Militants Storm Afghan Government Building

KABUL – Insurgents wearing police uniforms and armed with suicide vests stormed a police compound in eastern Afghanistan early Sunday morning, killing three policemen in a gunfight that lasted four hours before Afghan and NATO security forces regained control of complex, government officials said.

The dawn attack occurred a mile east of the provincial capital of Khost, a volatile province bordering the tribal areas of Pakistan that have served as a haven for militants crossing into Afghanistan. It follows a pattern of attacks this spring in which insurgents wearing Afghan military or police uniforms have attacked fortified government compounds. On Saturday, a suicide bomber believed to be wearing an army uniform blew himself up in a tent on the grounds of the national military hospital in the Afghan capital of Kabul, killing at least six people who were training to be medics and wounding more than 20 others.

In Sunday’s attack, four men in Afghan border police uniforms got out of a corolla station wagon and rushed toward the traffic police department and killed the gate security guard, according to a police officer who witnessed the assault just as we was coming on duty.

“They were in ABP uniforms,” the officer, who asked not to be named, said. “I thought, what do they want this early in the morning at the traffic police department. Then they shot the guard.”

The militants ran inside and then began firing down from the top floors onto a small police base below that housed a detachment of quick reaction forces, said Mohammed Yaqoob Noorzia, the deputy provincial police chief. The men were wearing vests laden with explosives and were armed with rocket propelled grenades and AK-47s, he said.

Afghan and NATO security forces surrounded the compound and firefight ensued. A spokesman with the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force could not say if NATO troops engaged in the firefight. “We’re still getting information on it, everything is sketchy right now,” the spokesman said.

The shooting finally stopped four hours later, leaving three police officers dead and wounding four others, including a civilian who was passing by, Mr. Noorzia said. The fate of the gunmen was not immediately known.

“We don’t know how many of the suicide bombers blew themselves up and how many were killed in the firefight with police,” Mr. Noorzia said.

The attacks have raised concerns about Taliban infiltration in the Afghan national security forces, but also underscore the ease with which militants, posing as soldiers or police officers, can blend into the ranks and bypass security checkpoints.

Meanwhile, two women were killed and five other people were wounded in Zabul province in southeastern Afghanistan Sunday when their vehicle hit a roadside mine, officials said.

An employee of The New York Times in Khost contributed reporting.

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Dressing the Wounds of Government Cuts

It has emerged that while over three-quarters of universities plan to charge the maximum permitted annual fee of ￡9,000, or $15,000, in an attempt to substitute income from student tuition fees for lost government subsidy, some universities may still have trouble remaining financially viable, while others are jettisoning hundreds of courses or even entire academic departments.

David Barrett, assistant director of the Office for Fair Access, the regulator charged with insuring that universities open their doors to students from disadvantaged backgrounds, said that his office did not plan to challenge any university that charged the maximum fees. At the same time a new poll of over 12,000 students in their final year at 24 universities that do plan to charge the maximum shows that 51 percent of them would not have come to university if tuition fees had been at that level.

How are different universities coping with the new financial landscape? And what are universities that do charge the ￡9,000 maximum doing to reassure students from poorer families that higher education is an affordable option?

“Most of our direct government funding will simply disappear,” said Malcolm Gillies, vice chancellor at London Metropolitan University, which has announced the most radical restructuring of any British university. “We have some income from research grants and enterprise activities, but we were still looking at a shortfall of roughly ￡50 million out of an annual turnover of ￡160 million.”

With many students being the first in their families to attend university — 58 percent of students have parents in “manual occupations” — charging the maximum was not seen as a realistic option. The university, which until 1992 was known as the City of London Polytechnic, has instead decided to return to its traditional mission of offering more vocationally focused courses and what Dr. Gillies described as “a more developmental” teaching style to prepare students for well-defined careers.

Last year the university offered 557 courses; in the 2012-13 academic year it will offer only 160, with tuition fees averaging ￡6,850 a year. The history department, which once boasted A.J.P. Taylor on its faculty, will be eliminated entirely, along with philosophy, performing arts and Caribbean studies.

