Afghan army recruits say they'll be ready to go solo

Tuesday, 15 January 2013

Kabul, Jan 15 : Rahmatullah, an illiterate young man with a wispy beard and remnants of teenage acne, may represent the last, best hope for Afghanistan's national army.

Wearing an old Russian-style helmet and firing an American M-16 automatic rifle, he squinted as his hissing rounds found their target on a firing range at the national training academy. At his elbow was his first cousin Azizullah, a functionally illiterate Pashtun tribesman who crouched to fire his own M-16.

The cousins decided in fall to join the Afghan National Army, which for a decade has struggled to mold itself into an effective fighting force. Both were encouraged to join by their fathers and uncles, Pashtuns from a nearby hilltop village where support for Afghan security forces is strong and hatred of Taliban insurgents runs deep.

Rahmatullah, 21, and Azizullah, 20, freely admitted that their own motives were more base: Soldiering pays about $155 a month for recruits and about $230 a month after they join a unit, better than anything they can find in their hardscrabble village. The food is plentiful and the beds are warm.

Oh yes, each recruit added, almost as an afterthought, "And I want to serve my country and protect it from its enemies," meaning the Taliban.

The two callow Pashtun villagers and 1,400 fellow recruits in 1st Battalion, 4th Company, 1st Platoon, are the vanguard of a deeply flawed force that must fight the Taliban on its own after U.S. troops withdraw by the end of 2014. Their 18 weeks of training here will be tested in Afghanistan's deserts and mountains, where hardened Taliban insurgents are poised to attack.

Five weeks into training, the cousins were off to a good start. Rahmatullah put 20 of 20 shots into the center of target cutouts 25 yards away. Azizullah hit 18 of 20. Neither man had ever fired a gun before — or so they claimed.

"They are motivated and they learn fast," said the platoon instructor, 1st Sgt. Haga Mohammed. "They'll be ready to fight when they leave here; all our guys will be ready, believe me."

Everyone at the sun-baked Kabul Military Training Center — the recruits, the training cadre, the mustachioed Afghan commanding general, and the soft-spoken Canadian chief advisor — spouts the same line: The Afghan army is unified, with no ethnic divisions. It will be fully capable of fighting off the Taliban when U.S. forces are gone.

That, of course, is what a long parade of Afghan generals and Western advisors has been assuring training center visitors for nearly a decade — even as the army remained poorly led and ill-equipped.

"We like the Americans, and we feel stronger if we're with them," Rahmatullah said in his barracks, amid the sour stench of unwashed bodies. "But we'll be ready 100% to fight on our own in 2014."

Rahmatullah's brother, 1st Sgt. Nazir Ahmad, who has fought the Taliban and is now a trainer at the center, said U.S. Marines taught him discipline under fire. "We have the lead now, but we're a poor country and we still need weapons and equipment from the Americans," he said.

At the front, the Afghan army's shortcomings are obvious, and a source of constant complaint among front-line American troops.

For all the enthusiasm and bravery of individual soldiers, the army has not weaned itself from air support, artillery, fuel, weapons, ammunition, communications and combat medical aid provided by U.S. and coalition forces. Drug use, theft, corruption and desertion are common. Discipline is improving, but remains erratic.

The desertion rate is 10% to 15%, said Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaher Azimi, and no deserters have been punished. "Well, it's a volunteer army," he said.

The army is also undercut by ethnic tension, and by Taliban infiltrators and disaffected soldiers who shoot and kill Western troops and civilian contractors. At the command level, ethnic Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras and others fight bitterly for influence.

Afghan Brig. Gen. Aminullah Patyani, the academy commander, says any such problems can be addressed through rigorous training. As academy commander, Patyani is bullish on the army.

What about so-called insider attacks, which have caused 130 coalition deaths since 2007, including 61 in 2012? There hasn't been a single such incident at the training center, Patyani said.

Recruits' phony IDs and fake letters of recommendation from village elders? Increased vigilance, with fresh help from the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan's intelligence agency, has the problem under control, Patyani said.

The washout rate? No such thing. Every recruit graduates, the general said, even if they have to keep repeating their courses.

Patyani said the Afghan army was nearing its goal of 195,000 soldiers. Troop strength was expected to reach 187,000 by the end of 2012. But the academy must churn out 50,000 new soldiers a year to help keep pace with desertions, casualties and retirements.

Col. Peter J. Williams, a wiry Canadian who commands a 320-member, eight-nation advisor team, said advisors directed hands-on training in the academy's early years. The focus was on delivering large numbers of recruits. Today, he said, advisors stand back and observe, offering quiet advice later.

"They're getting the quantity they want," Williams said. "Now's the time to focus on quality."

Williams has recommended extending the basic training course from nine weeks to 12. (Recruits take another nine-week "collective training" course after graduation.) A pilot 12-week class was this day in an elaborate ceremony featuring martial music, goose-stepping and fiery speeches.

The graduates carried no rifles. Every visitor to the ceremony, from recruits to senior officers, was searched for explosives or weapons. Armed Afghan, Canadian and private security guards stood watch, all on alert for an insider attack.

The ceremony played out without incident as Rahmatullah and Azizullah returned from the firing range. Rahmatullah was stunned to learn that his father, Azizullah's uncle, was pacing outside the academy gate.

A Times reporter had phoned the father, Qandi Gul, to request an interview. His wife, Ashad Bibi, was convinced that the call meant her son had been wounded or killed. At her insistence, Gul drove his ancient rickshaw motorcycle down a mountain road to the academy.

Gul waited for hours, seeking permission for his son to speak with him. At last, the young recruit emerged. He buried his head in his father's arms as the older man showered him with kisses.

"Call your mother right now," Gul ordered. Rahmatullah grabbed his father's cellphone and walked to a lonely spot along a barbed-wire fence.

Later, in the mud-walled village of Qalai Mohsen, Gul described how he had practically ordered his son, and his nephew too, to join the army. Gul served six years as an Afghan police officer. Three sons, including Rahmatullah, are in the security forces. So are three nephews.

Most of the men in the village, in fact, are in the army or police. Gul's compound overlooks the national police training academy. On display inside his home is a photo of his eldest son in uniform.

Over a meal of steaming lamb, rice and spinach spread out on his floor, Gul says the village is rabidly anti-Taliban. They are Pashtuns, like most of the Taliban, but Gul calls the insurgents "devils and thieves."

When he was a police officer, a pro-Taliban mullah told him he wasn't a real Muslim because he served the U.S.-backed government.

"I told him, 'I'm a true Muslim and an Afghan patriot who serves his country, and I'll send all my sons to serve their country,'" Gul said.

