Megaupload founder refused bail in New Zealand

(Reuters) - A New Zealand court refused an appeal by the founder of online file-sharing site Megaupload.com to be freed on bail, Friday, agreeing with prosecutors there was a risk he would attempt to flee before an extradition hearing.

Kim Dotcom, a German national also known as Kim Schmitz and Kim Tim Jim Vestor, was returned to custody until February 22 ahead of a hearing on an extradition application by the United States.

The High Court in Auckland said the lower court judge was right to rule there was a significant risk Dotcom, who had passports and bank accounts in three names, might try to flee the country.

There was nothing to tie Dotcom to New Zealand except his motivation to fight the charges and get his funds, Justice Raynor Asher said.

"The judge correctly concluded that the risk of flight cannot be mitigated by the imposition of conditions, including electronic monitoring," said prosecutor Anne Toohey.

STRENUOUSLY DENIES CHARGES

Prosecutors say Dotcom was the ringleader of a group that netted $175 million since 2005 by copying and distributing music, movies and other copyrighted content without authorization.

Dotcom's lawyers say the company simply offered online storage and that he strenuously denies the charges and will fight extradition.

Dotcom, 38, and three others, were arrested on January 20 after armed New Zealand police raided his country estate at the request of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.

He told the court that with his assets frozen and business shut down he had no intention of trying to flee to his native Germany, where he would be safe from extradition.

"I will not run away. I want to fight these allegations on a level playing field. I have three little children. My wife is pregnant with twins. I just want to be with them," he said in court.

EXTREME FLIGHT RISK, FUNNY VISITS

The prosecution again painted Dotcom as an extreme flight risk because of he had multiple passports, sources of funds, access to various means of travel, and previous history of fleeing to avoid criminal charges.

Officers cut Dotcom out of a safe room he had barricaded himself in within the sprawling mansion, reputedly New Zealand's most expensive home.

Dotcom said he said he had received "funny visits" and contacts while in jail, including one from a man claiming to be a prosecutor asking for money in return for a favorable bail hearing. He denied knowing anyone with a background in providing forged documents, whom the prosecution said had tried to visit him.

He said police had been unnecessarily aggressive when they raided his property.

"I was punched in the face, I was kicked down on the floor, one guy was standing on my hands ... it was bleeding."

Legal experts have said extradition hearings are likely to be drawn out with appeals likely all the way to the country's highest court.

The lower court judge said the accused appeared to have "an arguable defense at least in respect of the breach of copyright charges."

(Writing by Gyles Beckford; Editing by Ed Lane)

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'Man with the golden arm' saves 2million babies in half a century of donating rare type of blood

An Australian man who has been donating his extremely rare kind of blood for 56 years has saved the lives of more than two million babies.

James Harrison, 74, has an antibody in his plasma that stops babies dying from Rhesus disease, a form of severe anaemia.

He has enabled countless mothers to give birth to healthy babies, including his own daughter, Tracey, who had a healthy son thanks to her father's blood.

Mr Harrison, dubbed 'the man with the golden arm', is still donating every few weeks at the age of 74. He is thought to have saved 2.2million babies

Mr Harrison has been giving blood every few weeks since he was 18 years old and has now racked up a total of 984 donations.

When he started donating, his blood was deemed so special his life was insured for one million Australian dollars.

He was also nicknamed the 'man with the golden arm' or the 'man in two million'.

His blood has since led to the development of a vaccine called Anti-D.

He said: 'I've never thought about stopping. Never.' He made a pledge to be a donor aged 14 after undergoing major chest surgery in which he needed 13 litres of blood.

'I was in hospital for three months,' he said. 'The blood I received saved my life so I made a pledge to give blood when I was 18.'

Just after he started donating he was found to have the rare and life-saving antibody in his blood.

At the time, thousands of babies in Australia were dying each year of Rhesus disease. Other newborns suffered permanent brain damage because of the condition.

The disease creates an incompatibility between the mother's blood and her unborn baby's blood. It stems from one having Rh-positive blood and the other Rh-negative.