Dr. Gillies, who has degrees in classics and music, said in an interview that he took no pleasure in having to make such deep cuts. But he added that he regarded the restructuring as “a reality test for us.”

“If we don’t rethink what the product is and what value we are offering students we can’t be surprised if people don’t turn up,” Dr. Gillies said. He argued that broad-based study of the humanities “is very hard to do under the British system,” where students traditionally study a single subject at university level. Reducing the number of courses offered would also allow the university to extend the teaching year to 30 weeks, with many courses offered as yearlong modules.

“Our students need the extra learning time,” he said.

At Cambridge, where the teaching year is only 241/2 weeks long, “there are no plans to discontinue any courses,” according to John Beard, the university’s director of undergraduate recruitment. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Cambridge plans to charge students the full ￡9,000.

“The tuition fee and grant didn’t cover our costs before,” said Mr. Beard, for things like lab-intensive science courses and humanities courses taught mainly in tutorials, or “supervisions” as they are called in Cambridge, with one instructor teaching just one or two students at a time. “Teaching here costs about ￡17,500 a year per student,” he said. “Putting fees up merely allows us to maintain the status quo.”

Cambridge is the leading research university in Britain and has an endowment of nearly ￡1.5 billion, leaving it with no need to seek immediate savings.

 

Suit Accuses U.S. Government of Failing to Protect Earth for Generations Unborn

Similar lawsuits are to be filed against states around the country, according to the plaintiffs, a coalition of groups concerned about climate change called Our Children’s Trust.

Most of the individual plaintiffs in the suit, filed in United States District Court in San Francisco, are teenagers, a decision apparently made to underscore the intergenerational nature of the public trust that the earth’s atmosphere represents. More novel, however, is the suit’s reliance on the public trust doctrine, which dates to Roman times.

That doctrine has been invoked in cases involving the protection of Chicago’s lakefront and of Mono Lake in the Sierra Nevada.

But in some ways the suit parallels a current case, brought by several states against the five largest utilities in the country, that frames greenhouse gas emissions as a public nuisance, legal experts noted.

Last month, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on issues in that case, including the standing of the states to bring such lawsuits. Several justices expressed skepticism: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, for example, questioned whether the courts were being asked to intervene in an arena in which the executive branch — specifically the Environmental Protection Agency — has the requisite expertise to act.

?The E.P.A. has determined that greenhouse gases pose a danger to the public health and welfare and are therefore subject to regulation under the Clean Air Act. It has argued that this regulatory process, which is already under way, should not be pre-empted by the courts.

Legal experts interviewed on Wednesday said they were unsure whether the new lawsuit could gain legal traction, given that it presents issues that overlap in some ways with the public nuisance case. The Supreme Court is expected to issue an opinion on that case this spring.

Courts that hear these cases will be heavily influenced by the Supreme Court’s opinion, said Michael B. Gerrard, director of Columbia University’s Center for Climate Change Law.

Mr. Gerrard said that by filing such lawsuits, environmentalists were “trying to use all available options in view of the failure of Congress” to act on greenhouse gas emissions. The House approved a sweeping bill to limit such emissions in 2009, but a more cautious effort died in the Senate last year. And the recently elected Republican majority in the House is threatening to strip the E.P.A. of regulatory powers related to global warming.

Lisa Heinzerling, an environmental law expert at Georgetown University, said of the new suit, “Part of this is keeping the issue alive in lots of different settings and having all the branches, including the courts, continually react to it.”

 

Suit Accuses U.S. Government of Failing to Protect Earth for Generations Unborn

Similar lawsuits are to be filed against states around the country, according to the plaintiffs, a coalition of groups concerned about climate change called Our Children’s Trust.

Most of the individual plaintiffs in the suit, filed in United States District Court in San Francisco, are teenagers, a decision apparently made to underscore the intergenerational nature of the public trust that the earth’s atmosphere represents. More novel, however, is the suit’s reliance on the public trust doctrine, which dates to Roman times.

