World Bank Is Withholding $70 Million as Afghans Try to Resolve a Scandal

The delay is part of a looming crisis surrounding Kabul Bank negotiations that could force the Afghan government to dip into badly needed cash reserves and imperil future development projects, according to Western diplomats. It also stands to deepen the crisis in confidence in the government at a key moment, as NATO forces begin handing over security responsibilities in seven areas of the country next month, Western diplomats say.

The World Bank-managed Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund, which receives money from international donors, was scheduled to deliver $70 million on June 11 for incentive programs intended to reward the government for meeting certain benchmarks in areas like public administration reform. But the payment was contingent on the International Monetary Fund’s renewing its main credit program for the country, which was suspended in September as the banking crisis worsened.

“That money hasn’t gone to the government by the deadline of June 11, and the donors are undecided whether to say to the government, ‘You’ve lost it forever,’ or to just hold it back,” said one Western diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

With no program in place, Western donors have suspended payments to the reconstruction trust fund. In addition to providing incentive money, the trust fund finances about half the non-security costs of government, including salaries for civil servants. No donor nation has given money to the fund in the last three months, the diplomat said.

At the current spending rate, the fund stands to run dry sometime next month, which could force the Afghan government to dip into its reserve funds to pay the salaries of some 250,000 civil servants on its own. The government reserves are deep enough to do that for now, the diplomat said, but such a move could hamper the government’s ability to become self-sustaining as foreign aid money draws down, which is expected to occur over the next few years.

The continuing discord between the Afghan government and the monetary fund over the banking crisis is a “litmus test” of the country’s governance, said a senior Western diplomat, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity. “And all of us have held to the view that the I.M.F. program is of paramount importance to show the Afghan government’s commitment to transparency, especially when it comes to Kabul Bank, which is critical to regain the confidence first and foremost of the Afghan people, but also to the international community.”

The banking crisis erupted in August when depositors made a run on Kabul Bank in a panic after government officials learned of $300 million in losses and demanded the resignation of the bank’s president and chairman. Banking specialists and others feared the crisis at Kabul Bank could prompt a run on solvent banks and threaten to destabilize the country’s financial system.

The bank was the nation’s largest private financial institution, and its politically connected shareholders included the brothers of President Hamid Karzai and First Vice President Muhammad Qasim Fahim. By January, the estimated losses had reached as much as $900 million.

In April, the Afghan government presented an overhaul plan intended to resolve the crisis by splitting the bank in two: one unit would take over the bank’s branches, deposits and good loans, and the other would be set up as a receivership to try to collect bad loans.

Afghan officials and diplomats at the time hoped the plan would persuade the monetary fund to resume its credit program. But Raphael Anspach, a spokesman for the monetary fund, said Friday that important issues still needed to be addressed, “including actions to ensure that problems that led to the collapse of the Kabul Bank do not recur.”

“The timing of how fast to move forward depends on how quickly the authorities act on the remaining issues,” he added, without providing specifics on the outstanding issues.

Among the steps the monetary fund had been pushing were that the Afghan government put the Kabul Bank in receivership to try to collect as much as possible from the bad loans and that it prosecute those who defrauded the bank. But so far, no one has been charged; in fact, a presidential commission last month cleared some of the most politically connected borrowers.

The commission, appointed by President Karzai to assess responsibility for the wide-ranging fraud scheme, said last month that 207 borrowers, including members of the president’s cabinet and Parliament, had taken out undocumented loans. But the commission absolved the brothers of the president and the first vice president of any wrongdoing. The commission concluded that, so far, only about $347 million was expected to be repaid.

The monetary fund has also been pushing the government to pass a supplemental budget to recapitalize the Central Bank for money it spent keeping Kabul Bank afloat, said Najibullah Manali, an adviser to the Afghan finance minister.

“We sent this proposal to the Parliament but the Parliament rejected it,” he said. The Karzai administration will try again when Parliament reconvenes in August, Mr. Manali said.

Sharifullah Sahak contributed reporting from Kabul.

View the original article here

52 Years and $750 Million Prove Einstein Was Right

 

The finding confirms some of the weirdest of the many strange predictions — like black holes and the expanding universe — of Albert Einstein’s theory of gravity, general relativity.