"The army, the government, will stand against the Taliban, and against Pakistan, even after the Americans are gone," Gul said, sucking on a cracked lamb bone.

Beside him was another son, Ruhollah. Thin and dark-eyed, Ruhollah said he tried to join the army in 2011, but was rejected because he wasn't yet 18. He had just turned 18 and planned to sign up soon.

In Gul's lap was his youngest son, Haroon, 2 1/2. The boy gurgled and stuffed a wad of rice into his mouth.

His father took the boy in his arms and nuzzled him with his bearded chin.

"One day," he said, squeezing Haroon, "another soldier for the army."

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Cosmetic surgery catches on in a more open Afghanistan

Kabul, Jan 15 : Shoqofa never liked her nose. She thought it was too wide. Her father told her not to worry; it was given to her by Allah.

But when the 22-year-old started working at a beauty salon, she had the means and freedom to do something about it.

Six months ago, she had rhinoplasty at one of several new private clinics offering cosmetic surgery in Kabul, Afghanistan's capital. She paid for it herself, telling her father that she was seeing a doctor about a mole.

"When he saw my nose covered in bandages, he asked, 'What happened?' " she said, laughing. "The whole family was surprised."

Shoqofa, who, like many Afghans, uses one name, is part of an emerging middle class exposed to beauty trends from India and Iran through movies, travel and the country's proliferating media outlets. Women show up at doctors' offices carrying pictures of their favorite Bollywood celebrities and Turkish telenovela stars.

Just over a decade ago, women were largely confined to their homes and forbidden to work, even if they could find a job in the war-ravaged country. Cut off from the rest of the world under the Taliban's rule, many had never heard of cosmetic surgery.

It remains a touchy subject in many Afghan families, especially for women, eliciting questions about their modesty and acceptance of God's will. But as women have rejoined the workforce in cities like Kabul, they have started earning their own money, which some are choosing to spend on changing their looks.

Many have little idea what to expect from cosmetic surgery. Shoqofa's doctor, Najibullah Najib, shows prospective patients before-and-after pictures on his cellphone. Most procedures are performed with a local anesthetic and patients are sent home the same day.

Najib honed his skills treating victims of war, poverty and domestic violence.

His patients include children born with clubfeet and cleft palates, survivors of gas-lamp fires and gunshot wounds, and girls who have set themselves alight in protest against forced marriages, often to much older men. In the last two years, he has also been getting a growing number of requests for cosmetic surgery.

Nose jobs and eyelid lifts are especially popular, he said. In many cases, the patients are ethnic Hazaras who he said are frequently mocked by Pashtuns and Tajiks, the country's two largest ethnic groups, for their flat noses and distinctive eyes. Others have come to him for face-lifts and tummy tucks.

One recent morning, Mohammad Hanif, a man in a traditional tunic and turban, walked into Najib's examination room at Kaisha Health Care with his 21-year-old daughter, Bibi, who was wrapped in a black veil that revealed only her eyes. She had already had surgery to correct a collapsed nose bridge, and he wanted the doctor to repair some skin discoloration.

Hanif said he had spent time in Iran, one of the world's leading centers for cosmetic surgery. So when he heard on local television that these kinds of procedures were available in Afghanistan, he sought out Najib.

"When she was with her classmates, other girls were making fun of her because of her nose," he said.

Such congenital defects can hurt a young woman's marriage prospects, the doctor explained.

"It's a conservative society," he said. "Most of the people here don't think about a girl's talent or education, they think about her beauty."

Benafsha, a 23-year-old law student in a red leopard-print head scarf and shearling jacket, asked Najib to excise several large scars running down one arm — the result of a car accident six years ago. Although her arms are covered in public, she likes to wear sleeveless dresses at women's-only wedding parties and is tired of drawing stares.

Her mother, Fahima, a 43-year-old businesswoman, is thinking about a face-lift. She hates the wrinkles around her eyes. "I want to look young," she said.

By the time Najib arrived at his afternoon job at the nearby Rose Dermatology and Cosmetics Hospital, the patients were lined up on blue plastic chairs, waiting for him.

A young woman named Mariam had brought in her 14-year-old niece, Shabnam. The girl had tried several times to slash her wrists after her parents died in a suicide bombing last year, Mariam said. Now she was threatening to drop out of school unless her aunt and uncle agreed to surgery to remove the scarring on her face from a childhood bout of leishmaniasis, a skin-sore-causing disease transmitted by sand flies.

"Whenever I see myself in the mirror, I feel depressed," Shabnam said tearfully.

Najib said he sees many such cases. He used a ballpoint pen to show the pair how he would graft from a healthy part of her face.

As word spreads about the country's cosmetic surgeons, some Afghans who live abroad are opting for cheaper procedures at home. Rhinoplasty here costs about $300 to $600. In the West, the price can be 10 or 20 times higher.

But some doctors worry about inexperienced colleagues setting up shop. Dr. Aminullah Hamkar, who trained in Russia and has two decades of experience, said others will attempt complicated procedures after a few months with a foreign medical aid group — often with unsatisfactory results.

Shoqofa said she did her research on the Internet and consulted numerous doctors before deciding on Najib. He performed the surgery the same day.

She loves her new, trim nose and displays the before-and-after pictures on a wall at home.

"I'm much happier," she said.

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Of Sofia Vergara, Demi Lovato and Jordin Sparks, who styled this gown best?

London, Jan 15 : Here we have three beautiful, talented ladies with subtly different body types all looking rather fierce in the same leather and chiffon bustier dress. I think we can all agree on that, right?

Jordin Sparks was the first to wear the strapless Mason maxi dress at the Billboard Music Awards in May, and she teamed with delicate earrings, a collection of silver bangles, a low pony tail, and not much else.

Demi Lovato gave the black and electric cobalt number a little architectural adornment with a breastplate necklace at the Irresistible Awards in August.

Finally, Sofia Vergara rang in the new year at famed Miami hotel, The Delano, wearing the seductive gown. A couple of bangles and her long, straightened locks completed the look.

We think the fit is best on Miss Sparks, but what do you think? Do you even like the dress? Are you over leather? Let us know.

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Afghanistan’s IED Complex: Inside the Taliban bombmaking industry

Kandahar, Jan 15: “I am here in Kandahar on a short vacation,” says the young man, about 27, who we will call Mullah Kalam.

His beard is trimmed neat; he is wearing a black leather jacket and a striped beige turban. Kalam has been a student for five years at a religious seminary across the border in Chaman, a foreign media report said.

Two years into his studies, as U.S. President Barack Obama ordered a surge of 33,000 troops in Afghanistan, much of it focused in the south, Kalam’s family of 11 left their home in Panjwai district, about 40km from the city of Kandahar, to settle in Chaman.

