Reader, she married an Afghan warlord

Saturday 9 February 2013

Kabul, Feb 9: "HONEY, don't come home now, we've got warlords in the living room," is hardly your typical excuse for a husband who fears his wife interrupting a night in with the lads.

But for Debbie Rodriguez it has become such a common refrain that she has set up Kabul's first coffee bar as somewhere to wait.

The crimson-haired hairdresser from America's Midwest who came to Afghanistan to train its women in highlights and Brazilian waxing, has ended up married to a key commander for one of the country's most brutal warlords in the unlikeliest of post-Taliban alliances.

The "I'm a D girl" slogan emblazoned across her tight black T-shirt refers not to an ample breast but to General Abdul Rashid Dostum, the boss of her husband Sher. The whisky-drinking Uzbek warlord from northern Afghanistan is best known for running over his enemies with tanks, and his men were accused of suffocating hundreds of Taliban prisoners in shipping containers in 2001.

"The general has always been kind, gentle and sweet to me," said Rodriguez, 46, brushing the Kabul mud and snow off her jeans and warming her hands on a latte in her cafe. "He calls me 'Sher's long American' and has embraced me into the family. He's not this evil figure westerners believe. He's stopped drinking and he just wants peace."

She admits, however, that when anyone mentions the Taliban plaguing the British forces in southern Afghanistan, Dostum growls: "If they just gave me three months, I'd sort them out."

After three years of marriage, Rodriguez is accustomed to the Kalashnikov by the bed. But she still gets fed up with the general's summonses at any time of day or night. "Sometimes I'm like, 'Does he not own a watch?' " Rodriguez is well known in Kabul as "Debbie the hairdresser". She is the driving force behind the Kabul Beauty School which has trained more than 170 Afghan women and is the subject of her forthcoming book.

A hairdresser since the age of 15 in her mother's salon in Michigan, Rodriguez was moved by the September 11 attacks to help a disaster relief unit at ground zero in New York. For two weeks she gave massages to fire-fighters. "There is a link between physical touch and emotion and many of them really let loose," she said.

When the unit decided to set up clinics for women in Afghanistan, she begged to go along as a nurse's assistant. "I didn't know what I could do, but I just felt so much for how those women had suffered under the Taliban, maybe because I was in an abusive marriage myself that I wanted to escape."

Somehow word got out that a hairdresser was in town and Rodriguez would come back at night to her hotel room to find her door plastered with Post-it notes from journalists and aid workers begging: "Please cut my hair!" "It was like people in the desert dying for water," she laughs. "I was doing 30 haircuts a day.

"I knew the Taliban had banned beauty salons, but I couldn't understand why there weren't any operating by then, because cutting hair is not a skill you lose. I wandered all over Kabul looking. Eventually after three days I found one and I was shocked.

"They were trying to do hair with the most medieval equipment I'd ever seen. Scissors that looked like hedge-trimmers, broken mirrors, sticks for rollers, no electricity. It was like this moment of truth. Do you walk away and pretend you've never seen it or do something?" With her mother impatient for her to return to the salon and two children at college, Rodriguez initially thought she would go back, send some suitcases full of scissors and hair products and get on with her own life. "But then someone said to me, 'Don't give them a fish, teach them to fish'. It had never occurred to me that hairdressing could be part of the aid effort."

Back in Michigan, she called the number on the back of a bottle of Paul Mitchell shampoo. "I left a message saying, 'Hi, I'm Debs, I just came back from Afghanistan. The Taliban annihilated the beauty industry and we should put a school there and I want you to help me'."

Two days later the owner called and asked: "What do you need?" Rodriguez secured other donations and soon her garage was filled with 10,000 boxes of products. Another group of New York beauticians had had the same idea and between them the first Kabul Beauty School was born. Rodriguez returned to Afghanistan and in 2003 trained her first class in an outbuilding of the Ministry of Women's Affairs.

She found it extremely rewarding, with more than 90% of her graduates finding jobs. Despite Kabul's drabness, beauty is a lucrative business, particularly in preparing brides for their big day.

But running the school was a struggle. "Afghanistan dropped off the map when Iraq happened," she said. "Donations dried up."

The school lost its premises in the ministry for what she says were political and cultural reasons. The girls were denounced for "too much laughing", and the ministry accused her of stealing donations.

But Rodriguez is far too forceful a character to give up. "In many ways me and my warlord husband are the same. We're both warriors." Now she runs the Oasis Salon, where students work on the ground floor of the home she shares with Sher.

The couple were introduced by mutual friends in October 2003 and married within 20 days, despite being unable to speak a word of each other's language. "We didn't really notice because this other couple were already around translating. When we were alone he would play computer games and I would watch videos."

On top of that, he was 12 years younger and already had a wife and eight children living in Saudi Arabia. But because of his position as Dostum's foreign relations adviser and nephew of the minister for hajj (pilgrimage), Sher could not afford to be caught dating an American. "He said we either do it the Afghan way or stop seeing each other."

Asked what he meant by the Afghan way, he said: "Get married." "First I thought he was joking, then I thought, why not? It was like jumping off a cliff but my gut instinct said yes."

She admits that her gut had led her into two previous failed marriages, the second of which was to a travelling preacher who beat her up.

The couple did not tell their families at first. "His family are really conservative, they live in Mecca. I'm a Christian, I smoke, I'm a hairdresser and an American. I might as well be Satan."

Her parents found out from an article about the beauty salon which mentioned she had married an Afghan. For a long while he refused to tell his. "I felt a bit like the mistress."

It was this that made Dostum's endorsement so important. "I wanted someone important to Sher to acknowledge me." These days the pair are regulars at Dostum's palace, listening to his war stories late into the night.

Sher has learnt English, she has picked up some Farsi and they spend all year together, except for one month when he goes to his other family in Saudi. Their house is often filled with other commanders so she used her book advance from Random House to open the coffee house. A cosy place with colourful prints and jazz on the speakers, it has become a popular refuge.

"What can I say?" she shrugs. "I know it's weird. I married a warlord. What else does a girl from the Midwest do in Afghanistan, apart from becoming a hairdresser?"

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Afghan women inch ahead

Kabul, Feb 9 (Newswire): Each morning, the policewoman puts on her uniform, goes to her precinct office, sits behind a bare desk. And waits.

She is one of several officers appointed to make it easier for women to report domestic violence. Her job ought to be one of the busiest in the district. Instead, Pushtoon, who goes by one name, has one of the loneliest.

"Last week we had one woman. Before that there had not been anyone for several weeks," she said, twisting hands left scarred by her attempt at suicide years ago in a Taliban jail. "Women are afraid to come, but we are not allowed to go to them.

"The police chiefs will not let us. They say it is unsafe for women officers," she said.

Five years after the end of the Taliban era, there are new opportunities for women in Afghanistan, and notable efforts are underway to make their daily lives better, especially in Kabul, the capital. Improving the status of women has been a core goal of U.S. policy, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at a congressional hearing in 2005 that enshrining women's equality in the Afghan constitution was an important advance for the entire region.

But conversations with dozens of women suggest that each step forward has been a struggle. Afghan society remains deeply uncomfortable with the idea of women gaining independence and authority. The Taliban's resurgence has reversed incremental gains, particularly in the south. If the Taliban incursions spread, more women probably will lose ground.

Families in the south that recently began allowing their daughters to go to school and wives to enroll in vocational programs have pulled them out because of Taliban attacks.

"Women's future depends so much on security. As much as security deteriorates, women's situation deteriorates," said Masuda Jalal, former acting minister of women's affairs. "At the first sign of insecurity, the head of the family protects his women and children, and the first measure they take is to keep them inside the house."