“We have completed this landmark experiment of testing Einstein’s universe,” Francis Everitt, leader of the project, known as Gravity Probe B, said at a news conference at NASA headquarters in Washington. “And Einstein survives.”

That was hardly a surprise. Observations of planets, the Moon and particularly the shifting orbits of the Lageos research satellites had convinced astronomers and physicists that Einstein’s predictions were on the mark. Nevertheless, scientists said that the Gravity Probe results would live forever in textbooks as the most direct measurements, and that it was important to keep testing theories that were thought to be correct.

Clifford M. Will of Washington University in St. Louis — who was not part of the team but was chairman of a National Aeronautics and Space Administration advisory committee evaluating its work, and who wrote a book titled “Was Einstein Right?” — said that in science, “no such book is ever closed.”

Einstein’s theory relates gravity to the sagging of cosmic geometry under the influence of matter and energy, the way a sleeper makes a mattress sag. One consequence is that a massive spinning object like Earth should spin up the empty space around it, the way twirling the straw in a Frappuccino sets the drink and the whole Venti-size cup spinning around with it, an effect called frame dragging. Astronomers think this effect, although minuscule for Earth, could play a role in the black hole dynamos that power quasars.

Empty space in the vicinity of Earth is indeed turning, Dr. Everitt reported at the news conference and in a paper prepared for the journal Physical Review Letters, at the leisurely rate of 37 one-thousandths of a second of arc — the equivalent of a human hair seen from 10 miles away — every year. With an uncertainty of 19 percent, that measurement was in agreement with Einstein’s predictions of 39 milliarcseconds.

Likewise, the “sag” should alter the space-time geometry around Earth, warping it from the Euclidean ideal and cutting an inch out of the Gravity Probe’s orbit around it, so that the circumference is slightly less than the Euclidean ideal of pi times the orbit’s diameter, a fact confirmed by the Stanford gyroscopes to an accuracy of 0.3 percent.

For Dr. Everitt, who joined the Gravity Probe experiment in 1962 as a young postdoctoral fellow and has worked on nothing else since, the announcement on Wednesday capped a career-long journey.

The experiment was conceived in 1959, but the technology to make these esoteric measurements did not yet exist, which is why the experiment took so long and cost so much. The gyroscopes, for example, were made of superconducting niobium spheres, the roundest balls ever manufactured, which then had to be flown in a lead bag to isolate them from any other influences in the universe, save the subversive curvature of space-time itself.

Shortly before the probe’s launching, Dr. Francis said the project had been canceled at least seven times, “depending on what you mean by canceled.” It was finally sent into orbit in 2004 and operated for some 17 months, but not all went well. When the scientists began analyzing their data, they discovered that patches of electrical charge on the niobium balls had generated extra torque on the gyroscopes, causing them to drift.

It would take five more years to understand the spurious signals and retrieve the gravity data by dint of an effort that Dr. Will called “nothing less than heroic.”

In the meantime, the NASA grant ran out. Dr. Everitt secured another one from Richard Fairbank, a financier and son of one of the experiment’s founders, William Fairbank, that was matched by NASA and Stanford. When that ran out and NASA turned him down for a new grant, Dr. Everitt obtained a $2.7 million grant from Turki al-Saud, a Stanford graduate and vice president for research institutes at the King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia.

View the original article here

52 Years and $750 Million Prove Einstein Was Right

The finding confirms some of the weirdest of the many strange predictions — like black holes and the expanding universe — of Albert Einstein’s theory of gravity, general relativity.

“We have completed this landmark experiment of testing Einstein’s universe,” Francis Everitt, leader of the project, known as Gravity Probe B, said at a news conference at NASA headquarters in Washington. “And Einstein survives.”

That was hardly a surprise. Observations of planets, the Moon and particularly the shifting orbits of the Lageos research satellites had convinced astronomers and physicists that Einstein’s predictions were on the mark. Nevertheless, scientists said that the Gravity Probe results would live forever in textbooks as the most direct measurements, and that it was important to keep testing theories that were thought to be correct.