But Kalam’s “short vacations” home, at least twice every year, are no innocent excursions. Panjwai is considered one of the most heavily mined areas in the country. The Taliban have been known to place homemade bombs and booby-traps everywhere—on dirt roads, pomegranate trees, and vegetable fields—and have forced a curfew on locals between 8pm and 8am. Besides Kalam’s religious studies, he has been spending time with “explosive experts,” he says. Putting that training to work, he has helped orchestrate about 20 Improvised Explosive Device (IED) attacks.

The U.S. troop surge and the increasing reach of the Afghan security forces have weakened the Taliban as a fighting force in recent years. But the Taliban, known for their tactical flexibility, has turned more and more to IEDs. These are easy to make, largely from fertilizer and simple materials that are easy to transport across the porous border with Pakistan.

The U.S, government has spent more than $21 billion since 2006 in tackling the IEDs, which it considers a strategic weapon that will remain “an enduring threat.” Marred with questions of inefficiency and mismanagement, the effort is led by JIEDDO, Joint IED Defeat Organization. The group has focused heavily on fielding technologies to address the problem in a three-prongedstrategy: “attack the network, defeat the device, train the force.” But the numbers on the ground suggest it has been a difficult, largely losing fight—and one that is increasingly asymmetric in terms of economic cost.

While in Iraq, use of IEDs plummeted after reaching a peak of 23,000 attacks in 2007, the trend in Afghanistan seems to be only heading upwards. The Pentagon is reporting an 80% increase in IED incidents over the past two years here. In 2012 alone, there have been nearly 15,000 IED incidents, causing about 1,900 U.S. casualties. Overall, more than 60% of U.S. casualties in Afghanistan are caused by IEDs. While the weapon will continue to take a heavy toll on the U.S. troops until their planned withdrawal in 2014, the larger victim will remain Afghan forces, who are ill-equipped and more prone to fall victim in mined areas. IEDs are responsible for about 85% of casualties in Afghan army and police forces.

Fighting the phenomenon through detective technology is unsustainable, analysts and officials say. The lethality of the weapon lies in its flexibility. The technology, developed through large defense contracts, simply cannot keep up. “The enemy is actually better equipped than my soldiers—they have night goggles, to see how they can cross the border at night,” says Brigadier General Abdul Raziq, the 33-year-old police commander of Kandaharprovince who has survived about 40 attempts on his life, several of them by way of IEDs. “The enemy has been given the kind of explosives, triggers and remote controls that our equipment—not the new jammers and such, but equipment from 2010—cannot detect.”

The Afghan police have 97 mine clearance teams across the country with very basic training and equipment designed for Soviet-era bombs. The force largely relies on human intelligence, which has been undermined by significant budget cuts over the past three years.

More than 70% of the IEDs in Afghanistan are made withCalcium Ammonium Nitrate (CAN) produced in two factories. Urging regulation on the factories, dismantling the smuggling supply chain, and disrupting the networks inside is really the only way. “While CAN is produced in other regional countries, I have seen no evidence to indicate the CAN used for IEDs in Afghanistan comes from any other country besides Pakistan,” says Army Lt. Gen. Michael D. Barbero, director of JIEDDO.

The Pakistani military has taken measures to curb the problem, but only domestically, which has been spreading like the larger militancy. At least 900 IED attacks causing 3,700 casualties have been reported inside Pakistan. The U.S. government tried to reach out directly with the two factories in Pakistan, which has only resulted in “minor packaging, tracking, and marketing changes,” according to Barbareo. With the producing source and the supply chain intact, the Afghan and coalition forces have increased their crack down on IED material—particularly CAN—on the Afghan side of the border. In 2012 alone, 444 tons of IED material was seized in Afghanistan, but a large amount still continues to be smuggled in.

“The enemy mixes ammonium nitrate in flour, in cement, in powder detergent, in passengers’ luggage to carry it across the border,” says General Raziq. “We can’t always just knife people’s goods.” And Raziq’s men do not even have control over all of Kandahar’s 44-kilometer border with Pakistan, which is a small share of the vast 2,400km border.

“If I have 300 soldiers in Shorawak, there are 500 terrorists training in the open directly on the other side of the border inPanjpai,” Raziq says. “Across the border, they have open headquarters, training grounds, and they bring their injured for treatment to hospitals there.”

Once the material is in the country, there is a vast network of trained, active agents, disarmed former members of the movement, and ideological sympathizers that play a role along the way as the material is turned into explosives, and then planted. TIME spoke to some of these agents. A 35-year old, beefy commander, his beard trimmed short and his head half bald under his massive white turban, is in charge of a 10-member team just 70km outside Kandahar city. With training in Chaman twoyears ago, he leads the ten men in assembling the explosives—in oil cans, pressure cookers, and, most recently, in 1.5liter soda bottles, which are easier to transport. A Kandahar intelligence official swore he had even seen IEDs carved into large copies of the Quran.

Then there are the facilitators, like the 38-year-old former member of the Taliban who helps by hiding IEDs at his home in Daman, and transports them on the back of his motorcycle. And, finally, there are people like themustachioed 33-year-old from the lush Arghandab valley who has brought eight IEDs to the city in his truck, which he usually uses to deliver commercial fruits.

“For transporting the explosives, we use cars, animals, and even some government officials,” the bald commander says, lowering his voice into a whisper during the last part, stretching his words with satisfaction. The use of vehicles for transporting explosives, and even carrying out attacks, is not unusual. The police chief of Nimroz province was reportedly killed last month by explosives placed in the door of his own official vehicle.

Locals in Panjwai claim the Taliban have also turned to subcontracting, so far a trademark of the coalition side of the war. The insurgents supply the explosives, they say, but unemployed youth plant them for cash. If they blow up an Afghan police vehicle, they get anything between 10,000 and 20,000 Pakistani rupees ($100-$200). If they blow up a coalitionvehicle, the reward is as high as 100,000 Pakistani rupees. The claim is difficult to prove. But there does exist an internal Taliban bonus structure for operatives carrying out IEDs successfully. Mullah Kalam said he has gotten up to 20,000 PKR for blowing up U.S. vehicles, and 10,000 PKR for Afghan police vehicles. “We definitely have a bonus, a sweetener,” Kalam says.

So the incentive means that not a day goes by in Afghanistan without reports of IEDs across the country. As in all wars, civilians bear the heavy brunt: the United Nations reports at least 967 civilians killed and 1,590 injured during the past four months, 56% caused by IEDs.

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Four dead in townhouse shooting in Aurora, Colorado

Aurora, Jan 15 : A gunman who barricaded himself inside a townhouse after killing three people in the home was shot to death by police in Aurora, Colorado, the same Denver suburb where 12 people were slain in a movie house massacre last July, police said.