Women who have gained ground haven't talked of the constitutional principles of equality. Instead, they focus on the respect accorded women by the Qur'an and on the importance of mothers and homes, where older women have long held positions of power.

Their goal, often unstated, is to convince fathers and brothers, husbands and sons that when a woman is empowered, the males benefit as well. They hope their daughters at least will have more choices than they had.

Women are learning to drive, some at their husbands' urging so they can help with family errands. A few have opened bank accounts. Women have become a regular presence on TV talk shows, and they deliver weather reports and other news features.

According to Farsona Simimi, a popular talk-show host, "There is a quiet revolution here." But, she added, "I do not know whether it will succeed."

Educated Afghans and international aid workers say the U.S.-backed government of President Hamid Karzai has done little besides removing the Taliban restrictions. He has only one woman in his Cabinet of 25 and none among his top advisers.

Several Afghan women said that they had encouraged Karzai to do small things, such as have his wife accompany him to public events, but that he had never done so.

Rahala Salim was one woman who became a judge in the 1980s under the Communists, and she recalls watching in horror as the Taliban dismantled every vestige of protection for women.

"As a judge, when I saw women coming to me crying because they had been abused, I felt responsible, I felt I had to defend their rights," said Salim, who was removed from her post by the Taliban.

Under their rule, she said, "If a man was accused of rape, it was the woman who was arrested and blamed."

Salim knew from her legal studies that Sharia, or Islamic law, offered women some legal protection. The Qur'an and "hadiths," the sayings of the prophet Muhammad, are open to an array of interpretations. And early Islam glorifies several women, including Muhammad's daughter Fatima, who is portrayed as an independent leader of her people.

"We have to know the real Sharia, we have to be able to point to passages in the holy Qur'an and say, 'Here, read this,' " Salim said. "In Islamic history, men have been the boss. They want to be the boss forever. That's why they never want women to appear in public, but that is not Islam; that is cultural tradition." The notion of Islam as a pillar of freedom came from Salim's mother.

"My mother didn't have any sons, and so my father took a second wife, and it made her extremely sad and it made her life very hard," Salim said. "She told me, 'Unless you can have enough education, you can never stand against men. You must learn Islam so you can struggle against them.'"

During the Taliban era, Salim began to teach the Qur'an. Once a week, 70 women would gather for classes -- sometimes at her house, sometimes elsewhere, so the Taliban would not become suspicious.
"l would cook something, as if we were just gathering for a meal, and then we would recite the holy Qur'an and discuss Islamic questions and then political issues," she recalled.

After the Taliban fled, Salim ran for Parliament. But she understood that she would need the mullahs behind her, and when she was elected, she asked them whether she could address families in the mosque. Her appeal opened the door for women to enter there. In her district, women never had; they prayed at home.

"It was the first time that women saw the inside of the mosque," she said. Then, with the mullahs' assent, she asked the families to send their daughters to school.

Other women have reached similar conclusions: that if they are to persuade men to stand behind them, they will need mullahs as allies and Islam as a shield.

Jalal, the former women's minister, has convened meetings of mullahs to discuss Qur'anic interpretations of women's rights. A meeting last summer in Kabul drew 100 mullahs from around the country. Jalal also has asked new "women's councils" to work closely with local mullahs. So far, the councils are active primarily in Kabul and on its outskirts.

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Softly, softly in the Taliban's den

Kabul, Feb 9 : In five years, US military might, from daisy-cutter bombs to high-tech weaponry, could not smoke out the Taliban, who retreated to the mountains of Afghanistan after being forced from power in 2001.

They emerged last year of their own volition after being welcomed back into the community by various tribal groups, many of which are ready to join in a mass uprising planned for the spring.

Seasoned British officers assigned in southern Afghanistan to clean up the mess created by the Americans can sense that big trouble is simmering, but they are convinced that any aggressive policy will aggravate the situation.

They realize that they have to accept the Taliban's existence as a reality, strike peace deals with them and allow them into the political power-sharing apparatus. This, they argue, can be done through extensive reconstruction, which is the only way to isolate hardline insurgents. Military might, therefore, is to be used only for the security of the people, not for aggressive armed campaigns.

In southwestern Afghanistan, the city of Kandahar and its environs are the Taliban's main focus. However, their main strategic back yard is Helmand province, from where they raise human and material resources with money flowing from poppy cultivation. In the spring, Helmand will be the main engine for the Taliban's planned capture of Kandahar and the proposed push to Kabul.

Helmand, understandably, has in recent months been the center of the International Security Assistance Force's (ISAF's) operations, with heavy US bombings and frequent engagements between the Taliban and British ground troops.

All the same, the Taliban claim that of 17 districts in the province, they are now in control of 13, either partially or completely. The deputy British Task Force commander of Helmand province, Colonel Ian Huntley, dismisses this claim. In an interview with Asia Times Online, however, he did agree that the Taliban had secured some pockets of Helmand.

In response, the ISAF is redefining its approach, ranging from a "definition of the enemy" to the role of foreign forces in society.

"There is no military solution to the insurgency," said Nic Kay, the British regional coordinator for southern Afghanistan. Kay is a seasoned official of the Foreign Commonwealth Office (FCO) and heads all operations in Helmand province. He previously served in Pakistan and Afghanistan, besides serving as a senior desk officer handling Afghanistan and Pakistan in the FCO.

"It would be a blunder if we assess the situation with a single-track mind. We need to appreciate the fact that 'Taliban' is a generic name and there are a whole lot of reasons behind the support for the Taliban in southwestern Afghanistan," Kay told Asia Times Online in his newly built office at the British task force camp in Lashkar Gah, Helmand province.

"One of the reasons for Taliban support is loyalty to local commanders, and the sense at the moment is one of injustice, poor governance, corruption and general incompetence. Once we tackle these problems, it will be easy for us to find solutions," Kay said.

"We have conducted research, which does not have any scientific basis but it is based on our feelings. After talking to the people, we believe there are two types of Taliban - one reconcilable and the other irreconcilable. The reconcilable Taliban are about 80%, and they are disgruntled because of bad governance and corruption. The irreconcilable Taliban are those who are ideologically motivated and loyal to their command structures. They are hardly 20%. We need to carefully assess both trends separately and deal with the situation accordingly," Kay said.

In a related move, the governor of Helmand province has been replaced by Asadullah Wafa, a former royalist and expert on tribal affairs. His task is to revive tribal structures destroyed by warlords and later by the Taliban.

District shuras (councils) have been established across the province to make contact with the Taliban. The traditional structures of tribal elders and mullahs are part of the shuras, which to date have struck peace deals in Sangeen and Nawzad districts. A peace agreement in Musa Qala was secured some months ago.

"These peace agreements are actually a blessing for the people of Helmand province as they have got rid of the fighting. In the meantime, it allows us to address people's concerns, like law and order and development work," said Kay.

"For instance, three weeks ago the Afghan Auxiliary Police were deployed in Musa Qala. The police have been stationed for the protection of specific development projects like the National Solidarity Program, which is being undertaken by the Bangladeshi NGO [non-governmental organization] BRAC [Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee]. This includes the construction of new mosques and schools, and in the meantime, with the help of the shura, we have make sure that the Taliban do not disrupt these development works," Kay said.

Kay acknowledged that despite the peace agreements, the Taliban still move around relatively freely and that the shuras themselves comprise pro-Taliban people. But Kay is confident that as long as all the protocols of the agreements are implemented, gradually the writ of the Afghan government will become stronger and the hardline Taliban will be isolated.