Clifford M. Will of Washington University in St. Louis — who was not part of the team but was chairman of a National Aeronautics and Space Administration advisory committee evaluating its work, and who wrote a book titled “Was Einstein Right?” — said that in science, “no such book is ever closed.”

Einstein’s theory relates gravity to the sagging of cosmic geometry under the influence of matter and energy, the way a sleeper makes a mattress sag. One consequence is that a massive spinning object like Earth should spin up the empty space around it, the way twirling the straw in a Frappuccino sets the drink and the whole Venti-size cup spinning around with it, an effect called frame dragging. Astronomers think this effect, although minuscule for Earth, could play a role in the black hole dynamos that power quasars.

Empty space in the vicinity of Earth is indeed turning, Dr. Everitt reported at the news conference and in a paper prepared for the journal Physical Review Letters, at the leisurely rate of 37 one-thousandths of a second of arc — the equivalent of a human hair seen from 10 miles away — every year. With an uncertainty of 19 percent, that measurement was in agreement with Einstein’s predictions of 39 milliarcseconds.

Likewise, the “sag” should alter the space-time geometry around Earth, warping it from the Euclidean ideal and cutting an inch out of the Gravity Probe’s orbit around it, so that the circumference is slightly less than the Euclidean ideal of pi times the orbit’s diameter, a fact confirmed by the Stanford gyroscopes to an accuracy of 0.3 percent.

For Dr. Everitt, who joined the Gravity Probe experiment in 1962 as a young postdoctoral fellow and has worked on nothing else since, the announcement on Wednesday capped a career-long journey.

The experiment was conceived in 1959, but the technology to make these esoteric measurements did not yet exist, which is why the experiment took so long and cost so much. The gyroscopes, for example, were made of superconducting niobium spheres, the roundest balls ever manufactured, which then had to be flown in a lead bag to isolate them from any other influences in the universe, save the subversive curvature of space-time itself.

Shortly before the probe’s launching, Dr. Francis said the project had been canceled at least seven times, “depending on what you mean by canceled.” It was finally sent into orbit in 2004 and operated for some 17 months, but not all went well. When the scientists began analyzing their data, they discovered that patches of electrical charge on the niobium balls had generated extra torque on the gyroscopes, causing them to drift.

It would take five more years to understand the spurious signals and retrieve the gravity data by dint of an effort that Dr. Will called “nothing less than heroic.”

In the meantime, the NASA grant ran out. Dr. Everitt secured another one from Richard Fairbank, a financier and son of one of the experiment’s founders, William Fairbank, that was matched by NASA and Stanford. When that ran out and NASA turned him down for a new grant, Dr. Everitt obtained a $2.7 million grant from Turki al-Saud, a Stanford graduate and vice president for research institutes at the King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia.

 

BP Is Fined $25 Million for ’06 Spills at Pipelines

The fine is the largest per-barrel assessment ever levied against an oil company in a spill case and represents a new blow to BP’s corporate treasury and reputation.

The aggressive approach of federal prosecutors in this case could portend huge fines and penalties from BP’s much larger spill in the Gulf of Mexico last year. That case, which is still under investigation, could cost the British oil giant more than $20 billion if the company is found grossly negligent, as it was in the Alaska pipeline matter.

“This penalty should serve as a wake-up call to all pipeline operators that they will be held accountable for the safety of their operations and their compliance with the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act and the pipeline safety laws,” Ignacia S. Moreno, head of the environmental enforcement division at the Justice Department, said in a conference call with reporters. “This agreement will help prevent future environmental disasters and protect the fragile ecosystem of Alaska’s North Slope.”

Ms. Moreno declined to answer any questions about the investigation into the Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill in the gulf in April 2010, which killed 11 people and poured nearly five million barrels of oil into the ocean.

BP Exploration Alaska owns the largest share of the consortium that runs the pipeline and depends on income from North Slope production to pay for damages caused by the gulf blowout.

As a result of corrosion and poor maintenance of its pipelines in Alaska, BP was found responsible for the discharge of more than 5,000 barrels of oil onto the Arctic tundra and into a lake on the North Slope in March 2006; a much smaller spill occurred in August of that year. The company paid more than $20 million in criminal fines and restitution and was ordered by the federal Department of Transportation to perform extensive repairs on its system of 1,600 miles of pipelines.