The gunman and his three victims, as well as a woman who fled safely from the home at the outset of the violence and alerted authorities, were all believed to be related to one another, police spokeswoman Cassidee Carlson said.

But the motive for the killings was not immediately understood.

"We're trying to find out what set this guy off," she said.

A hostage-negotiation team called to the scene had sought to talk the suspect into surrendering for about five hours before police moved to shoot tear gas into the home at about 8:00 a.m. (10:00 a.m. EST/1500 GMT), prompting the gunman to open fire on officers from inside, police said.

About an hour later, the gunman began firing at police again from a second-floor window, and police returned fire, killing the suspect, according to a police statement following the incident. No police were wounded.

Officers entering the townhouse found the bodies of the gunman and three other people - two men and a woman - who were presumed to have been shot hours earlier before police were called to the scene.

"None of the officers heard gunshots until they were directed at us at about 8 o'clock," Carlson said. The woman who escaped the home also told police the victims were shot before she fled.

The names of the gunman and his three victims were being withheld until the coroner could confirm their identities and notify next of kin, authorities said.

The episode kept residents in much of the surrounding community awake overnight, as police notified neighbours of an emergency situation and evacuated several adjacent blocks.

One neighbor, Sunil Pawar, 59, said he received a reverse 911 call advising him to stay inside and away from windows before police later showed up to ring doorbells and escort residents of the townhouse development to safety.

Pawar said he opted to stay put, later hearing gunshots, followed by the voices of police calling to the gunman though a bullhorn, saying, "Sonny, we want to talk to you, pick up the phone, Sonny."

Another neighbor, Michael Ignace, 46, said he had previously spoken with the man suspected of the shooting, and "he seemed like a reasonable guy, and we talked about motorcycles."

The standoff and shooting unfolded just a few miles south of the Aurora movie theatre where 12 people were killed and 58 others wounded when a lone gunman opened fire there in July during a midnight showing of the Batman film, "The Dark Knight Rises."

The suspect in that rampage, former college student James Holmes, is due back in court for a hearing in which prosecutors will seek to convince a judge they have sufficient evidence to put him on trial.

The Colorado movie theatre killings had ranked as deadliest mass shooting in the United States last year until a December 14 massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, where a gunman shot 20 school children and six adults to death before taking his own life. The shooter in that case also had killed his mother at their home.

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Missoni scion on plane missing in Venezuela

Caracas, Jan 15 : Rescue crews used boats and aircraft to search for a small plane that disappeared off Venezuela carrying the CEO of Italy's iconic Missoni fashion house and five other people.

But more than a day after the BN-2 Islander aircraft disappeared from radar screens on its short flight from the Venezuelan resort islands of Los Roques to Caracas, no sign of the plane had been found, officials said.

"We have no other news" about the plane carrying 58-year-old Vittorio Missoni, the head of the company; his wife, Maurizia Castiglioni; two of their Italian friends; and two Venezuelan crew members, said Paolo Marchetti, a Missoni SpA official. He spoke briefly to reporters as he left company headquarters in the northern Italian town of Sumirago.

Missoni's younger brother, Luca, who is active in the family-run business, was reportedly traveling to Venezuela to monitor search efforts.

"We're holding onto a glimmer of hope," said Oswaldo Scalvenzi , a relative of Elda Scalvenzi, one of the Missoni friends aboard the flight. "Until we can see the wreckage" hope will remain, Scalvenzi told Italian state TV.

Search teams were using a plane and a helicopter, working together with the Venezuelan coast guard, Venezuela's National Civil Aviation Institute said in a statement.

The twin-engine plane had enough fuel on board for a three-hour flight, said Francisco Paz Fleitas, president of the civil aviation agency. Paz said the plane took off at 11:39 a.m. and had been expected to arrive at Caracas' Simon Bolivar International Airport 42 minutes later.

The civil aviation agency said the authorities declared an alert after the plane didn't make contact with the control tower at the Caracas airport or with the tower in Los Roques.

"The last position registered in radar data and those supplied by a system on board the aircraft" was about 11 miles (18 kilometers) south of Los Roques, the agency said in the statement.

The Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported that Venezuelan aircraft, boats and helicopters took off at dawn to resume the search for the missing plane, which had been suspended.

Venezuelan Interior Minister Nestor Reverol announced that the plane was missing hours after it took off from Los Roques, a string of islands popular for scuba diving, white beaches and coral reefs, and where the Missonis and their friends were on vacation.

Reverol said that two navy patrol boats were involved in the search and that a specialized oceanographic ship, the Guaicamacuto, also had been deployed.

Vittorio Missoni is the eldest son of the company's founder, Ottavio, who at 91 still follows the business.

The Corriere della Sera newspaper reported that Ottavio and his wife Rosita were at their home in Italy, along with their daughter Angela, waiting for information about the search. Rosita Missoni designs housewares for the company, and Angela is the company's creative director.

The Missoni fashion house, with its trademark zigzag and other geometric patterns in sweaters, scarves and other knitwear, is one of Italy's most famous fashion brands abroad. It is scheduled to display its latest menswear creations at a fashion show in Milan later this month.

Vittorio Missoni played a key role in marketing the Missoni family creations in Asia, especially in Japan, Hong Kong and South Korea as general director of marketing for Missoni SpA. He also spearheaded a push for the company's products in the United States and France. His efforts to expand the brand abroad led Missoni to be dubbed the company's "ambassador."

Vittorio Missoni has been described as an active sportsman and lover of the outdoors. He and his wife and their friends from northern Italy were scheduled to fly back from Caracas to Italy after spending the Christmas and New Year's holidays in the islands.

The plane disappeared shortly after takeoff on a flight of about 95 miles (150 kilometers) from the islands to the Caracas airport.

Other small planes have gone down or vanished on flights between the archipelago and the mainland.

On Jan. 4, 2008, a plane on a flight from Caracas to Los Roques disappeared after crashing with 14 people aboard, including eight Italians, a Swiss man and five Venezuelans. The pilot had radioed to controllers that he was having engine trouble before the plane went down as it approached the islands. The body of the Venezuelan co-pilot later washed ashore, but no wreckage was found and most of those on board remain missing.

In 2009, a small plane returning from Los Roques with nine people aboard plunged into the Caribbean Sea, but all survived.

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SC woman, oldest living US citizen, dies at 114

New York, Jan 15  : A 114-year-old South Carolina woman who was the oldest living US citizen has died, two of her daughters said.

Mamie Rearden of Edgefield, who held the title as the country's oldest person for about two weeks, died at a hospital in Augusta, Ga., said Sara Rearden of Burtonsville, Md., and Janie Ruth Osborne of Edgefield. They said their mother broke her hip after a fall about three weeks ago.