Huntley reiterated: "Our whole counterinsurgency approach rotates around rebuilding, reconstruction and providing security. We do not aim to chase the Taliban in the population.

"In December, in Operation Baaz Tsuka, we cleared Taliban pockets around Highway 1, which is the main artery for the supplies of UK troops between Kandahar and Camp Bastion, Helmand. In addition, we aim to provide security at the Kajaki dam project [near the source of the Helmand River]. The dam will generate 500 megawatts of hydroelectric power. We conducted an operation in the north of Helmand to provide security to the whole infrastructure of dam and the transmission routes and cleared the area of insurgents," Huntley said.

The British task force in Helmand is clearly taking careful steps not to challenge the Taliban directly, but through invoking tribal structures to isolate them, and through measures such as permanent vehicle control points, which limit their movements.

These are practical steps, but some feel it might be a case of too little too late. "Had our plans been implemented two years ago, the situation now would be diametrically opposite," commented a junior official of the FCO on condition of anonymity. "We have just started our plans, and the Taliban have already reinforced their positions and geared up for their massive spring offensive. I am afraid we missed the boat."

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Japan airlines replaced 787 batteries many times

Tokyo, Feb 9 : All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines said they replaced lithium-ion batteries in their Boeing 787 Dreamliners on multiple occasions before a battery overheating incident led to the worldwide grounding of the jets.

ANA said it replaced batteries on its 787 aircraft some 10 times because they failed to charge properly or showed other problems, and informed Boeing about the swaps. Japan Airlines said it had also replaced lithium-ion batteries on its 787 jets but couldn't immediately give details.

All 50 of the Boeing 787s in use around the world were grounded after an ANA flight on Jan. 16 made an emergency landing in Japan when its main battery overheated. Earlier in January, a battery in a Japan Airlines 787 caught fire while parked at Boston's Logan International Airport. Lithium-ion batteries are prone to overheating and require additional safeguards to prevent fires.

ANA spokeswoman Megumi Tezuka said the airline was not required to report the battery replacements to Japan's Transport Ministry because they did not interfere with flights and did not raise safety concerns. She said that having to replace batteries on aircraft is not uncommon and that it was not considered out of the ordinary.

Laura Brown, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman, said in Washington that the agency was checking whether the previous battery incidents had been reported by Boeing.

With 17 of the jets, ANA was Boeing's launch customer for the technologically advanced airliner. The airline has had to cancel hundreds of flights, affecting tens of thousands of people, but has sought to minimize disruptions by switching to other aircraft as much as possible.

The battery problems experienced by ANA before the emergency landing were first reported by The New York Times.

Japanese and U.S. investigators looking into the Boeing 787's battery problems shifted their attention this week from the battery-maker, GS Yuasa of Kyoto, Japan, to the manufacturer of a monitoring system. That company, Kanto Aircraft Instrument Co. makes a system that monitors voltage, charging and temperature of the lithium-ion batteries.

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said it was conducting a chemical analysis of internal short circuiting and thermal damage of the battery that caught fire in Boston.

The probe is also analyzing data from flight data recorders on the aircraft, the NTSB said in a statement on its website.

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Belafonte: Blacks should participate in gun debate

Providence, Feb 9: Singer, actor and civil rights activist Harry Belafonte urged leaders in the black community to get more involved in the national debate on guns.

Belafonte said that the current discussion arising out of the Connecticut school massacre in December often ignores decades of urban gun violence. He said it's important that African-American leaders participate in the debate over gun control.

"What really concerns me is the ingredients of the discourse," he said. "The African-American community ... where is that community? Where is that voice? I think the black community, the black leadership need to stir it up."

The 85-year-old Belafonte made his comments during a visit to the Rhode Island School of Design, where he delivered an address on his life as an artist and activist. He urged the 550 people in attendance to embrace "radical thoughts" for solving poverty, inequality, violence and greed.

"What I find missing mostly in the American discourse is the rejection of radical thought," he said. "They (national leaders) speak within the same dull space they inherited from past oppressors."

Belafonte was called "The King of Calypso" for bringing Caribbean music to a global audience. He was also a key figure in the civil rights movement, giving financial support to Martin Luther King Jr. and funding organizations like the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. He was an organizer of the 1963 March on Washington.

More recently, Belafonte has worked on efforts to fight poverty and AIDS and was a vocal critic of former President George W. Bush. He again criticized the former president, saying Bush led a "regime that stole an election" and led the nation to war in Iraq without justification.

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Virginia considers dropping ban on unmarried couples cohabitating

New York, Feb 9 : Like its travel slogan says, Virginia is for lovers. But if said lovers are cohabitating outside marriage, they are currently breaking the law.

But there’s good news for those lawless lovebirds: State officials in the commonwealth are considering a bill that would legalize cohabitation.

Florida, Michigan and Mississippi have similar laws banning cohabitation.

In 2011, a Florida lawmaker attempted to revoke the Sunshine State law, which carries a penalty of $500 or up to 60 days in jail.

As the Washington Post reports, a Virginia law dating to the 1800s states that it is illegal for “any persons, not married to each other, [to] lewdly and lasciviously associate and cohabit together,” though officials say the law has not been enforced for decades.

However, as recently as the 1990s, prosecutors attempted to use the law to take away a day care license from a childcare provider.

Darlene K. Davis, 73, told the Post a state inspector attempted to take away her day care license after learning that Davis had been living with her boyfriend for 16 years. “She said, ‘You live in sin,’” Davis said.

Still, state Sen. Adam Ebbin and Delegate Scott Surovell, both Democrats, say they plan to leave one part of the 19th-century law in place: a provision banning sex in public places.

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Brazil police: Outdoor flare started club fire

Santa Maria, Feb 9 : Penny-pinching by a band known for its onstage pyrotechnic displays may have cost more than 230 people their lives at a nightclub in southern Brazil, according to a police inspector leading the investigation into this weekend's deadly blaze.

Inspector Marcelo Arigony told reporters at a news conference that members of the band knowingly purchased flares meant for outdoor use because they cost a mere $1.25 a piece, compared with the $35 price tag for an indoor flare.

"The flare lit was for outdoor use only, and the people who lit them know that," said Arigony, adding that members of the group acknowledged regularly opting for the less expensive flares. "They chose to buy those because they were cheaper than those that can be used indoors."

Arigony, whose cousin died in the fire, added: "The pyrotechnics were part of their show — the guys even wore gloves onstage so they wouldn't burn their hands."

The repercussions of the band's choice to use flares continued to send shock waves through Santa Maria, a college town of 260,000 people that's been stunned by the tragedy in the Kiss nightclub.

The Rio Grande do Sul state forensics department raised the death toll from 231 to 234 to account for three victims who did not appear on the original list of the dead. Authorities say more than 120 people remain hospitalized for smoke inhalation and burns, with dozens of them in critical condition.

The blaze began at around 2:30 am local time, during a performance by Gurizada Fandangueira, a country music band that had made the use of pyrotechnics a trademark of their shows. The band's guitarist told media that the 615 square-meter (6,650-square-foot) club was packed with an estimated 1,200 to 1,300 people. The police have said the capacity for a club of that size is under 700 people.

Police said the club's ceiling was covered with insulating foam made from a combustible material that appeared to have ignited after it came in contact with a spark from a flare lit during the performance.

After the fire extinguisher malfunctioned, the blaze spread throughout the packed club at lightning speed, emitting a thick, toxic smoke. Because Kiss apparently had neither an alarm nor a sprinkler system and only one working exit, the crowd was left to search desperately for a way out.