After his blood type was discovered, Mr Harrison volunteered to undergo a series of tests to help develop the Anti-D vaccine.

'They insured me for a million dollars so I knew my wife Barbara would be taken care of,' he said.

'I wasn't scared. I was glad to help. I had to sign every form going and basically sign my life away.'

Mr Harrison is Rh-negative and was given injections of Rh-positive blood.

It was found his plasma could treat the condition and since then it has been given to hundreds of thousands of women.

It has also been given to babies after they are born to stop them developing the disease.

It is estimated he has helped save 2.2 million babies so far.

One of the mothers he has helped is Joy Barnes, who works at the Red Cross Blood Bank in Sydney.

She has known Mr Harrison for 23 years but has only just told him she is one of the countless mothers he has helped.

Ms Barnes, who miscarried at four and five months before having treatment, said: 'Without him I would never have been able to have a healthy baby.'

Speaking to Mr Harrison on an Australian TV show, she said: 'I don't know how to thank you enough.'

His own daughter, Tracey, also had to have the Anti-D injection after the birth of her first son.

She said she was 'proud' of her dad for continuing to give blood, even after the death of her mother after 56 years of marriage.

Mr Harrison said: 'I was back in hospital giving blood a week after Barbara passed away.

'It was sad but life marches on and we have to continue doing what we do. She's up there looking down, so I carry on.'

Mr Harrison is expected to reach the 1,000 donation milestone in September this year.

Source: Dailymail

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A New World - by Anonymous

What it is, the demand the 1% can’t comprehend, is us. It is the individuals and villages, the cities and peoples across the world who are seeing each other on the far side of appeals and petition. It is the world we are becoming.

Establishment polls confirm what everyone in the street already knows: a clear majority of New Yorkers, three of every four, support the occupation and get the “demand” in their gut. The epicenter of the October 15 international day of action was Times Square, barricaded by police insistent to demonstrate their control. But our town is only one center. The world is round.

In the south, thousands streamed onto the avenues of Buenos Aires and Santiago. In Brazil, Peru and Colombia, in more than 20 cities of Mexico and all through our Americas, people came out. There was noise. More like a song.

In the East, demonstrators supporting the occupation emerged on the streets of Hong Kong and Seoul, Manila and Jakarta, Auckland and Melbourne. Days earlier, astonishingly, a solidarity rally in Zhengzhou, China supported the “Great Wall Street Revolution.” China has rallied for our human rights. Imagine.

In Africa, protestors gathered in Nairobi and Johannesburg. The heroes of Tahrir Square in Cairo have returned to battle the military regime that did not follow Mubarak into infamy.

Germany and Greece, ruled by the same banks, rose up with Spain and a lost generation of Europeans to claim a future from the dust of faded empire. Everywhere the lack of demands let us see each other clearly. Across the world, as if for the first time.

And in our own backyard, in thousands of backyards, from Augusta and Jackson, Springfield and Sioux Falls, Vegas and Santa Rosa and Green Bay: Americans celebrated the occupation in its infancy. Jobs with dignity. Housing fit for families. Education. Health care. Pensions. The very air we breathe. What can those who want democracy demand from the king, except his crown? Regime change is in the air. America is looking at itself, it’s place in the world and who we are to be.

This is not a demonstration. It’s participation. Creation. This is a movement where we can be ourselves, together. In Liberty Square. In New York City. In America. A new world.

Source: AnonOps

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Public Executions in Saudi Arabia Spark Fury in Bangladesh

Human rights activists have condemned the public execution of eight Bangladeshi migrant workers in Saudi Arabia.

According to reports, the eight men were beheaded in Riyadh on Friday following conviction for the alleged killing of an Egyptian national in April 2007. Three other Bangladeshis who were also convicted of murder, were sentence to prison terms and flogging.

Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK), a Bangladeshi legal aid and human rights organization, said that while the executions were carried out under Saudi laws, such a punishment will cause grave suffering to the families of the condemned men. ASK also pointed out that foreign workers in Saudi Arabia often don’t understand the nuances of Saudi law, do not understand the Arabic language, and frequently fail to secure effective legal representation.