Gerontology Research Group, which verifies age information for Guinness World Records, listed Mamie Rearden as the oldest living American after last month's passing of 115-year-old Dina Manfredini of Iowa. Rearden's Sept. 7, 1898, birth was recorded in the 1900 U.S. Census, the group's Robert Young said.

Rearden was more than a year younger than the world's oldest person, 115-year-old Jiroemon Kimura of Japan.

"My mom was not president of the bank or anything, but she was very instrumental in raising a family and being a community person," said Sara Rearden, her youngest child. "Everybody can't go be president of a bank or president of a college, but we feel just as proud of her in her role as housewife and particularly as mother and homemaker."

Mamie Rearden, who was married to her husband Oacy for 59 years until his death in 1979, raised 11 children, 10 of whom survive, Sara Rearden said. She lived in the family homestead with a son and a daughter on land that had been in the family since her father's accumulation of acreage made him one of the area's largest black landowners.

Her father sent her off to earn a teaching certificate at Bettis Academy on the far side of the county, spending an entire day on a loaded wagon to reach the school along dirt roads, her daughter said. She taught for several years until becoming pregnant with her third child.

In the mid-1960s at age 65, when some settled into retirement, she learned to drive a car for the first time and started volunteering for an Edgefield County program that had her driving to the end of remote rural roads to find children whose parents were keeping them home from school, Sara Rearden said.

Mamie Rearden always counseled that her children should treat others as they wanted to be treated and that included never gossiping or speaking ill of others. When asked about a preacher's uninspiring sermon, her daughter recalled her mother saying: "'Well, it came from the Bible.' She never would bad-mouth them."

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Cat caught sneaking saw, phone into Brazil prison

Rio De Janeiro, Jan 15 : A cat carrying a saw and a mobile phone was "detained" as it entered a prison gate in northeast Brazil, Brazilian media reported.

Prison guards were surprised when they saw a white cat crossing the main gate of the prison, its body wrapped with tape. A closer look showed the feline also carried drills, an earphone, a memory card, batteries and a phone charger.

All 263 detainees in the prison of Arapiraca, a city of 215,000 people in the state of Alagoas, are considered suspect in the plot, which is being investigated by local police.

"It's tough to find out who's responsible for the action as the cat doesn't speak," a prison spokesperson told local paper Estado de S.Paulo.

The cat was taken to an animal disease center to receive medical care.

The incident took place on New Year's day but was first reported by national media.

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Gun owners push back: A former Marine's letter to Dianne Feinstein

Washington, Jan 15 : Talk of reviving an assault weapons ban and creating a national gun registry in the wake of the Newtown, Conn., school massacre is touching a deep nerve in America, epitomized this week by debate over a stern open letter to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D) from a former Marine.

After Adam Lanza used a semiautomatic assault-style rifle to kill 20 students and six school staff Dec. 14, Senator Feinstein of California has said she will try to revive the 1994 assault weapons ban, which sunsetted in 2004. She would also push for Americans to be required to register "grandfathered" weapons.

But the open letter from Joshua Boston, which has caused a raucous online debate after being posted on CNN's iReport website on Dec. 27, is a reminder of the huge stakes involved. Namely, many of America's 80 million gun owners are liable to balk at having to register their weapons, raising the potential for confrontations with federal authorities.

Addressing Feinstein directly, Mr. Boston, who served tours in Afghanistan and Iraq, says he'll refuse to register his weapons and writes, "You ma'am have overstepped a line that is not your domain."

"I am not your subject," he continues. "I am the man who keeps you free. I am not your servant. I am the person whom you serve. I am not your peasant."

As Democrats, led by President Obama, have pushed to expand the purview of the federal government in recent years, a recoil has ensued – on display in the rise of the tea party, a massive run on guns, and an explosion in the number of concealed-weapons permits. At times, the recoil has taken on tones of warning and alarm. Many in this camp, especially in the wake of several mass shootings last year, fear that America is entering a post-constitutional era where basic precepts like the Second Amendment are curtailed by a central authority.

"If you take out the heat and the emotion of this [Connecticut] tragedy, the reaction is an interesting case study in public versus individual rights," says James Wright, a sociologist at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. "It puts the issue on a knife point in a way that a lot of other issues don't. It's hard to deny the public interest in gun crimes, but at the same time there's that old Second Amendment, and it's hard to deny what it seems to imply."

Indeed, what it implies for some Americans, including many in the so-called warrior class – hundreds of thousands of retired soldiers – is that an armed population is an essential guarantee against centralized tyranny. The lobbying of the National Rifle Association and the expansion of gun rights by federal courts have tended to further the idea that the Second Amendment is a safeguard against tyranny, as well as a key to personally protecting oneself against crime.

Feinstein's office replied to Boston's letter this past week, pointing out that there's another side to the argument – the millions of Americans who worry about US society becoming militarized through the expansion of weaponry. What's more, Feinstein says, the law won't affect Americans’ basic right to purchase and use weapons.

"Senator Feinstein respects Cpl. Boston's service. She has heard from thousands of people – including many gun owners – who support her plan to stop the sale, transfer, importation and manufacturing of assault weapons and large capacity magazines, strips and drums that hold more than 10 rounds,” the statement from Feinstein’s office read. “As Senator Feinstein has said, the legislation will be carefully focused to protect the rights of existing gun owners by exempting hundreds of weapons used for hunting and sporting purposes."

In response to Boston's letter, a commenter on the iReport website suggested that the former Marine, by refusing to comply with a law, would be going against the Constitution.

"Ms. Feinstein is an elected official who was selected by voters to represent their interests in a governing body," YankCT wrote. "She has the authority and responsibility to do just that until the people whom she represents decide otherwise through their votes. This gentleman believes that he is above the law. This is untrue; in fact, my guess is that he swore to defend the country and respect its laws when he entered the Marines."

One point Boston makes in his letter is that many of the 120 guns that would be banned under Feinstein's bill are cosmetic variations of standard semiautomatic hunting rifles. Boston says he's angered by "the fact that I'm supposed to be punished for doing nothing more than owning a rifle that looks scary because its stock isn't made out of wood," he said.

Feinstein contends that America should "put weapons under some kind of appropriate authority," as she recently told Fox News. Yet many gun owners believe there is already an authority in place – the Constitution.

"With everything that has happened these last four years under President Obama and with the fresh attacks on the Second Amendment by gun grabbers like Dianne Feinstein (and David Gregory and Piers Morgan and Nanny Bloomberg, plus dozens more) I can safely [say that] yes we do live in a post constitutional Republic, and that is very troubling," writes Ulysses Arn on the RedState blog.