About 50 of the victims were found in the club's two bathrooms, where the blinding smoke caused them to believe the doors were exits.

Police investigator Arigony said people headed to the bathrooms because the only lights in the dark club were coming from there, and the patrons mistook them for exits. The foam, which emitted a toxic gas, was not proper soundproofing equipment and was likely only used to cut down on the echo inside the club, Arigony said.

He added that a full analysis of the foam was ongoing. The malfunctioning fire extinguisher was not legal, he said, and the club's operating license had expired in August.

"There were diverse irregularities," Arigony said. "Any child could have seen that this establishment should not have been open."

Outraged locals, mostly young people like those who died in the blaze, marched through Santa Maria to demand justice for the dead, an unusual move in a country where public protests are rare. The demonstration interrupted the police news conference, even as Arigony pledged to investigate everyone involved in the tragedy — including the authorities charged with making sure such establishments are up to code, such as firefighters and city officials.

"There could have been an administrative failure in the mayor's office or with the firefighters," he said. "We have no proof, but we will investigate, we will look into everything."

No charges have been filed. Under Brazilian law, prosecutors can only file charges after police complete their investigation, which in this case could take 30 days. Prosecutors have said manslaughter charges could be filed.

The fire inspired nationwide action, and several mayors said they would crack down on nightclubs and other venues in their cities.

The government of the country's biggest city, Sao Paulo, promised tougher security regulations for nightclubs and other places where many people gather. The mayor of the city of Americana, Sao Paulo state, ordered the temporary shutdown of 10 of the city's nightclubs. Mayor Diego de Nadai suspended the operating permits of the nightclubs pending inspections into the fire and accident prevention measures in place, local media reported.

The Folha de S. Paulo newspaper reported that in Manaus, nightclubs with empty fire extinguishers and unmarked emergency exits have been shut down and fined. And in Rio de Janeiro, a consumer complaint hotline has received more than 60 calls since the tragedy denouncing hazardous conditions at night spots, theaters, supermarkets, schools, hospitals and shopping malls around the state. Blocked emergency exits and nonexistent fire alarms and extinguishers top the list of most common complaints.

Brazil's O Globo newspaper reported on its website that the mayor's office in Santa Maria ordered all nightclubs closed for 30 days while inspections are carried out. In Brasilia, the nation's capital, lawmakers in the lower house worked on a proposal that would require federal safety minimum standards across Brazil — now, states individually create such laws.

Investigator Arigony said police searched two other Santa Maria nightspots owned by Mauro Hoffmann, one of the partners of the Kiss nightclub, for evidence that could help shed light on the investigation.

Police said earlier that computers that had stored footage from security cameras inside the club were missing — but Arigony said police had found them at a computer repair shop, where they were dropped off a week ago, meaning images from the disaster would not be on them. Owners of the club told police the security cameras hadn't worked in months.

Both owners of the club were provisionally detained, along with two of the band members. A judge froze the assets of the club's owners, pending the investigation.

The fire appeared to mark a possible turning point for a country that has long turned a blind eye to safety and infrastructure concerns. The disaster, the worst fire of its kind in more than a decade, has also raised questions of whether Brazilian authorities are up to the task of ensuring safety in such venues as the country prepares to host next year's World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.

O Globo published an editorial saying it was time for action.

"The tragedy in Santa Maria forces us to seriously reflect over our national culture of leniency, contempt and corruption," it said. "We must start from the principle that the mea culpa belongs to us all: public servants, owners of establishments that disregard safety regulations, and regular citizens who flout them."

Soccer legend Pele, too, urged the Brazilian government to "make safety and security a priority in this country."

"So many young people are no longer with us, they had entire lives ahead of them. I ask God to protect them and take care of their families," he wrote on Twitter.

According to state safety codes here, clubs should have one fire extinguisher every 1,500 square feet as well as multiple emergency exits. Limits on the number of people admitted are to be strictly respected. None of that appears to have happened at the Santa Maria nightclub.

Rodrigo Martins, a guitarist for the group playing that night, told Globo TV network in an interview that the flames broke out minutes after the employment of a pyrotechnic machine that fans out colored sparks.

"I thought I was going to die there," Martins said. "There was nothing I could do, with the fire spreading and people screaming in front."

Most of the dead were college students 18 to 21 years old, but they also included some minors. Almost all died from smoke inhalation rather than burns.

The blaze was the deadliest in Brazil since at least 1961, when a fire that swept through a circus killed 503 people in Niteroi, Rio de Janeiro.

The fire also appeared to be the worst at a nightclub anywhere in the world since December 2000, when a welding accident reportedly set off a fire at a club in Luoyang, China, killing 309 people.


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Britain Blanketed by snow in new satellite image

London, Feb 9 : Unusually frigid and snowy conditions blanketed much of the island of Great Britain in snow earlier this month. The winter wonderland was spotted from above by NASA's Terra satellite.

The snow started falling mid-month when a storm system blowing in from over the North Atlantic combined with unusually chilly conditions ushered in by a pattern called the Scandinavian Block, according to Accuweather.com. This high-pressure pattern sits in place over Scandinavia and funnels cold air toward the United Kingdom from over the Baltic and western Russia, according to the U.K. Met Office.

As of the afternoon of Jan. 21, Redesdale Camp, Scotland, was the nation's leader in snowfall, with 11 inches (29 centimeters), Accuweather reported. Earlier Accuweather reports said 8 inches (20 cm) had fallen in Sennybridge, Wales, and 6 inches (15 cm) in Dunkeswell, in the southwest of England. The snows closed many schools and forced flight cancellations and delays at London's Heathrow Airport.

Snow is a relatively uncommon sight, particularly in the southern parts of Great Britain, as the flow of the Gulf Stream funnels warm waters toward the islands, influencing the atmosphere and making conditions there milder than might be expected for the island's northerly latitudes.

Met Office records show that the U.K. sees about 33 snow days per year, based on 1971-2000 averages, though most of this falls on higher ground where temperatures are colder. And not all of that snow even settles on the ground, with the U.K. seeing only about 16.5 days a year of snow on the ground. Scotland, situated at higher latitudes, sees a higher average, with about 52 days of snow or sleet in a given year and 27.7 days of snow on the ground, the Met Office says. It lists the snowiest place in the U.K. is Banffshire, a county in the northeastern part of Scotland, which has a yearly average of 63.8 days of snow or sleet. (At the other extreme is Cornwall, which has an average of 10.2 days of snow or sleet.)

The snowiest winter of the 20th century for the U.K. was that of 1947, the Met Office says, when snow fell every day somewhere in the country between Jan. 22 and March 17.

Since the snows came earlier this month, temperatures have gotten milder and precipitation has fallen in the form of rain, at least in the southern parts of the island. Skies had largely cleared when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra satellite snapped its picture of Great Britain, the NASA Earth Observatory noted, though a few remained over the western part of the island.

Southern parts of the island are currently threatened by flooding from heavy rains, with some higher elevations possibly seeing strong wind gusts, the Guardian reports.

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Mexico breaks up alleged border sex-slavery cult

Mexico City, Feb 9 : Mexican officials broke up a bizarre cult that allegedly ran a sex-slavery ring among its followers on the U.S. border, Mexican immigration authorities said.

The "Defensores de Cristo" or "Defenders of Christ" allegedly recruited women to have sex with a Spanish man who claimed he was the reincarnation of Christ, according to an institute official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak publicly about the case.

Followers were subjected to forced labor or sexual services, including prostitution, according to a victims' advocacy group that said it filed a complaint more than a year ago about the cult.