ASK has urged the Bangladeshi government in Dhaka to provide legal assistance to countrymen who find themselves in serious trouble in foreign countries.

According to Sultana Kamal, executive director of ASK in Dhaka, the Bangladeshi government did not even inform the families of the executed men – they learned of it through newspaper reports.

“They [migrants] are poor people they go there [Saudi Arabia] for economic reasons and we are not sure whether they were given enough opportunity to defend themselves and why weren't the families informed?,” she told Radio Australia.

However, it is unlikely that Bangladeshi officials will do much to pressure the Saudis – there are an estimated 2 million Bangladeshi workers in Saudi Arabia and their cash remittances home are important to the impoverished nation’s economy.

Similarly, the London-based human rights organization Amnesty International is also outraged by the mass beheading, citing that since the end of the Holy month of Ramadan, executions have resumed in Saudi Arabia at an alarming rate.

Amnesty stated that the Saudis have now executed 58 people this year, more than double the rate for all of last year.

“Court proceedings in Saudi Arabia fall far short of international standards for fair trial and news of these recent multiple executions [are] deeply disturbing,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty’s Deputy Director for Middle East and North Africa.

“The Saudi authorities appear to have increased the number of executions in recent months, a move that puts the country at odds with the worldwide trend against the death penalty. The [Saudi] government must establish an immediate moratorium on executions in the Kingdom and commute all death sentences, with a view to abolishing the death penalty completely.”

Amnesty also pointed out that many of those who are executed in Saudi Arabia are foreign workers from poor countries who can neither afford lawyers, nor even understand the Kingdom’s court system.

“Defendants often have no defense lawyer and are unable to follow court proceedings in Arabic,” Amnesty stated. “They are also rarely allowed formal representation by a lawyer, and in many cases are not informed of the progress of legal proceedings against them. They, and many of the Saudi Arabians who are executed, also have no access to influential figures such as government authorities or heads of tribes, nor to money, both crucial factors in paying blood money or securing a pardon in murder cases.”

Meanwhile, the Saudi ambassador to Bangladesh, Abdullah. N. Al Bussairy, told the Daily Star newspaper of Bangladesh, insisted that his government tried to help Dhaka officials pay blood money to the family of the murdered man in Egypt (whose forgiveness might have spared the convicted men, under Sharia law).

However, the intervention didn't succeed.

Source: International Business Times

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KFC to stop using palm oil

Fast food chain KFC is to stop frying chicken in palm oil.

The company says it is removing the vegetable oil from deep fat friers to gain a "double benefit" by reducing climate change and heart disease.

Used widely as a cooking oil, palm oil employs hundreds of thousands of people in developing countries but has a poor health and environmental record. Forests in Indonesia and Malaysia have been cut down to make way for plantations and the oil is high in artery-clogging saturated fat.

From this month KFC will use high oleic rapeseed oil at its 800 outlets in UK and Ireland, at an estimated cost of £1m a year.

The move will cut levels of saturated fat in its chicken by 25 per cent, according to the company.

Mark Bristow, head of KFC food assurance said: "Switching to high oleic rapeseed oil means not only can we offer our customers the benefit of reduced saturated fats, but the assurance we're doing everything we can to lessen our impact on the environment."

KFC added: "The global expansion of the palm oil industry has been a contributor to the destruction of tropical rainforests and peat lands to make way for palm oil plantations, which has inadvertently caused large amounts of greenhouse gases being pushed into the atmosphere."

KFC will still use palm oil in fries, buns, tortillas and hash browns, but said it had begun talks with suppliers aimed at getting them to switch to alternatives or source only sustainably-certified palm oil.

Since the The Independent disclosed palm oil's role in deforestation two years ago, many retailers and manufacturers have agreed to buy supplies certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.

Campaigners want the European Union to force food firms to list palm oil as an ingredient because it is often listed as ‘vegetable oil' on packs.