That doctrine has been invoked in cases involving the protection of Chicago’s lakefront and of Mono Lake in the Sierra Nevada.

But in some ways the suit parallels a current case, brought by several states against the five largest utilities in the country, that frames greenhouse gas emissions as a public nuisance, legal experts noted.

Last month, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on issues in that case, including the standing of the states to bring such lawsuits. Several justices expressed skepticism: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, for example, questioned whether the courts were being asked to intervene in an arena in which the executive branch — specifically the Environmental Protection Agency — has the requisite expertise to act.

?The E.P.A. has determined that greenhouse gases pose a danger to the public health and welfare and are therefore subject to regulation under the Clean Air Act. It has argued that this regulatory process, which is already under way, should not be pre-empted by the courts.

Legal experts interviewed on Wednesday said they were unsure whether the new lawsuit could gain legal traction, given that it presents issues that overlap in some ways with the public nuisance case. The Supreme Court is expected to issue an opinion on that case this spring.

Courts that hear these cases will be heavily influenced by the Supreme Court’s opinion, said Michael B. Gerrard, director of Columbia University’s Center for Climate Change Law.

Mr. Gerrard said that by filing such lawsuits, environmentalists were “trying to use all available options in view of the failure of Congress” to act on greenhouse gas emissions. The House approved a sweeping bill to limit such emissions in 2009, but a more cautious effort died in the Senate last year. And the recently elected Republican majority in the House is threatening to strip the E.P.A. of regulatory powers related to global warming.

Lisa Heinzerling, an environmental law expert at Georgetown University, said of the new suit, “Part of this is keeping the issue alive in lots of different settings and having all the branches, including the courts, continually react to it.”

 

Asthma Rate Rises Sharply in U.S., Government Says

According to the report, from 2001 to 2009 the prevalence of asthma increased among all demographic groups studied, including men, women, whites, blacks and Hispanics. Black children are most acutely affected: the study found that 17 percent of black children — nearly one in five — had a diagnosis of asthma in 2009, up from 11.4 percent, or about one in nine, in 2001.

While officials at the Centers for Disease Control emphasized that asthma could be controlled if managed effectively, they were at a loss to explain why it had become more widespread even as important triggers like cigarette smoking had become less common.

“We don’t know exactly why the number is going up, but, importantly, we know there are measures individuals with asthma can take to control symptoms,” said Ileana Arias, principal deputy director of the centers.

Agency officials declined to comment on budgetary proposals that would reduce money for the National Asthma Control Program.

Prevention depends on educating patients about appropriate use of medications and ensuring that each patient has a written medical plan to control asthma, but the report found that only one-third of patients had been given a plan and only about half had been advised to make changes to eliminate asthma triggers at home, school and work.

Paul Garbe, chief of the Air Pollution and Respiratory Health Branch at the centers, noted the success of several state public health initiatives, including one in Connecticut in which asthma educators and environmental assessors were sent into homes to advise patients on what changes needed to be made and how to manage the disease.

The report found that the overall prevalence of asthma increased to 8.2 percent in 2009, when 24.6 million cases were diagnosed, from 7.3 percent in 2001, when 20.1 million cases were diagnosed — a 12.3 percent increase. Among the most affected were children, 9.6 percent of whom had asthma, and especially poor children, of whom 13.5 percent had it.

While 7.7 percent of adults were found to have asthma, the rate was higher among women (9.7 percent) and among poor adults of both sexes (10.6 percent).

Asthma costs grew to about $56 billion in 2007, up from about $53 billion in 2002, the report said, though annual deaths attributed to asthma declined to about 3,500 in 2007, from a peak of about 5,500 deaths in 1996.

Researchers are investigating several potential causes for the increase in asthma, including exposure to various allergens, traffic exhaust fumes, pesticides and certain plastics, as well as factors like obesity and diet that may play a role, said Dr. Rachel L. Miller, director of the asthma project at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.