Federal police, agents of Mexico's National Immigration Institute and prosecutors raided a house earlier this week near Nuevo Laredo, across the border from Laredo, Texas, and found cult members, including children, living in filthy conditions, according to an institute official.

The institute in a statement said 14 foreigners were detained in the raid and have been turned over to prosecutors, pending possible charges.

Those detained include six Spaniards, and two people each from Brazil, Bolivia and Venezuela. One person from Argentina and one from Ecuador were also detained. Spain's Foreign Affairs Ministry confirmed its citizens were among those arrested.

The institute said 10 Mexicans were also found at the house, mainly women, and are presumably among the victims of the cult.

The Attorney General's Office said the investigation was still under way as to what charges, if any, might apply in the case. Given the binds of sect loyalty that had been built over an estimated three years, prosecutors were still trying to work out which of the detainees may be considered victims, and which were abusers.

The institute statement said the sect's leaders made members pay "tithes," with money or forced labor.

The institute said in a statement that the Defenders of Christ was headed by Venezuelan citizen Jose Arenas Losanger Segovia.

But according to the cult's website, the leader was Spaniard Ignacio Gonzalez de Arriba. He set up shop in Mexico about three years ago, after a stint in Brazil and other parts of South America, said Myrna Garcia, an activist with the Support Network for Cult Victims who has worked with victims of the Defenders of Christ cult.

He became involved in offering courses on "bio-programming," an esoteric practice that claims to allow practicants to "reprogram" their brains to eliminate pain, suffering and anxiety, according to institute.

Neither Gonzalez de Arriba nor Losanger Segovia could be reached for comment. A number listed in an advertisement for the "bio-programming" courses was disconnected. It was not clear if they were among those detained.

The cult thrived in an area of Mexico that is tightly controlled by the violent Zetas drug cartel.

The Interior Department said the Defenders of Christ had not registered as a religious group, as required under Mexican law. Garcia said cells of the cult might still be active in Peru and Argentina.


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NTSB takes microscopes to damaged Boeing 787 battery

Washington, Feb 9: The National Transportation Safety Board said it was carrying out a detailed, microscopic investigation of a battery that caught fire on a Boeing Co (BA) 787 Dreamliner in Boston this month as the probe dragged into a fourth week.

All 50 Boeing Dreamliners remain grounded around the world, as the U.S., Japanese and French governments continue to investigate that fire and a separate battery-related incident that forced another 787 to make an emergency landing in Japan.

The NTSB said experts at the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center laboratories were looking at a second, undamaged lithium-ion battery pulled from the same Japan Airlines plane that caught fire in Boston for signs of in-service damage and manufacturing defects. Both batteries were built by GS Yuasa, a Japanese company.

At the same time, Boeing was giving investigators relevant fleet information about its 787 airliners, which would help investigators understand the operating history of lithium-ion batteries on those airplanes, the NTSB said.

U.S., Japanese and French safety inspectors - aided by industry officials - have been trying to determine what caused the battery fire on the 787 in Boston and a separate smoke incident that forced the other 787 to make an emergency landing in Japan the following week.

After weeks of investigative work in Japan and various sites in the United States, officials still do not have any answers, raising concerns that Boeing and the airlines that operate the world's newest airliner will face a bigger-than-expected financial hit while it remains grounded.

The NTSB's latest update on the 787 investigation came hours after U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced he planned to resign, marking the latest departure from President Barack Obama's Cabinet.

Boeing's shares closed 0.5 percent lower at $73.65 on the New York Stock Exchange. Investors are looking for news about how long the probe will take when Boeing reports its fourth quarter earnings.

A one-month delay in 787 deliveries could cost Boeing $1.2 billion in revenue this year, said Zafar Khan, an analyst at Society Generale. He has a "sell" rating on the stock.

Neither the NTSB, nor the Federal Aviation Administration, which is looking at a broader range of problems with the 787, have set timetables for completing their work.

The NTSB said its work on the damaged battery from the Boston incident, part of an auxiliary power system, had transitioned from macroscopic to microscopic examinations and also included chemical and elemental analysis of the areas of internal short circuiting and thermal damage.

The undamaged battery being examined by U.S. Navy experts provides backup power for important flight controls on the 787. They are using mechanical and electrical tests to determine the performance of the battery, and to find signs of any degradation in expected performance, the NTSB said.

Other investigators were looking at data from the two digital flight data recorders on the aircraft for any further clues about the performance of the battery and the operation of the charging system, which was built by Securaplane, a unit of Britain's Meggitt Plc (MGGT.L).

Investigations are also continuing in Seattle, where Boeing builds the planes, and in Japan.

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JPMorgan bet against itself in "Whale" trade

New York, Feb 9 : There is a new twist in the London Whale trading scandal that cost JPMorgan Chase $6.2 billion in trading losses last year. Some of the firm's own traders bet against the very derivatives positions placed by its chief investment office, said three people familiar with the matter.

The U.S. Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations, which launched an inquiry into the trading loss last fall, is looking into the how different divisions of the bank wound up on opposite sides of the same trade, said one of the people familiar with the matter.

The committee is expected to release a report on its investigation in the next few weeks.

The people familiar with the situation did not comment on the dollar value of the opposing trades placed by JPMorgan Chase & Co's (JPM) investment bank traders, which was much smaller than the total positions put on by the CIO.

The intra-bank trading was not mentioned in a 129-page report JPMorgan released on January 16, which chronicled some of the bank's risk management failures. The scandal has led to a number of management changes at JPMorgan and has sullied CEO Jamie Dimon's image as a hands-on risk manager.

Kristin Lemkau, a spokeswoman for JPMorgan, declined to comment on the investment bank's trading positions.

A spokeswoman for the Senate committee, led by Michigan Sen. Carl Levin, a Democrat, declined to comment on its investigation.

It was widely known that a group of about eight credit-focused hedge funds, such as BlueMountain Capital Management and Saba Capital Management, were on the other side of the trades that JPMorgan's London-based Whale team made on an index tied to corporate default rates. But the role JPMorgan's own investment bank may have played in the messy unwinding of the derivatives trade has not come out until now.

One of the three people familiar with the matter claimed that JPMorgan managers discussed merging the two sets of trades in an attempt to offset some of the CIO's losses. Those talks ended about a month before Bloomberg News first reported the CIO trades on April 5 last year, the source said.

JPMorgan's Lemkau said that this "never came up in our exhaustive internal investigation."

Last July, the bank fired the three London-based traders in the CIO most closely tied to the trading, including Bruno Iksil, dubbed the London Whale by hedge fund traders because of the size of the trades he placed for the CIO.

Two people familiar with Iksil and his boss, Javier Martin-Artajo, said the two CIO employees complained about the investment bank's actions in the spring of 2012, accusing its traders of deliberately trying to move the market against the CIO by leaking information on its position to hedge funds. Iksil made his complaint to a member of JPMorgan's compliance department, one of the people said.

But those same sources said they had not seen any evidence to support that claim and JPMorgan's Lemkau declined to comment on the allegation.

Martin-Artajo's lawyer did not respond to a request for comment. A lawyer for Bruno Iksil declined to comment.

It is not clear when the investment bank traders and the London Whale team became aware they were taking opposing sides on a trade that involved index linked to credit default swaps sold on corporate debt.

JPMorgan's internal report did note that, in deciding how to handle the CIO trades, JPMorgan eventually applied a valuation methodology from the investment bank and not the one the chief investment officer had been using.

Federal authorities are currently investigating whether some employees in the CIO deliberately used misleading valuations to try to conceal some of the losses.