Click here to read about Call4.org's campaign to press for palm oil legislation

Source: The Independent (Original Post)

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Bangladeshi scientist brings good news for acid victims

A Bangladeshi scientist now living in New Zealand has brought good news for the people with severe wound and similar physical injury from acid attack and fire incident.

Dr Azam Ali, an agro-scientist, has invented a bio-based wound dressing, which cures severe wound 40 percent faster than any other conventional medicine currently available on the market.

A leading pharmaceutical company from Bangladesh has already contacted the scientist to introduce the new product on the local market.

The breakthrough innovation of the Bangladeshi scientist won the globally reputed Bayer Innovation of the Year Award in 2010.

Dr Azam Ali (in the middle), winner of New Zealand’s prestigious Bayer Innovators Awards 2010 in Science and Health category poses with other winners of the award. Photo: Bayer Innovators

Ali has invented bio-based materials to create new wound dressing, bone-graft implant products and medical suture technology using wool from New Zealand sheep. He uses low-volume protein sources from the wool to wound dressing and medical devices.

Two of his wound-care medical products are now being used at New Zealand hospitals and are approved for use in Australia, United States and the European Union.

"Bangladesh can get benefit out of the invention," Ali said in an interview with BSS last week when he came to Dhaka for a personal visit.

He said the new wound dressing dramatically brings down the treatment time while the result is far better than any other existing treatment process as the bio-based wound dressing accelerates wound healing process and tissue growth.

"It works 40 percent faster than any other traditional products in wound treatment", Ali said.

The scientist sees very bright prospect of using the new product in Bangladesh because of availability of natural raw materials.

He pointed out that Bangladesh can use shrimp shell in place of wool to produce the same products with similar quality and effectiveness.

'There is lot of shrimp shells available at the industry where shrimp are being processed regularly for either export or domestic use," he said.

Ali said he is now in talks with a local pharmaceutical company to introduce the products in Bangladesh.

"We are expecting a positive result from the on-going discussions and hoping to introduce the products in a year," he said,

He believes the new products will serve better in treating the acid victims and the people with severe burn injury.

He, however, said the treatment would be costlier than the existing synthetic products, but it would heal the wounds of the acid and burn victims to the extent so they can get back to normal life.

A post graduate in chemistry from Jahangirnagar University, Ali did higher study in his subject in the United State before joining in research work first in Korea and then in New Zealand.

Currently, he is a senior scientist at the AgResearch, a leading research organisation in New Zealand.

Source: The Daily Star

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New Zealand quake Photo's Part-2

New Zealand quake Photo's Part-1

Image: Mark Mitchell, New Zealand Herald / AP Photo

Image: David Wethey, EPA / Landov

Image: Mark Mitchell, New Zealand Herald / AP Photo

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New Zealand quake Photo's

Image: Logan McMillan, AFP / Getty Images

Image: Martin Hunter / Getty Images

Image: Logan McMillan, AFP / Getty Images

Image: Martin Hunter / Getty Images

Image: Kristy Graham, Ashburton Guardian / AP Photo

New Zealand quake Photo's Part-1

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New Zealand quake kills at least 65

(Reuters) - A strong earthquake killed at least 65 people in New Zealand's second-biggest city of Christchurch on Tuesday, with more casualties expected as rescuers worked into the night to find scores of people trapped inside collapsed buildings.

The Carlton Hotel, after the 6.3 earthquake. Photo / NZPA

It was the second quake to hit the city of almost 400,000 people in five months, and New Zealand's most deadly natural disaster for 80 years.

"We may well be witnessing New Zealand's darkest day...The death toll I have at the moment is 65 and that may rise," New Zealand Prime Minister John Key told local TV.

"It's hard to describe. What was a vibrant city a few hours ago has been brought to its knees," added Key, who had flown to his home town of Christchurch, where he still has family.

The 6.3 magnitude quake struck at lunchtime, when streets and shops thronged with people and offices were still occupied.

Christchurch's mayor described the city, a historic tourist town popular with overseas students, as a war zone.