“There’s no easy singular explanation,” Dr. Miller said. “The more we study this, the more it raises a lot of questions. It’s not a straightforward puzzle at all.”

 

Asthma Rate Rises Sharply in U.S., Government Says

According to the report, from 2001 to 2009 the prevalence of asthma increased among all demographic groups studied, including men, women, whites, blacks and Hispanics. Black children are most acutely affected: the study found that 17 percent of black children — nearly one in five — had a diagnosis of asthma in 2009, up from 11.4 percent, or about one in nine, in 2001.

While officials at the Centers for Disease Control emphasized that asthma could be controlled if managed effectively, they were at a loss to explain why it had become more widespread even as important triggers like cigarette smoking had become less common.

“We don’t know exactly why the number is going up, but, importantly, we know there are measures individuals with asthma can take to control symptoms,” said Ileana Arias, principal deputy director of the centers.

Agency officials declined to comment on budgetary proposals that would reduce money for the National Asthma Control Program.

Prevention depends on educating patients about appropriate use of medications and ensuring that each patient has a written medical plan to control asthma, but the report found that only one-third of patients had been given a plan and only about half had been advised to make changes to eliminate asthma triggers at home, school and work.

Paul Garbe, chief of the Air Pollution and Respiratory Health Branch at the centers, noted the success of several state public health initiatives, including one in Connecticut in which asthma educators and environmental assessors were sent into homes to advise patients on what changes needed to be made and how to manage the disease.

The report found that the overall prevalence of asthma increased to 8.2 percent in 2009, when 24.6 million cases were diagnosed, from 7.3 percent in 2001, when 20.1 million cases were diagnosed — a 12.3 percent increase. Among the most affected were children, 9.6 percent of whom had asthma, and especially poor children, of whom 13.5 percent had it.

While 7.7 percent of adults were found to have asthma, the rate was higher among women (9.7 percent) and among poor adults of both sexes (10.6 percent).

Asthma costs grew to about $56 billion in 2007, up from about $53 billion in 2002, the report said, though annual deaths attributed to asthma declined to about 3,500 in 2007, from a peak of about 5,500 deaths in 1996.

Researchers are investigating several potential causes for the increase in asthma, including exposure to various allergens, traffic exhaust fumes, pesticides and certain plastics, as well as factors like obesity and diet that may play a role, said Dr. Rachel L. Miller, director of the asthma project at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.

“There’s no easy singular explanation,” Dr. Miller said. “The more we study this, the more it raises a lot of questions. It’s not a straightforward puzzle at all.”

 

Government in Yemen Agrees to Talk Transition

The governing party, the General People’s Congress, known as the G.P.C., gave its official consent even though a coalition of opposition political leaders balked on Monday over one of the proposal’s conditions, that protests end immediately.

“The G.P.C. approved,” said Mohamed Al-Tayeb, a prominent member of the governing party. “Both sides will go on Monday to Riyadh.”

Mr. Tayeb said the parties had received an invitation from the six-nation Persian Gulf bloc that had formulated and promoted the proposal for the transition of power from President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

“So far, so good,” Mr. Tayeb said, adding that the governing party and the opposition had each sent letters to the regional bloc, called the Gulf Cooperation Council, agreeing to the initiative.

But a leading member of Yemen’s opposition coalition said that the opposition had given only oral approval to the proposal and that it would not send a delegation to Riyadh, the Saudi capital, until Mr. Saleh formally signed the plan for the transition. Mr. Saleh will not go to Riyadh.

“First, the president, he should officially sign the agreement,” the opposition leader, Mohammed Abdulmalik al-Mutawakil, said. “Because he is not going to Saudi Arabia, therefore he has to sign it before we leave.”

The back and forth between the two sides has been a trademark of the political impasse over the past few months in Yemen, as tens of thousands of protesters in cities throughout the country have called for Mr. Saleh’s ouster.

