they might personally object to abortion.” Der Spiegel’s journalist was baffled by the comparison of abortion to sport. But Savulescu insisted: “Pregnancy is not a disease, so abortion is no therapy. In most cases, it is a reproductive enhancement. It helps people decide when to have children and how many of them. Only a tiny amount of abortions are done for medical reasons, the overwhelming majority are done for social reasons, including in Germany. And of course, we have a whole system of regulations to prevent backyard abortions -- as we should in doping.”Source: Bioedge

Read More........ → July 30, 2012

Corruption in the “heart of democracy”

By Mamonov Roman, While passions are running high in the US ahead of the upcoming presidential elections, a new scandal has unfolded around Washington DC mayor Vincent Gray. It has been revealed that members of his staff illegally used the data bases with information about the district’s residents. While passions are running high in the US ahead of the upcoming presidential elections, a new scandal has unfolded around Washington DC mayor Vincent Gray. It has been revealed that members of his staff illegally used the data bases with information about the district’s residents. Earlier several members of the staff were accused of not properly reporting the funds raised for Gray’s election campaign in 2010.Against a different information background this scandal could have become international. But now this scandal in Washington pales beside the events in Syria, the euro-crisis and the coming US presidential elections. But the fact as such is a sensational one. The Mayor of Washington DC, the capital of one of the global powers, is about to face criminal accusations. The story is linked with of Vincent Gray’s election campaign for the post in 2010. Tags: campaign, corruption, World, US, Society, Opinion & Analysis, Читать далее, Source: Voice of Russia. 

Read More........ → July 26, 2012

2 Indian origin men in UK cyber fraud

London (PTI): Two Indian-origin men are among six people jailed over a multi-million-pound cyber racket that involved the design, production and sale of fake identities and the management of online forums where clients were coached on how to commit fraud. The six sentenced on Friday at the Southwark Crown Court for a catalogue of fraud offences include Jaipal Singh, 31, who is a director of a telecom company based in the West Midlands, and student Arun Thear, 22, also based in the West Midlands. All six pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing. Besides Singh and Thear, the other four are Jason Place (42), Mark Powell-Richards (59), Allen Stringer (57) and Michael Daly (68). Jaipal Singh was sentenced to 18 months for conspiracy to defraud, contrary to Common Law, while Arun Thear was sentenced to 6 months in jail, suspended for two years, and 150 hours unpaid community service for forgery, contrary to section 1 of the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981. Jason Place and Barry Sales ran operations from the comfort of their Spanish villas in Alicante while employees based at locations around the UK would monitor the website Confidential Access and work on various documents, including false bank statements, wage slips, driving licences and utility bills. Source: The Hans India

Read More........ → June 17, 2012

High-profile Russian hacker extradited from France

The notorious hacker and alleged credit card trafficker, Vladislav Khorokhorin, has been extradited from France to the US over the alleged theft of around US$9.5 million from over 2,100 ATMs in some 280 cities worldwide in less than 12 hours. Khorokhorin, a 27-year-old Moscow-born Israeli-Ukrainian citizen, (sometimes incorrectly spelt as Horohorin), is believed to be one of the most prolific sellers of stolen credit card data. He was extradited to the United States on June 6, and was arraigned before US magistrate Judge Alan Kay in the District of Columbia on June 7. He was ordered to be detained pending trial, ENewsPF.com reports. American authorities consider Khorokhorin to be among the founders of an international cyber-criminal network called CarderPlanet – “one of the most sophisticated organizations of online financial criminals in the world,” according to the US Secret Service Assistant Director for Investigations, Michael Merritt. The criminal network employed about 7,000 people, based mostly in Eastern Europe and CIS countries. American secret services shut down the network in 2004, since when they had been tracking criminals at large. Vladislav Khorokhorin, aka “BadB”, was arrested in Nice by order of Interpol order while boarding a plane to the Russian capital on August 7, 2010. In the United States, he faces criminal charges filed against him in the District of Columbia and in the Northern District of Georgia. If a guilty verdict is passed in connection with fraud, he could be sentenced to 10 years behind bars and a fine of US$250,000. A conviction for theft could add another two years to the prison term and an additional fine of US$250,000. (rt.com) Source: Sam Daily Times