"There will be deaths, there will be a lot of injuries, there will be a lot of heartbreak in this city," Mayor Bob Parker told Australian TV by phone.

He told local radio that up to 200 could be trapped in buildings but later revised down to around 100 or so.

The quake is the country's worst natural disaster since a 1931 quake in the North Island city of Napier which killed 256.

Christchurch Hospital saw an influx of injured residents.

"They are largely crushes and cuts types of injuries and chest pain as well," said David Meates, head of the Canterbury Health Board. Some of the more seriously injured could be evacuated to other cities, he added.

TRAPPED

All army medical staff have been mobilized, while several hundred troops were helping with the rescue, officials said.

A woman trapped in one of the buildings said she was terrified and waiting for rescuers to reach her six hours after the quake, which was followed by at least 20 aftershocks.

"I thought the best place was under the desk but the ceiling collapsed on top, I can't move and I'm just terrified," office worker Anne Voss told TV3 news by mobile phone.

Christchurch has been described as a little piece of England. It has an iconic cathedral, now largely destroyed, and a river called the Avon. It had many historic stone buildings, and is popular with English-language students and also with tourists as a springboard for tours of the scenic South Island.

Twelve Japanese students at a school in Christchurch were still missing after a building collapse, an official told Reuters in Japan. Nine Japanese students and two teachers from the same group had already been rescued or accounted for.

Emergency shelters had also been set up in local schools and at a race course, as night approached. Helicopters dumped water to try to douse a fire in one tall office building. A crane helped rescue workers trapped in another office block.

"I was in the square right outside the cathedral -- the whole front has fallen down and there were people running from there. There were people inside as well," said John Gurr, a camera technician who was in the city center when the quake hit.

"A lady grabbed hold of me to stop falling over...We just got blown apart. Colombo Street, the main street, is just a mess...There's lots of water everywhere, pouring out of the ground," he said.

Emergency crews picked through rubble under bright lights as night fell, including a multi-storey office building whose floors appeared to have pancaked on top of each other.

SILT, SAND AND GRAVEL

Christchurch is built on silt, sand and gravel, with a water table beneath. In an earthquake, the water rises, mixing with the sand and turning the ground into a swamp and swallowing up sections of road and entire cars.

TV footage showed sections of road that had collapsed into a milky, sand-colored lake right beneath the surface. One witness described the footpaths as like "walking on sand."

Unlike last year's even stronger tremor, which struck early in the morning when streets were virtually empty, people were walking or driving along streets when the shallow tremor struck, sending awnings and the entire faces of buildings crashing down.

Police said debris had rained down on two buses, crushing them, but there was no word on any casualties.

The quake hit at 12:51 pm (2351 GMT Monday) at a depth of only 4 km (2.5 miles), according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

TALK OF POST-QUAKE RATE CUT

The quake helped knock the New Zealand dollar down to $0.75, about 1.8 percent off late U.S. levels, on fears the damage could dent confidence in the already fragile economy.

Westpac Bank also raised the possibility that the central bank could cut interest rates over the next few weeks to shore up confidence after the quake, while other banks pushed out their expectations for the next rate hike. ANZ now expects the central bank to be on hold until the first quarter of 2012.

Shares in Australian banks and insurers, which typically have large operations in New Zealand, fell after the quake.

The tremor was centered about 10 km (six miles) southwest of Christchurch, which had suffered widespread damage during last September's 7.1 magnitude quake but no deaths.

New Zealand sits between the Pacific and Indo-Australian tectonic plates and records on average more than 14,000 earthquakes a year, of which about 20 would normally top magnitude 5.0.