The Department of Transportation’s pipeline safety division determined that BP had failed to fully comply with the order to clean and replace miles of pipeline, and the government sued the company again in 2009.

The consent decree announced on Tuesday requires BP to develop a program to maintain the safety and integrity of its pipelines and will subject the company to enhanced surveillance of its operations by federal regulators. The company also will be required to hire an outside monitor to ensure that it is regularly inspecting and maintaining its pipelines.

“We are not just going to take BP at its word,” said Cynthia Giles, director of the Environmental Protection Agency’s office of enforcement and compliance assurance. “This requires an independent monitor to assure that BP is fully complying with the terms of today’s settlement. This case sends a clear message that we are vigorously enforcing the nation’s environmental laws.”

Since the Deepwater Horizon spill and a fatal natural gas pipeline explosion last year in San Bruno, Calif., federal regulators have been taking a much harder regulatory line on drilling permits and pipeline inspections in general.

In a brief statement, BP said the company did not admit to any liability in reaching the agreement with the government. The company also said the penalty was not calculated on a per-barrel basis, although government officials described the payment in those terms. BP did not say how it was calculated or offer specifics.

The settlement must be ratified by a federal court to take effect.

Alaska’s North Slope is one of BP’s most important oil fields and provides a vital income stream. BP produces nearly two-thirds of the 600,000 barrels a day that come from the North Slope, a giant oil field that has been in decline for many years but still produces about 3 percent of the crude oil consumed by the United States.

Last week BP reported a first-quarter profit of $5.37 billion excluding one-time items and inventory changes, down 4 percent from a year earlier. The results included a $400 million charge related to the gulf spill.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: May 4, 2011

This article has been corrected to clarify that the charges against BP arose partly from a willful failure to comply with a government order to properly maintain pipelines, not a court order or orders.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: May 5, 2011

An article on Wednesday about an agreement by BP to settle $25 million in civil charges related to two oil spills from its pipeline network in Alaska misstated the origin of an order for proper maintainence of the pipelines that the company was accused of disobeying. It was issued by the federal Department of Transportation, not by a court or courts.

 

BP Is Fined $25 Million for ’06 Spills at Pipelines

The fine is the largest per-barrel assessment ever levied against an oil company in a spill case and represents a new blow to BP’s corporate treasury and reputation.

The aggressive approach of federal prosecutors in this case could portend huge fines and penalties from BP’s much larger spill in the Gulf of Mexico last year. That case, which is still under investigation, could cost the British oil giant more than $20 billion if the company is found grossly negligent, as it was in the Alaska pipeline matter.

“This penalty should serve as a wake-up call to all pipeline operators that they will be held accountable for the safety of their operations and their compliance with the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act and the pipeline safety laws,” Ignacia S. Moreno, head of the environmental enforcement division at the Justice Department, said in a conference call with reporters. “This agreement will help prevent future environmental disasters and protect the fragile ecosystem of Alaska’s North Slope.”

Ms. Moreno declined to answer any questions about the investigation into the Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill in the gulf in April 2010, which killed 11 people and poured nearly five million barrels of oil into the ocean.

BP Exploration Alaska owns the largest share of the consortium that runs the pipeline and depends on income from North Slope production to pay for damages caused by the gulf blowout.

As a result of corrosion and poor maintenance of its pipelines in Alaska, BP was found responsible for the discharge of more than 5,000 barrels of oil onto the Arctic tundra and into a lake on the North Slope in March 2006; a much smaller spill occurred in August of that year. The company paid more than $20 million in criminal fines and restitution and was ordered to perform extensive repairs on its system of 1,600 miles of pipelines.

The Department of Transportation’s pipeline safety division determined that BP had failed to fully comply with the order to clean and replace miles of pipeline, and the government sued the company again in 2009.

The consent decree announced on Tuesday requires BP to develop a program to maintain the safety and integrity of its pipelines and will subject the company to enhanced surveillance of its operations by federal regulators. The company also will be required to hire an outside monitor to ensure that it is regularly inspecting and maintaining its pipelines.