Read More........ → June 17, 2012

Cameron faces Murdoch storm at UK media probe

British Prime Minister David Cameron, under fire for courting an exclusive media clique led by Rupert Murdoch, appeared before a judicial inquiry on Thursday to try and neuter claims his ministers tailored policy to further Murdoch's interests.Cameron's once cosy ties with Murdoch's inner circle mean he is under pressure to pull off a virtuoso performance at the inquiry, which has sharpened the perception that Britain has been run for years by an elite that fawned on the News Corp chairman. The coalition government has divided

Read More........ → June 15, 2012

Oh no! Not again! Not another Korean stem cell fraud

BioEdge: Korean scientists will need more than a stiff drink to recover their joie de vivreafter stem cell researcher at Seoul National University admitted that she manipulated data for articles published in an international journal. Veterinary researcher Kang Soo-kyung was pinged by an anonymous whistleblower who sent the editors of ten journals a 70-slide Powerpoint report on her irregularities. On May 19 Antioxidants & Redox Signaling announced that four of her papers were being retracted, including two in the latest issue. Kang ‘fessed up immediately. “In response to allegations brought forth by a reader of this Journal, I take full responsibility as corresponding author and accept that some of the data presented is not accurate. I retract the publication in its entirety from scientific literature,” she said in a statement.However, she also insinuated that the whistleblower was driven by malice. “About 80 percent of the evidence used against me is false,” she said. There could be more unsettling revelations, as the whistleblower claims that Kang has been cheating since 2006. “If we don’t stop this author now, no one can prove fabrication later on,” he wrote. A cloud now hangs over more than a dozen of her studies. Poor oversight may have contributed to the problem. Kang was hauled before a university committee two years ago after “mistakes” surfaced in a paper for theInternational Journal of Cancer. Some Korean scientists blame intense pressure and competition. “The school and the government demand their scholars show visible progress in their projects on yearly basis. They are all stressed. What she did is unacceptable but I can see where her deeds came from,” one scientist commented on a Korean university blog. The latest incident is a painful reminder that one of the worst scientific frauds of the past century happened in the same field at the same university by another veterinary researcher. In 2005, after being feted as a national treasure for being the first in the world to clone human embryos and create embryonic stem cells, Hwang Woo Suk turned out to be a fraud. The incident severely tarnished Korea’s scientific reputation. This new imbroglio will do nothing to shine it up. Source: BioEdge

Read More........ → June 12, 2012

Kara Hurring the 'Accidental Millionaire' is found guilty of 30 counts at Rotorua District Court, New Zealand

The Coming Crisis: A New Zealand woman who went on the run after a bank mistakenly deposited millions of dollars into her partner's account has been convicted of theft, dishonesty and money laundering. "Runaway millionaire" Kara Hurring disappeared when $10m (£4.89m) was paid into partner Hui 'Leo' Gao's account by Westpac Bank in April 2009 after he requested a $100,000 (£48,000) overdraft. The error was discovered within days but by then $6.78m (£3.26m) had already been transferred into other accounts and the couple had fled the country for China. The pair were running a petrol station in the tourist destination of Rotorua at the time and were dubbed the "Accidental Millionaires" in the global media. Hurring was arrested after she returned voluntarily to New Zealand in February last year. Source: The Coming Crisis

Read More........ → May 20, 2012

Biggest scandal for CCP due to British businessman death

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By Elly Mui, Ties between former party leader Bo Xilai and a mysterious death of a British businessman have ignited news headlines around the world with one of the biggest political scandals to hit China’s Communist Party in recent history. Here to speak to us about the implications of the scandal is Jeremy Goldkorn , Founder of the Chinese media website Danwei.org. Tags: Commentary, Bo Xilai, Politics, World, Читать далее, Vource: Voice of Russia. 

Read More........ → April 22, 2012

How can voter fraud in America be avoided?

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By Carmen Russell-Sluchansky, Recently, voter ID laws stirred up a lot of controversy. Last week, James O’Keefe's project called Veritas was launched showing how easy it is to prevent fraud at voting polls in the U.S. To talk more on this we are now joined by Eric Marshall, Manager of Legal Mobilization for the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under Law. Tags: Commentary, Politics, World, US presidential elections 2012, Читать далее, Source: Voice of Russia. 

Read More........ → April 18, 2012