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Pace of slide in Toyota China sales slows in December

Beijing, Jan 15 : Toyota Motor Corp is still dogged by a sales crisis Japanese carmakers are suffering in China as a result of a territorial row between the two countries but December sales proved "surprisingly resilient", a senior Toyota executive said.

The executive said customer traffic in Toyota's showrooms was recovering to levels seen before the crisis over the disputed islands in the East China Sea broke out last September.

Toyota sold "almost" 90,000 vehicles in China in December, compared with 108,000 cars the company and its two Chinese partners sold in December 2011.

Toyota is expected to announce its China sales data for December, according to a Beijing-based company spokesman. He did not respond to calls seeking comment on November sales.

The pace of last month's decline -- roughly 17 percent from a year earlier -- eased from the previous three months.

"Sales rebounded faster than we had expected," said the Toyota executive, who declined to be identified because the sales information has not been made public yet.

He attributed the recovery in part to discounts and other sales incentives the Japanese company provided during the month.

Toyota's December sales fall followed a decline of 22 percent in November, 44 percent in October, and almost 50 percent in September.

Signs in the marketplace across China -- including a recovery in customer traffic in dealer showrooms -- were "encouraging", the Toyota executive said.

Sales patterns showed consumers were no longer as spooked as they were before a surge of anti-Japan sentiment that affected sales at auto stores and other Japanese-branded companies such as electronics firms.

Violent anti-Japan protests swept China from mid-September after Japan bought two East China Sea islands, known as the Diaoyu in Chinese and Senkaku in Japanese, from their private owner. China claims the islands as its own territory.

Demand slumped in September and October, reducing the market share of Japanese firms in China's passenger car market to about 17 percent from 19 percent at the end of August, according to the China Association of Automotive Manufacturers.

Some Chinese consumers have since avoided Japanese cars. In a widely reported incident during the height of the anti-Japanese sentiment, a Chinese man was attacked by angry protesters for driving a Toyota Corolla.

December sales showed Chinese consumers were "not as fearful of buying and driving Japanese cars as before", the Toyota executive said.

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BMW to pare back car discounts in Germany: magazine

Frankfurt, Jan 15 : BMW will cut back on sales discounts in Germany and focus on maintaining profit margins rather than market share, Chief Executive Norbert Reithofer told German weekly WirtschaftsWoche.

"We have decided that this year in Germany we will not defend market share at any price, and that profitability must come first," Reithofer told the magazine.

The volume of discounts will therefore be pared back substantially. "We're not just talking 5,000 cars," Reithofer told the magazine.

Auto manufacturers in Germany often give large dealerships cash bonuses to "self register" a purchase by the dealership, rather than a real customer, as a way to flatter monthly sales figures.

Based on currently available statistics, BMW still holds the crown of being the world's biggest maker of premium cars, ahead of rivals Mercedes-Benz and Audi.

Separately, Reithofer said the premium auto maker needs to sell a "five digit number" of electric vehicles from 2020 onwards in order to comply with European Union emission rules to cut BMW's average carbon dioxide emission level to 101 grams per kilometer per vehicle.

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December payrolls: A ‘goldilocks’ number for the market says Lutz

New York, Jan 15 : Stocks remain flat after the December jobs report showed the economy added 155,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate ticked up to 7.8%.

According to various consensus estimates, economists were expecting between 150,000 to 160,000 jobs added and a 7.7% unemployment rate.

The unemployment rate for November was revised higher to 7.8% and nonfarm payrolls growth was revised to 161,000 from 146,000.

“That might be the goldilocks number the market was looking for,” says David Lutz, head of ETF trading at Stifel Nicolaus. “There was a lot of conjecture saying ‘if we had a really good nonfarm payrolls number, if we added a lot of jobs, does that increase a lot more of the anxiety that the FOMC minutes brought on yesterday?’”

Federal Reserve minutes from the December meeting jolted investors, revealing several members want to end quantitative easing sometime this year. During that policy meeting the FOMC adopted official rate targets of 2% for inflation and 6.5% unemployment.

“In light of being in line with expectations, this was actually a really solid number and a really solid reaction for the market,” says Lutz in the attached video. “So we’re watching gold right now. Gold is going to be a leading indicator, it’s still getting absolutely pummeled.”

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BASF's Hambrecht to delay comeback until 2014

Frankfurt, Jan 15 : Juergen Hambrecht, the former chief executive of Germany's BASF, (BAS.DE) will delay an attempted comeback to the world's largest chemical maker by sales until 2014, he told German weekly Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

Hambrecht, who left the CEO post in 2011, has sought to get a seat on BASF's board of directors, a body known in Germany as the supervisory board.

German law prohibits an immediate move from management to the board of directors, demanding that executives undergo a two-year "cooling off" period.

"BASF has a very good supervisory board. New appointments will take place in 2014," Hambrecht told the paper. "I have cooled off for almost two years, so it doesn't make much difference if I do it for three," he further said.

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SAP CEO says China to become as important as US

Frankfurt, Jan 15 : German business software maker SAP sees potential for one million new customers in China, five times the number it currently has world-wide, German weekly paper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung said.

"China will be as important for us as the United States," SAP's co-Chief Executive Jim Hagemann Snabe told the paper, according to an advance extract.

Snabe said SAP wants to open the Chinese market by securing a deal with authorities to allow cloud computing services.

"We want to find a solution with Chinese authorities this year if possible," Snabe told the paper.

As part of SAP's growth strategy, it plans to invest around $2 billion in China by 2015.

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‘Neglected blood' screened

Srinagar, Jan 15 : A documentary depicting the struggles and endurance of Hemophilia  patients and their families made its debut here, marking the first time they spoke about the blood disorder on the screen.

 'Neglected Blood’ is a 20-minute documentary about the life journey of Hemophilia patients in Kashmir amid many odds. The film is supported by an NGO, Kashmir Corp and Greater Kashmir.
 Hemophilia is a bleeding disorder where patient’s blood lacks an essential protein to allow it to clot normally.

“The severity of a person's bleeding disorder usually depends on the amount of clotting factor that is missing or not functioning,” said doctors.

 Bleeding into joints and muscles causes severe pain and disability while bleeding into major organs, such as the brain, can cause death, they said.

 The film tries to reflect that pain through the lens and the narration embedded into the testimonies of the families.

 In the past, the pain of the patients and problems faced by them has been highlighted by the print media through the series of stories. “It is the first time both the patient and his family member have been willing to stand up and speak out on camera,” said Muhammad Saleem Malik, a student of social works and co-producer of the film.