“We are not just going to take BP at its word,” said Cynthia Giles, director of the Environmental Protection Agency’s office of enforcement and compliance assurance. “This requires an independent monitor to assure that BP is fully complying with the terms of today’s settlement. This case sends a clear message that we are vigorously enforcing the nation’s environmental laws.”

Since the Deepwater Horizon spill and a fatal natural gas pipeline explosion last year in San Bruno, Calif., federal regulators have been taking a much harder regulatory line on drilling permits and pipeline inspections in general.

In a brief statement, BP said the company did not admit to any liability in reaching the agreement with the government. The company also said the penalty was not calculated on a per-barrel basis, although government officials described the payment in those terms. BP did not say how it was calculated or offer specifics.

The settlement must be ratified by a federal court to take effect.

Alaska’s North Slope is one of BP’s most important oil fields and provides a vital income stream. BP produces nearly two-thirds of the 600,000 barrels a day that come from the North Slope, a giant oil field that has been in decline for many years but still produces about 3 percent of the crude oil consumed by the United States.

Last week BP reported a first-quarter profit of $5.37 billion excluding one-time items and inventory changes, down 4 percent from a year earlier. The results included a $400 million charge related to the gulf spill.

 

Sony ships 50 million PlayStation 3s, eight million Move controllers worldwide

PLAYSTATION?3 SALES REACH 50 MILLION UNITS WORLDWIDE

Sales of PlayStation?Move motion controller for PlayStation?3 (PS3?) surpass 8 million units worldwide, accelerating the expansion of the PS3 Platform.

Tokyo, April 15, 2011 – Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCE) today announced that the cumulative sales of the PlayStation?3 (PS3?) computer entertainment system reached a milestone of 50 million units*1 worldwide, as of March 29, 2011. SCE also announced that PlayStation?Move sales surpassed 8 million units*1 worldwide as of April 3, demonstrating
continued growth and momentum of the PS3 platform.

The PS3 system, equipped with future proof cutting–edge technologies including the powerful Cell Broadband Engine? and RSX? processors as well as the Blu-ray disc? (BD) player and HDMI, has delivered users with high-definition and high quality entertainment experience since its launch in November 2006. The PS3 system continues to evolve and enhance the user experience through new features and services delivered via software updates.

Concurrently with the introduction of PS3, SCE launched PlayStation?Network service which now has more than 75 million registered accounts and operates in 59 countries and regions*2 around the world. PlayStation Network supports free community-centric online gameplay and communication tools such as PlayStation?Home*3, and offers vast downloadable digital content through PlayStation?Store, from games to movies of more than 32,840 content totaling to 105,988 digital content worldwide. In September 2009, SCE launched the new slimmer and lighter PS3 system with new form factor and less power consumption that has been well received by users around the world.

To further expand entertainment experience only possible on PS3, stereoscopic 3D game and Blu-ray 3D? features were introduced to the system via a free system software update*4 in April and September 2010 respectively. The feature enables users to enjoy stunningly realistic stereoscopic 3D in their living room on their PS3 system by simply connecting it to a 3D-compatible TV such as 3D "BRAVIA" TV using an HDMI cable. The number of stereoscopic 3D software titles has reached to 89 as of April 1 in 2011.

SCE launched PlayStation Move in September 2010 for North America, Europe/PAL territories and in Asia, and in October 2010 for Japan to deliver a new entertainment experience across all categories of games, from casual to immersive. The PlayStation Move motion controller is used in combination with the PlayStation?Eye camera to detect the precise movement, angle, and absolute position in 3D space of the user, thereby allowing users to intuitively play as if they are within the game. The number of PlayStation Move supported/dedicated software titles has reached to 155 as of March 24 in 2011, including titles such as Sports Champions, SingStar Dance and Killzone3*5. PlayStation Move continues to further expand the new gameplay along with variety of upcoming new PlayStation Move titles for 2011including SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs*6.

With strong support from 3rdparty developers and publishers worldwide, PS3 features a vast library of more than 2,128 software titles with more than 480 million units sold worldwide*7. Recently released blockbuster franchise titles from first party studios include Grand Turismo 5, LittleBigPlanet2 and KILLZONE 3. SCE will continue to further expand the PS3 platform and create a new world of computer entertainment.