It is not uncommon for large banks to hold opposing positions in the same market. That is sometimes done as a way of hedging a position or because different trading desks formulate opposing views about a trade.

Still, the revelation that the bank was taking two sides on the same trade also is likely to rekindle the debate about whether banks such as JPMorgan Chase are too big to manage and should be scaled back.

"The big banks have always had a habit of pitting people in the bank against each other," said Charles Geisst, a finance professor at Manhattan College and a former banker. "When it's discovered it's not taken well."

A group of JPMorgan shareholders led by the AFL-CIO labor federation is pushing for a vote at JPMorgan's annual shareholders meeting this spring on reducing it's overall size by spinning off one or more of its businesses. They cite the big trading losses in the London Whale scandal as evidence the bank is too big to manage.

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Treasury needs exit plan for Ally Financial: Watchdog

New York, Feb 9 : The U.S. Treasury needs to develop a concrete plan for exiting its 74 percent stake in auto lender Ally Financial Inc, the second-largest remaining recipient of federal bailout dollars, an internal watchdog said in a report released.

The agency, however, must exercise "great care and coordination" with the U.S. Federal Reserve in planning its exit to make sure Ally maintains a viable presence as a lender to the U.S. auto industry, said the watchdog, the special inspector general for the U.S. government's bailout program.

Starting in 2008, the government pumped $17.2 billion into the Detroit-based lender, then known as GMAC, to keep financing available to the auto industry, which was receiving its own bailout. Unlike General Motors (GM) and Chrysler (FIA.M), however, the Treasury didn't require GMAC to produce a plan for dealing with its liabilities, particularly toxic subprime mortgage loans that were piling up losses.

"Treasury missed an opportunity to address GMAC's mortgage issues, thereby better protecting the taxpayers' investment and promoting GMAC's financial stability," the report said.

In March 2011, Ally, the one-time in-house lending unit for GM, filed for an initial public stock offering that would have allowed the Treasury to sell some of its stock, but the plan was later shelved. In May, Ally's Residential Capital mortgage unit filed for bankruptcy, and the lender launched a plan to sell international operations to speed up taxpayer repayment.

Ally still owes taxpayers $14.6 billion, according to the inspector general.

In a letter responding to the report, Timothy Massad, assistant Treasury secretary for financial stability, defended the agency's actions during the financial crisis and said it does have a strategy for exiting its Ally investment. After the ResCap bankruptcy is completed and the international sales are completed, Treasury can either sell its stock or sell more Ally assets, Massad wrote.

In an interview, Special Inspector General Christy Romero said Treasury's plan is not concrete enough.

"What Treasury has talked to us about is options," Romero said. "Those are options that exist anytime Treasury has an investment. That is not an exit plan."

Ally is the largest recipient of Troubled Asset Relief Program bailout dollars without a clear path for repaying the Treasury.

The Treasury has said that so far it has recovered 93 percent of the $418 billion disbursed through TARP. Last month, the agency said it plans to sell its remaining stock in GM, its largest remaining investment, over the next year or so. In the same month, it sold its final shares of insurer American International Group Inc (AIG).

Ally's exit is complicated by the fact that it has failed Federal Reserve stress tests that determine if large banks would maintain sufficient capital under severe economic scenarios. The next round of stress tests will be made public in March.

"Treasury has to exercise great care to exit Ally out of TARP in a way that promotes financial stability not just in Ally but in the auto industry," Romero said.

In a report released, the inspector general found Treasury failed to curb executive pay at companies rescued with taxpayer funds, including Ally.

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Chesapeake CEO McClendon steps down after year of tumult

New York, Feb 9  : Chesapeake Energy Corp said that Aubrey McClendon will step down as chief executive after a tumultuous year in which a series of investigations triggered civil and criminal probes of the second-largest U.S. natural gas producer.

News of the executive's plan to depart on April 1 boosted the company's shares by 9 percent. The stock has made a partial recovery since losing almost half its value last spring after a report opened the company and its co-founder up to intense scrutiny.

Federal regulators and Chesapeake's board are both looking into whether McClendon, 53, blurred the line between his personal dealings and those of the company, and into possible antitrust violations. Big shareholders took control of the board in June after he was stripped of his title as chairman of the company he cofounded in 1989.

The internal deliberations that led to McClendon's departure remain unclear. The findings of the board's probe will be released next month, but Chesapeake said in a statement that the review has "to date found no improper conduct."

"I think that the controversy, governance and other issues that have been pulled up have caused lots of questions about him," said David Larcker, professor of accounting at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business. "This was just sucking up so much time, it had to be a reasonable decision to change management."

Chairman Archie Dunham was not available to comment. The former head of ConocoPhillips was brought in to quell the shareholder revolt.

In an email to employees, McClendon put his departure down to "philosophical differences" with the board, but assured them: "The separation will be amicable and smooth."

Despite a history of McClendon's perks and corporate benefits creating controversy among shareholders, he will leave Chesapeake with a lavish package. The company said he "will receive his full compensation and other benefits to which he is entitled."

A person familiar with the terms of McClendon's departure said it was being treated as "termination without cause," entitling the CEO to some of the most generous benefits laid out in an employment contract that details a wide range of severance scenarios.

McClendon is entitled to total compensation of about $47 million (29.8 million pounds). That figure includes $11.7 million in total cash compensation based on McClendon's salary and bonus, which will be paid out over a period of four years. It also includes restricted stock awards already given to McClendon that have a value of $33.5 million, the person familiar with the compensation package said.

He is also entitled to deferred compensation of about $800,000 and personal use of corporate jets that could be worth up to $1 million over four years, the person said.

Chesapeake's board recently cut McClendon's pay package and gave him no bonus for 2012.

As head of a company that bet big on natural gas, McClendon played a key role in promoting the hydraulic fracturing technology that unlocked the huge U.S. supplies in shale formations that are now depressing prices.

News of his departure comes just over two weeks after Encana Corp CEO Randy Eresman said he would step down immediately.

Last June, media reported that Chesapeake plotted with Encana, its top competitor, to suppress land prices in the Collingwood shale formation in Northern Michigan, a matter that is the subject of investigations by both the state of Michigan and the Department of Justice.

That followed investigation in April which found McClendon had arranged to personally borrow more than $1 billion from EIG Global Energy Partners, a firm that also is a big investor in Chesapeake.

The loans, arranged through McClendon's personal shell companies, were secured by his interest in company wells. McClendon is allowed to take up to a 2.5 percent stake in every well Chesapeake drills under a controversial program called the Founders Well Participation Program (FWPP).

"The empire that he built was based on far higher gas prices, both for Chesapeake and for him through the Founder Well Participation Program. So given that outlook, it's not a surprise he is stepping down," said Mark Hanson, an oil and gas analyst at Morningstar Inc in Chicago.

"At the end of the day, it's no longer the company that it once was. The board is really not with him these days. If you have done things a certain way for 23 years and then all of a sudden things change as radically as they have in the last six months, it's hard to get used to."

Hefty spending on oil and gas acreage in the nation's shale formations and a prolonged period of low natural gas prices have left Chesapeake saddled with debt and a funding shortfall.

Chesapeake sold or agreed to sell about $12 billion in oil and gas properties last year. In 2013, it plans to sell up to $7 billion to fill a spending gap that JPMorgan estimates at $5.5 billion.

In early May, after another investigation revealed that McClendon had partially owned and helped run a secretive $200 million hedge fund to trade in the same commodities Chesapeake produces, Florida Senator Bill Nelson urged the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate potential market manipulation or fraud by the CEO.