 The film is based on the Academic Research done by the Student of Social Works, University of Kashmir, Showkat-ul-Islam. The script and narration of the film has been written by a Journalist, Rakib Altaf.

 “Access to treatment is perhaps the biggest challenge facing the majority of people with hemophilia in Kashmir as the there is proper policy and funds for these patients government,” he said.
 Some Hemophiliacs and their families also attended the screening event and highlighted their plight before the audience.

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India shortlists Goldman, five others for NTPC share sale

Mumbai, Jan 15 : India has shortlisted six banks, including Goldman Sachs (GS), Citigroup and Morgan Stanley (MS), for a selldown of state shares worth $2.3 billion in power producer NTPC Ltd, three sources with direct knowledge of the sale said.

Others shortlisted by the Indian government's department of disinvestment for the NTPC (NTPC.NS) offering are Deutsche Bank (DBK.DE) and India's SBI Capital Markets and Kotak Mahindra Capital, the sources said.

All three sources declined to be identified because they were not authorized to speak to the media before an official announcement.

India's cabinet approved a 9.5 percent stake sale in NTPC in November to help rein in its ballooning fiscal deficit. At current market price, the sale could raise as much as $2.3 billion for the government.

The NTPC stake sale is likely to be completed by the end of this month, two of the sources said.

Selling some shares in state companies is a central plank of the government's plan to bring down a widening fiscal deficit, a major weakness that has triggered repeated warnings of a credit downgrade from global ratings agencies.

The government is aiming to raise $5.5 billion from such partial privatizations in the current fiscal year that ends in March. The faltering divestment program got a boost from a $1.1 billion offering of miner NMDC Ltd (NMDC.NS) last month.

Before the NMDC selldown, the government had raised just $148 million in the current fiscal year in a process hit by volatile markets and wrangling among government officials.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said last month India would speed up the sales to revive the stock market and would push ahead with reforms aimed at spurring an investment recovery in the flagging economy.

The government is also looking to offload some of its stakes in the Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL.NS), NALCO (NALU.NS) and Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL.NS) over the next few months, but has not set firm timelines.

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Woman ‘thrashed’ by in-laws

Srinagar, Jan 15 : Police arrested three persons for allegedly thrashing a woman of Jogi-Lanker area here.

 Police said a 35-year-old woman (name withheld) of Jogi-Lanker area here was allegedly thrashed by her husband Muhammad Rafiq Khar, his uncle and sister- in-law causing injuries to her.

 Confirming the arrests, SP North City Tahir Saleem Khan said,"the incident occurred when the woman went to her maternal uncle’s home for some social function at Watal Kadal . She was beaten for this reason after she was returned to her home,” the SP said.

 “The victim filed a complaint at Police Post Bagiyas stating she was being abused physically by in laws since her marriage. She has received multiple injuries on her face, wrist and ankle”, the SP said.

 The victim belongs to Bemina area and was married with the accused about a year ago.

 An FIR No.05/2013 under section 498, A, 354,323  RPC has been registered at Police Station Safakadal.

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Acid attack victim speaks, rues her silence on stalking

New Delhi, Jan 15: Breaking her silence for the first time since the horrific incident, the Srinagar’s acid attack victim said she “should have lodged complaint against the stalker earlier.”

“I rue why I didn’t lodge a complaint with police earlier,” she told Greater Kashmir at the Indraprastha Apollo Hospital here, where she is undergoing specialized treatment.

Recalling the horrific incident, the 30-year-old victim said the attacker had been stalking her for quite some time but she did not report the incident to police, fearing that it “will bring them bad name in the society.”

The victim, who was attacked in Srinagar’s Parraypora area on past, said she is hopeful to see properly through the affected eye. “I am thankful to the state government for extending help to me and shifting me to the Apollo Hospital,” she said. “I hope I am able to see again properly through the affected eye after undergoing necessary treatment.”

Meanwhile, the victim is ‘responding well’ to the treatment, doctors said. They also said her condition is being “closely monitored.”

According to the medicos looking after her, the 30-year-old victim “is showing signs of improvement with regard to burn injuries on her face, although her left eye is badly affected.” “She has lost 80 per cent visibility in the affected eye,” they said.

According to victim’s family members, a decision with regard to her plastic surgery would be taken in next few days. “They (doctors) told us that the decision on plastic surgery would be taken after three to four days after closely monitoring her condition,” the victim’s brother-in-law, Nazir Ahmed told Greater Kashmir.

The family lauded the efforts of police, particularly Senior Superintendent of Police (Srinagar), Syed Ashiq Bhukhari for his “swift action” in the case which resulted in the arrest of the culprit within an hour of the incident.

In Delhi, the victim’s family has been provided boarding and lodging facilities in JK House while a liason officer is taking care of their requirements.

Dr Samir Kaul, senior surgeon at the Apollo Hospital, who is personally monitoring the victim’s condition, said that she is responding well to the treatment. “The situation will be clear within a week on further treatment,” he said. Dr Kaul has also offered to bear all treatment expenses of the victim.

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New therapies for prevention and treatment of Alzheimer's disease identified

Islamabad, Jan 15 : A Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute (BRNI) study published in the Journal of Neuroscience reveals underlying causes for the degeneration of synapses in Alzheimer's Disease and identifies promising pharmaceutical solutions for the devastating condition that affects more than 5 million people in the United States.

The BRNI study is the first to achieve fundamental molecular understanding of how synapses are lost in Alzheimer's Disease before the plaques and tangles develop. At the same time, it is the first study to demonstrate the comprehensive benefits of synaptogenic compounds in treating Alzheimer's Disease.

The BRNI study marks an important shift in our understanding of how Alzheimer's Disease is caused and should be treated. Previous autopsy-based studies have shown the critical role of synaptic loss in producing dementia (though, not the reason behind the degeneration), yet for decades scientists and pharmaceutical companies have focused on ways to target the amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles thought to play a role in causing Alzheimer's Disease. By preventing the loss of synapses, BRNI's new therapeutics prevent the progressive symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease.

"Alzheimer's Disease is not primarily a disease of plaques and tangles as many had previously concluded, it is most importantly a disease of synapses," said Dr. Daniel Alkon, the scientific director of BRNI and co-author of the study, "This study found that treatments that target the loss of synapses in the Alzheimer's brain, can virtually eliminate all other elements of the disease -- elevation of the toxic protein, A Beta, the loss of neurons, the appearance of plaques, and loss of cognitive function; the animals' brains were normalized."

The study utilized mice genetically engineered to express the symptoms and pathology of human Alzheimer's Disease in two different strains. BRNI used a difficult training regimen for the mice in order to reveal that significant cognitive deficits occurred five months before plaques were detected in their brains, providing evidence that plaques and tangles are not at the root of the disease.