*1 Sell-in number
*2 As of Mar 20, 2011.
*3 A ground-breaking 3D social gaming community available on PS3 that allows users to interact, communicate
and share gaming experiences. Within PlayStation Home, users can create and customize their own unique
avatars and explore the virtual community in real time where they can communicate freely through text or
voice chat. When the service is available, PlayStation Home icon will appear after booting/ re-booting the PS3
system. Some content and services are charged.
*4 System software versions 3.30 or later are required.
*5 Titles and year differ by each country or region.
*6 Adapts to stereoscopic 3D games
*7 As of the end of Dec, 2010

View the original article here

Sony ships 50 million PlayStation 3s, eight million Move controllers worldwide

 
PLAYSTATION?3 SALES REACH 50 MILLION UNITS WORLDWIDE

Sales of PlayStation?Move motion controller for PlayStation?3 (PS3?) surpass 8 million units worldwide, accelerating the expansion of the PS3 Platform.

Tokyo, April 15, 2011 – Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCE) today announced that the cumulative sales of the PlayStation?3 (PS3?) computer entertainment system reached a milestone of 50 million units*1 worldwide, as of March 29, 2011. SCE also announced that PlayStation?Move sales surpassed 8 million units*1 worldwide as of April 3, demonstrating
continued growth and momentum of the PS3 platform.

The PS3 system, equipped with future proof cutting–edge technologies including the powerful Cell Broadband Engine? and RSX? processors as well as the Blu-ray disc? (BD) player and HDMI, has delivered users with high-definition and high quality entertainment experience since its launch in November 2006. The PS3 system continues to evolve and enhance the user experience through new features and services delivered via software updates.

Concurrently with the introduction of PS3, SCE launched PlayStation?Network service which now has more than 75 million registered accounts and operates in 59 countries and regions*2 around the world. PlayStation Network supports free community-centric online gameplay and communication tools such as PlayStation?Home*3, and offers vast downloadable digital content through PlayStation?Store, from games to movies of more than 32,840 content totaling to 105,988 digital content worldwide. In September 2009, SCE launched the new slimmer and lighter PS3 system with new form factor and less power consumption that has been well received by users around the world.

To further expand entertainment experience only possible on PS3, stereoscopic 3D game and Blu-ray 3D? features were introduced to the system via a free system software update*4 in April and September 2010 respectively. The feature enables users to enjoy stunningly realistic stereoscopic 3D in their living room on their PS3 system by simply connecting it to a 3D-compatible TV such as 3D "BRAVIA" TV using an HDMI cable. The number of stereoscopic 3D software titles has reached to 89 as of April 1 in 2011.

SCE launched PlayStation Move in September 2010 for North America, Europe/PAL territories and in Asia, and in October 2010 for Japan to deliver a new entertainment experience across all categories of games, from casual to immersive. The PlayStation Move motion controller is used in combination with the PlayStation?Eye camera to detect the precise movement, angle, and absolute position in 3D space of the user, thereby allowing users to intuitively play as if they are within the game. The number of PlayStation Move supported/dedicated software titles has reached to 155 as of March 24 in 2011, including titles such as Sports Champions, SingStar Dance and Killzone3*5. PlayStation Move continues to further expand the new gameplay along with variety of upcoming new PlayStation Move titles for 2011including SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs*6.

With strong support from 3rdparty developers and publishers worldwide, PS3 features a vast library of more than 2,128 software titles with more than 480 million units sold worldwide*7. Recently released blockbuster franchise titles from first party studios include Grand Turismo 5, LittleBigPlanet2 and KILLZONE 3. SCE will continue to further expand the PS3 platform and create a new world of computer entertainment.

*1 Sell-in number
*2 As of Mar 20, 2011.
*3 A ground-breaking 3D social gaming community available on PS3 that allows users to interact, communicate
and share gaming experiences. Within PlayStation Home, users can create and customize their own unique
avatars and explore the virtual community in real time where they can communicate freely through text or
voice chat. When the service is available, PlayStation Home icon will appear after booting/ re-booting the PS3
system. Some content and services are charged.
*4 System software versions 3.30 or later are required.
*5 Titles and year differ by each country or region.
*6 Adapts to stereoscopic 3D games
*7 As of the end of Dec, 2010