Source: Reuters

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Rally In Support of Democracy In Egypt - Aotea Centre, Auckland (Part-2)

Click Here to watch Rally In Support of Democracy In Egypt - Aotea Centre, Auckland (Part-1)

Rally In Support of Democracy In Egypt - Aotea Centre, Auckland
Aotea Centre, Auckland, Feb 5 2011

Photo Credit and Copyright: Alison Withers

Contributor of BAG

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Rally In Support of Democracy In Egypt - Aotea Centre, Auckland (Part-1)

Click Here to watch Rally In Support of Democracy In Egypt - Aotea Centre, Auckland (Part-2)


Rally In Support of Democracy In Egypt - Aotea Centre, Auckland
Aotea Centre, Auckland, Feb 5 2011


Photo Credit and Copyright: Alison Withers


Contributor of BAG

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Australia Cyclone Yasi roars into Queensland coast

Powerful gusts of wind brought by the most dangerous storm ever predicted to hit Queensland have begun buffeting northern parts of the Australian state.

Cyclone Yasi, a category five storm, the most severe level, is expected to make landfall shortly.

It will hit between Innisfail and Cairns, where trees are swaying and power cuts have been reported.

Queensland residents have been told it is now too late to escape and that they should take shelter.

"The time for movement and evacuation has now passed," State Premier Anna Bligh said, adding that Yasi would be "the most catastrophic storm to ever hit our coast".

"People should be sheltering wherever they are."

Prime Minister Julia Gillard described the storm as a "cyclone of savagery and intensity".

"People are facing some really dreadful hours in front of them," she said.

The state disaster co-ordinator warned residents they would be on their own for up to 24 hours when Yasi strikes.

This image provided by Nasa shows Cyclone Yasi as it approaches
Queensland

Many fear this could be worse than Cyclone Tracy, which hit Darwin on Christmas Eve in 1974 and killed 71 people.

That was a category four storm.

The cyclone follows the worst floods in the state's history, triggered by tropical storms which have battered the region since the end of November.

'Life-threatening'

Cyclone Yasi is expected to make landfall between the northern city of Cairns - home to some 164,000 people, and popular with tourists - and the rural community of Innisfail, some 100km (60 miles) south.

The eye of the storm alone was reported to be 35km (22 miles) in width, with a front stretching across 650km (400 miles).

Storm surges are expected to cause widespread flooding and wind gusts are likely to rip off roofs and cause significant structural damage.

High winds and driving rain are already battering coastal towns and cities. In Innisfail, a roof has already been ripped from a building.

The Bureau of Meteorology has warned that Cyclone Yasi posed an "extremely serious threat to life and property" within the warning area, especially between Cairns and Townsville.

"This impact is likely to be more life-threatening than any experienced during recent generations," it warned.

More than 10,000 people are in evacuation centres, and there were reports that those who had not already secured a place were being turned away.

Those remaining in their homes were told to tape up windows, fill sandbags and prepare a "safe room" with mattresses, pillows, a radio, food and water supplies to wait out the cyclone.

They were also encouraged to fill their bathtubs with water for drinking supplies.

'The worse thing is the waiting'

State disaster co-ordinator Ian Stewart said it would be more dangerous for people to panic and leave their properties than to stay put once the storm strikes.

"[People] should be preparing themselves for the fact that the roofs of their houses may lift off but that does not make the structure of the house any less sound," he said.

Earlier, police had walked through the streets of Cairns and the northern capital of Townsville, urging people to leave the cities if they could.

Residents frantically bought up food and fuel supplies to last through what they have been told will be a storm of unprecedented ferocity.

Thousands of people have already fled their homes close to the coast and the army has flown hospital patients in the northern city of Cairns to Brisbane, which is further south.

More than 400,000 people live in the cyclone's expected path. The area, which includes the Great Barrier Reef, is also popular with tourists.

Cairns resident Philip Baker told the BBC it seemed "a safer bet" to stay in his home rather than flee or head to an overcrowded evacuation centre with his wife and young daughter.

"We're as prepared as we can be. There is little left to do but wait.

"The authorities have been wonderful, supplying us with updates and the latest information via text. We've been told that we might lose power and the phone lines in the next few hours.

"The windows have been taped and if the situation rapidly deteriorates we plan to bunker down in a windowless room when the storm hits - there's just enough room to fit a single blow-up mattress on the floor. We're reasonably high up, so hopefully should be okay."

Cairns airport closed on Wednesday. Rail lines, mines and coal ports have also shut down.

Source: BBC

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