Treatments of Bryostatin and similar compounds synthesized at BRNI that target the enzyme PKCe, which controls the creation of synapses at the molecular level, were administered for twelve weeks during the study. While the compounds promoted the growth of new synapses and preservation of existing synapses, they also stopped the decrease of PKCe and the increase of soluble ß amyloid, meaning that the treatments could be used to prevent the familiar hallmarks of Alzheimer's Disease, the plaques and tangles. BRNI has received approval to move forward with Phase II clinical testing for Bryostatin to treat Alzheimer's Disease, which is set to begin within the next several months.

The synaptogenic BRNI drugs have also shown potential for the treatment of traumatic brain injury (TBI), as recently reported in the journal Neurobiology of Disease, and stroke described in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science in 2008 and 2009.

The target of the synaptogenic compounds is the same molecule identified as a biomarker for early diagnosis of Alzheimer's Disease in clinical trials conducted by BRNI and published in Neurobiology of Aging. As a result of that study, researchers at the Institute are now working to develop a skin test for identifying Alzheimer's Disease in its early stages before significant progression.

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Airborne pathogens can induce mad cow disease

Islamabad, Jan 15 : Airborne prions are also infectious and can induce mad cow disease or Creutzfeldt-Jakob disorder, new findings suggest.

This is the surprising conclusion of researchers at the University of Zurich, the University Hospital Zurich and the University of Tübingen. They recommend precautionary measures for scientific labs, slaughterhouses and animal feed plants.


The prion is the infectious agent that caused the epidemic of mad cow disease, also termed bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), and claimed the life of over 280,000 cows in the past decades. Transmission of BSE to humans, e.g. by ingesting food derived from BSE-infected cows, causes variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease which is characterized by a progressive and invariably lethal break-down of brain cells.

It is known that prions can be transmitted through contaminated surgical instruments and, more rarely, through blood transfusions. The consumption of food products made from BSE-infected cows can also induce the disease that is responsible for the death of almost 300 people. However, prions are not generally considered to be airborne -- in contrast to many viruses including influenza and chicken pox.

Prof. Adriano Aguzzi's team of scientists at the universities of Zurich and Tübingen and the University Hospital Zurich have now challenged the notion that airborne prions are innocuous. In a study, mice were housed in special inhalation chambers and exposed to aerosols containing prions. Unexpectedly, it was found that inhalation of prion-tainted aerosols induced disease with frightening efficiency. Just a single minute of exposure to the aerosols was sufficient to infect 100% of the mice, according to Prof. Aguzzi who published the findings in the Open-Access-Journal "PLoS Pathogens." The longer expo-sure lasted, the shorter the time of incubation in the recipient mice and the sooner clinical signs of a prion disease occurred. Prof. Aguzzi says the findings are entirely unexpected and appear to contra-dict the widely held view that prions are not airborne.

The prions appear to transfer from the airways and colonize the brain directly because immune system defects -- known to prevent the passage of prions from the digestive tract to the brain -- did not prevent infection.

Precautionary measures against prion infections in scientific laboratories, slaughterhouses and animal feed plants do not typically include stringent protection against aerosols. The new findings suggest that it may be advisable to reconsider regulations in light of a possible airborne transmission of prions.

Prof. Aguzzi recommends precautionary measures to minimize the risk of a prion infection in humans and animals. He does, however, emphasize that the findings stem from the production of aerosols in laboratory conditions and that Creutzfeldt-Jakob patients do not exhale prisons.

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Individuals with partial hearing loss may benefit from hybrid cochlear implant

Islamabad, Jan 15: Hearing loss can affect anyone at any time. But it can be especially frightening for someone who suddenly starts to lose hearing during adulthood. Tom Groves, 77, first noticed his diminishing hearing when he was in his early 40s.

He was unable to hold conversations with large groups of people, found it nearly impossible to socialize in high-background noise environments like restaurants. and couldn't enjoy radio, TV and movies unless they were captioned. Now, Groves is hearing much better than he has in 30 years, thanks to an experimental hybrid cochlear implant.

Northwestern Memorial Hospital is one of nine centers in the U.S., and the only in Illinois, that is participating in a study investigating the effectiveness of a new cochlear implant device that aims to restore hearing for individuals with high-frequency hearing loss and functional low-frequency hearing.

This group of patients doesn't meet the criteria for conventional cochlear implants because they have near perfect residual hearing in low pitches that allows them to perform well on tests used to determine candidacy for traditional implants. However, their hearing in high pitches is so poor that a hearing aid is not helpful, making them ideally suited for the hybrid implant, which addresses both issues.

"We are hopeful that the hybrid cochlear implant will provide a subset of people who were previously not candidates for an implantable device the opportunity to test the device to determine if they can experience sound again," said Northwestern Medicine neurotologist Andrew Fishman, MD, principal investigator of the study, staff in the departments of otolaryngology and neurosurgery at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, and Mr. Groves' cochlear implant surgeon. "The potential for patients with a significant amount of residual hearing, but a large amount of high-frequency hearing loss, to have an alternative to hearing aids would be a great improvement over what is currently available."

Cochlear implants were FDA approved in 1984 as a treatment option for restoring hearing in people with severe and profound hearing loss. The surgical implant system is designed to stimulate the auditory nerve by bypassing damaged parts of the ear. A small battery-operated mini "computer" and microphone are worn on the outside of the ear and convert sounds into electric signals. The signals are then transmitted to implant electrodes in the cochlea, which stimulate the nerve endings so sound can be perceived by the brain.

The hybrid cochlear implant works in the same way as traditional cochlear implants, stimulating nerve endings in the cochlear so that high-pitched sounds can be heard. In addition, it also involves amplification for low-pitched sounds, similar to a hearing aid. Like traditional cochlear implants, the hybrid version is worn outside the ear and converts sounds into acoustic and electric signals.

"The surgical implantation of cochlear devices is typically done on an outpatient basis, and usually with non-serious complications, aside from mild discomfort following surgery," said Northwestern Medicine otolaryngologist Alan Micco, MD, co-investigator of the study and chief of otology/neurotology at the Feinberg School of Medicine. "A few weeks following surgery, the activation process and fine-tuning take place to determine what audio thresholds work best for the individual, and sounds can usually be perceived shortly thereafter."

Post-activation evaluations take place at three, six and 12 months following the initial activation process to assess progress of the cochlear implant. An audiologist will also test the implant to determine if participants are able to understand words, sentences in noisy and quiet environments, as well as experience music recognition.

A few months post-surgery, Groves is happy to have some of his hearing restored. "I'm very excited and encouraged by my experience with the implant. I know I'm hearing better than I have for many, many years, and for that I'm very grateful."

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