An aide to Senator Nelson said he was not immediately available for comment on McClendon's pending departure.

Major investors Carl Icahn, who now has a Chesapeake stake of nearly 9 percent, and Mason Hawkins, with 13.5 percent, took control of the nine-member board last June.

In a statement issued about a half-hour after the news of the departure, Icahn said he believed history would prove McClendon was right about the ultimate value of natural gas and praised the assets assembled by the former CEO.

"While it is known that some of these assets will be sold by the company in due course, I do not believe that this will in any way effect the ultimate realization of Chesapeake's potential," Icahn said.

Chesapeake has been forced to sell billions of dollars worth of acreage, but Dunham said in a memo to employees that "the company is not for sale."

Chesapeake shares rose to $20.69 in post-market trading, up from a New York Stock Exchange close of $18.97. The stock is down from highs just above $26 last March, which came before natural gas prices tumbled to decade lows and McClendon became an object of so much negative publicity.

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Fed seen maintaining bond-buying, but divisions remain

Washington, Feb 9 : The Federal Reserve is expected to keep monetary policy on a steady path when it concludes a two-day meeting, though behind the scenes intensive debate continues over when the controversial bond-buying program should be curtailed.

The policy statement issued by the U.S. central bank at the end of the meeting will likely be only slightly rephrased from its meeting in December to reflect minor changes in the economic outlook, notably reduced risks from financial turmoil in Europe

Otherwise, economists say the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee will maintain asset buying at $85 billion a month and retain the commitment to hold interest rates near zero percent until the unemployment rate falls to 6.5 percent, provided inflation does not threaten to breach 2.5 percent.

The Fed has taken unprecedented steps to try to spark a stronger economic recovery and drive down unemployment. It has kept overnight interest rates near zero since late 2008 and has launched three rounds of bond purchases, known as quantitative easing, to drive other borrowing costs down.

Recent data has been consistent with a gradual improvement in the economy, although the government's monthly labor market report, to be released, is expected to show the jobless rate remained stuck at 7.8 percent in January.

"The FOMC is expected to tweak the description of the state of the economy but announce no new policy measures," Morgan Stanley economist David Greenlaw wrote in a note to clients.

To get a sense of what likely will be a lively discussion on how the Federal Reserve should communicate about the future of its current securities purchase program, dubbed QE3, investors will have to wait three weeks for the release of the meeting's minutes.

Critics warn that the bond buying, which has tripled the Fed's balance sheet to almost $3 trillion since 2008, might stoke inflation or trigger an asset bubble that could tip the economy back into recession when it bursts.

Some policymakers advocate adopting set levels of certain economic variables that would signal when the central bank thinks the time is ripe to stop the purchases, much like the "thresholds" it has adopted to help guide the market's understanding of when interest rates are finally likely to rise.

An unexpected halt in the buying, which accounts for a considerable part of the demand for U.S. Treasury debt, could send long-term borrowing costs shooting up and damage the recovery.

The president of the Boston Federal Reserve Bank, Eric Rosengren, has led the charge for bond-buying thresholds, arguing the central bank should continue the purchases until unemployment falls under 7.25 percent.

Other officials think differently, and it may take months to build a consensus -- if one can even be built.

Since September, when it launched QE3, the Fed has said it would buy bonds until it saw a substantial improvement in the outlook for the labor market -- a mark many analysts think won't be reached this year.

More than half of 41 economists polled earlier this month expect purchases to continue into 2014.

"They have to see a substantial improvement in the labor market, and they don't forecast one this year," said Stephen Oliner, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington.

But minutes of the Fed's December meeting, released early this month, showed a few policymakers thought the program should be halted by the mid-2013, surprising financial markets.

As the first meeting of the year, four voting seats on the policy panel will change hands.

The new voters are Esther George, the Kansas City Fed president; Boston's Rosengren; James Bullard, the St. Louis Fed president; and Chicago Fed President Charles Evans.

George is viewed as a clear hawk and the most likely to dissent against maintaining the bond purchases, while Evans and Rosengren are expected to vote in favor. Bullard's recent comments have been hawkish, but he has not sounded sufficiently uncomfortable with current policy to dissent at this stage.

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U.S. growth seen braking as inventories, government weigh

Washington, Feb 9: The U.S. economy likely grew at its slowest pace in nearly two years in the fourth quarter as businesses added less stock to their warehouses and government spending fizzled, setting it up for a difficult start in 2013.

Gross domestic product probably expanded at a 1.1 percent annual rate, braking sharply from a 3.1 percent clip in the third quarter, according to a poll of economists.

That would mark the weakest growth pace since the first quarter of 2011 and it would show the economy entering the new year with little momentum.

However, an anticipated pick-up in consumer spending and a rebound in business investment should give the recovery a fighting chance even as Washington tightens its belt.

"The fact that GDP could come in above 1 percent is pretty respectable given all the headwinds and the challenges the economy faced in the final three months of the year," said Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody's Analytics in West Chester Pennsylvania.

The data will be published as officials at the Federal Reserve wrap-up a two-day meeting. Though some of the factors holding back growth were temporary, the report is not expected to give officials at the U.S. central bank any reason to ease up on their ultra-accommodative policy stance.

Economists say a growth pace in excess of 3 percent would be needed over a sustained period to significantly lower high unemployment. Since the recession ended in mid-2009, the economy has struggled to hold above a 2 percent growth pace.

The economy was slammed by a monster storm in late October, which caused extensive damage along the East Coast and may have cut around 0.5 percentage point off fourth quarter growth.

The recovery also had to deal with uncertainty over the so-called fiscal cliff of scheduled tax hikes and budget cuts, which hurt confidence even though data suggests that households and businesses largely shrugged off the worries.

Businesses, caught with too much inventory in their warehouses in the third quarter, appear to have slowed their stock building in the final three months of the year.

That slowdown could cut as much as a full percentage point from fourth-quarter GDP growth, economists estimate.

Government spending is expected to have been a drag on growth as well, as defense outlays reverse after a big burst. Government spending is seen contracting at a rate of at least 3 percent after a gain of 3.9 percent in the prior three months.

Export weakness is also expected to have weighed on growth. Exports have been hampered by a recession in Europe, a cooling Chinese economy and storm and strike-related port disruptions.

But not all the details in the report will be bleak.

Importantly, consumer and business spending are expected to show some strength.

Consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of economic activity, is seen accelerating from the prior quarter's 1.6 percent growth pace, while business investment is expected to rebound after its first drop in 1-1/2 years.

That should leave a measure of domestic demand, which excludes inventories and trade, quickening a bit from the third quarter's 1.9 percent rate.

"Considering all of the uncertainty last quarter associated with the election and the fiscal cliff, a steady pace of underlying demand speaks volumes about the economy's resilience," said Joseph LaVorgna, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank Securities in New York.

"There is good reason to expect the pace of underlying demand will accelerate," he said.

The housing market was likely another bright spot. Residential construction is expected to have gained further momentum after notching a 13.5 percent growth pace in the third quarter.

Homebuilding is seen adding to growth last year for the first time since 2005 and its continued recovery should help ensure the economy remains on a modest growth path.

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NRHM employees without salary for five months

Srinagar, Feb 9 : Hundreds of workers including doctors and paramedics working under the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) in held Kashmir’s health institutions are without salary for the past five months.

Official sources told Greater Kashmir that the delay is due to “pending liabilities of the state government under the NRHM.”

“The state governments have to provide 10 percent share in salary of the NRHM employees. But they don’t contribute the amount regularly. In some cases they divert the salary amount to other things,” they said.