Under the proposal, once both sides sign the agreement, a national unity government will be formed and the opposition will select a prime minister, who will govern with Mr. Saleh for 30 days, at which point the president will step down.

In another development on Tuesday, a protester was shot to death in the central city of Taiz, according to a local doctor. Taiz has endured significant violence between security forces and protesters over the past month. A YouTube video posted online Tuesday from Taiz showed a protester being hit in the head by live gunfire from what appeared to be a military vehicle.

 

Peugeot and Renault to Repay Government Loans Early

The French industry minister, éric Besson, told ?France Info radio that the remainder of the 6 billion euros, or $8.7 billion, owed would be repaid “in the next few days,” which was “faster than anticipated.”

The decision, he said, showed that “confidence has returned” to the ?sector.

In 2009, amid plummeting sales and the prospect of large layoffs, the French government announced that it would lend Peugeot ?and Renault $4.4 billion each over five years at 6 percent interest. Renault Trucks, now owned by Volvo, also received aid.

In conjunction, the automakers introduced part-time work arrangements and curbed production at some plants.

Since then, the health of the two companies has slowly improved. The turnaround was helped initially ?by government incentives for buyers that lifted sales in Europe but have now expired. Sales were also robust in emerging markets like Brazil, China and Russia. ?

A report this week from the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association,, showed new passenger car sales in the European Union fell 5 percent in March from the period a year earlier. Sales in Germany and France both grew, but they were weaker in Britain, Italy and Spain.

The two French companies have followed the same repayment rhythm, returning a first tranche of 1 billion euros ($1.5 billion) in the second half of 2010, then another 1 billion euros in February with the final 1 billion euros due on Tuesday.

 

50,000 Protest Government in Serbia

。 VOA News ?April 16, 2011

Serbia's Progressive Party leader Tomislav Nikolic attends a protest rally in Belgrade, Serbia, April 16, 2011

Tens of thousands of Serbians have gathered in the capital, Belgrade, to protest against the government and call for early elections.

Some 50,000 protesters Saturday shouted "thieves" and other sayings against President Boris Tadic and members of his administration.? And opposition leader, Toma Nikolic, told the crowd he was beginning a hunger strike until the government agreed to schedule elections.

Opposition against the government has been mounting as the economy suffers.? There have been a number of strikes calling for higher salaries and in February 70,000 people attended an anti-government rally.

Elections are not due until next year. And the government says it will not call elections sooner, because that could slow the process for Serbia's accession into the European Union.

Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.

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Now You Know
Watch Todd Grosshan's report - "What is Radioactivity?"

 

Curfew in Burkina Faso After President Dissolves Government

。 Scott Stearns | Ouagadougou ?April 16, 2011

Residents look at debris on the pavement on April 16, 2011 in Ouagadougou after soldiers from three barracks took to the streets of the Burkina Faso capital overnight, firing into the air and pillaging as a mutiny entered its third day

Burkina Faso's capital is under an overnight curfew after the president dissolved his government following an army mutiny.

President Blaise Compaore's government imposed the overnight curfew after merchants rioted because mutinous soldiers looted their shops.

The traders set fire to ruling party headquarters in the capital Ouagadougou Saturday and ransacked the National Assembly to protest what they say is the government's failure to stop mutinous soldiers from looting their stores.

President Compaore Friday dissolved his government and dismissed his army chief of staff and head of presidential security after soldiers at the presidential palace fired heavy weapons in the air demanding the payment of promised allowances. They then set fire to the home of President Compaore's chief of staff.

Tens of thousands of people Thursday marched in the capital to protest the high cost of living in demonstrations that were joined in at least ten other towns.

France is warning its citizens against travel to Burkina Faso, saying the situation is tense because of the soldiers' protest and warning that travelers face an increased risk of robbery and kidnapping.

Most stores in the capital were closed Saturday and few people were on the street well before the evening curfew.

President Compaore came to power in a 1987 coup against then-president Thomas Sankara. Mr. Compaore has been re-elected four times, most recently last November.