Employees said in absence of salary, they are facing immense hardships. “We are finding it hard to run our families in absence of wages,” they said. “Our children are suffering. Nobody is listening to us.”

Accusing officers of forcing them to pay two-month salary as ‘security deposit’, the employees said: “We are being asked to receive one month salary but pay two month amount as security deposit which is against the norms of the scheme.”

Those without salaries since October last year, in certain cases from September, include allopathic and ISM doctors, paramedics, health workers, ANMs and Helpers.

 Expressing strong resentment over the inordinate delay in release of their salary, a delegation of NHRM medicos strongly condemned “the failure of the authorities to manage the central funds properly.”

“We are without salary for the past several months. The higher-ups in the department are well aware of our problems. But they are turning a blind eye to resolve them,” the aggrieved employees said. “Salary is our right. Nobody can deny us this right, especially when we have attended our duties regularly and worked in hospitals with dedication.”

Besides NRHM staff, the employees working under Family Welfare Scheme are also without their salary for the past three months.

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Villagers clash with police over train's halting point

Srinagar, Feb 9 : Scores of villagers in occupied Kashmir's Budgam district attempted to block the railway track in support of their demand for a halting point for the train running between north and south Kashmir, police said.

The villagers of Naidigam staged a demonstration on the railway track in the village to press for a halting point for train and resorted to stone pelting when police rushed to the spot to clear the track, they said.

No one was injured in the clashes which were still continuing when last reports were received.

However, the train service remained largely unaffected, police added.

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‘Only 29 percent households in JK have access to toilet facility’

Srinagar, Feb 9 :  Painting a grip picture of sanitation in J&K, a national monitoring agency has revealed that only 29 percent households in the State have access to toilet facility.

In 35 percent villages, the agency said, less than 25 percent households are having access to such a facility.

The National Level Monitoring (NLM) agency has visited 137 villages in J&K to evaluate the sanitation scenario and report the same to the Ministry of Rural Development.

“Only in 29.2 percent villages, out of 137 villages visited by the NLM, had access to the toilet facility. In 35.7 percent villages less than 25 percent APL households were having toilet facilities; In only 17.5 percent villages out of 137 visited in the state, all the households have been provided toilets. 43 percent villages had less than 25 percent BPL households with toilet facilities,” NLM report reveals.

Continuing to portray dismal picture of sanitation, the report stated that in 65.7 percent of villages less than 25 percent BPL households of total BPL households have been provided Individual Household Latrines (IHHL) under Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC). “94.9 percent villages had less than 25 percent SC/ST of total households who have been provided IHHL under TSC.”

The NLM had conducted random checks in the village areas, visited houses, interviewed families on various aspects of toilet construction and usage to ascertain the sanitation status in these villages. “In 37.9 percent villages, all the visited households were having a functional toilet and were using them. In 67.1 percent visited villages, the practice of open defecation is still prevalent.”

NLM has also reported that in majority of villages in Baramulla, Jammu, Kupwara, Poonch and Rajouri and Udhampur, less than 25 percent households have toilet facility.

The sanitation in schools across J&K is also poor as NLM has stated that only 61.7 percent schools in the visited villages had toilet facilities. “However in 20.2 percent schools, the toilets were either defunct/not in use or locked.”

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Warfarin and aspirin are similar in heart failure treatment

Islamabad, Feb 9 : In the largest and longest head-to-head comparison of two anti-clotting medications, warfarin and aspirin were similar in preventing deaths and strokes in heart failure patients with normal heart rhythm, according to late-breaking research presented at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2012.

"Although there was a warfarin benefit for patients treated for four or more years, overall, warfarin and aspirin were similar," said Shunichi Homma, M.D., lead author of the study and the Margaret Milliken Hatch Professor of Medicine at Columbia University in New York.

In the 11-country Warfarin versus Aspirin in Reduced Cardiac Ejection Fraction (WARCEF) trial, researchers followed 2,305 patients with heart failure and normal heart rhythm for up to six years (average 3.5 years). The patients were on average 61 years old, and the power of the heart's main pumping chamber, the left ventricle (left ventricular ejection fraction), was less than 35 percent (normal is 55 percent or higher).

Thirteen percent of the patients experienced a stroke or transient ischemic attack and were at heightened risk of recurrence. Patients with heart failure in general are at increased risk of death, blood clots and strokes.

Researchers randomly assigned patients to receive either 325 mg/day of aspirin or warfarin doses calibrated to a pre-specified level of blood thinning. Warfarin therapy requires frequent blood testing to monitor its dosage in order to achieve the desired level of blood thinning. In order to avoid bias, all patients had blood drawn on the same schedule and their pills adjusted so neither the patients nor their treating physicians knew which regimen they were taking.

Death, ischemic stroke (caused by blockage of an artery feeding the brain) or intracerebral hemorrhage (bleeding inside the brain), which combined were the study's primary endpoint, occurred at a rate of 7.47 percent for patients assigned to warfarin and 7.93 percent for patients assigned to aspirin. The difference was not statistically significant.

However, "in the group of patients followed for more than three years, those on warfarin did better in comparison to the aspirin patients," Homma said. Over the entire study period, patients receiving warfarin were just over half as likely to develop a stroke, a component of primary endpoint, as those taking aspirin. The rates of stroke were low with annual rates of 0.72 percent in patients assigned to warfarin and 1.36 percent for those on aspirin.

Researchers evaluated the safety of the anti-clotting medications by monitoring major bleeding events other than intracerebral hemorrhage (which was a component of the primary endpoint). Each year, major bleeds occurred in 1.8 percent of patients on warfarin and 0.9 percent of those on aspirin -- a statistically significant difference.

"As expected, the overall bleeding rate was higher with warfarin," Homma said. "However, not all bleeds are equal, and the one that patients fear the most -- bleeding within the brain (intracerebral hemorrhage) occurred rarely in both groups." It occurred in 0.12 percent per year in the warfarin group and 0.05 percent per year in the aspirin group.

"Given that there is no overall difference between the two treatments and that possible benefit of warfarin does not start until after 4 years of treatment, there is no compelling reason to use warfarin, especially considering the bleeding risk," Homma said. The investigators are analyzing whether certain subgroups of patients benefited more from each treatment.

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The complex relationship between memory and silence

Islamabad, Feb 9: People who suffer a traumatic experience often don't talk about it, and many forget it over time. But not talking about something doesn't always mean you'll forget it; if you try to force yourself not to think about white bears, soon you'll be imagining polar bears doing the polka.

A group of psychological scientists explore the relationship between silence and memories in a new paper published in Perspectives on Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

"There's this idea, with silence, that if we don't talk about something, it starts fading," says Charles B. Stone of Université Catholique de Louvain in Belgium, an author of the paper. But that belief isn't necessarily backed up by empirical psychological research -- a lot of it comes from a Freudian belief that everyone has deep-seated issues we're repressing and ought to talk about. The real relationship between silence and memory is much more complicated, Stone says.

"We are trying to understand how people remember the past in a very basic way," Stone says. He cowrote the paper with Alin Coman of the University of Pittsburgh, Adam D. Brown of New York University, Jonathan Koppel of the University of Aarhus, and William Hirst of the New School for Social Research.

"Silence is everywhere," Stone says. He and his coauthors divide silence about memories into several categories. You might not mention something you're thinking about on purpose -- or because it just doesn't come up in conversation. And some memories aren't talked about because they simply don't come to mind. Sometimes people actively try not to remember something.

One well-studied example used by Stone and his colleagues to demonstrate how subtle the effects of silence can be, establishes that silences about the past occurring within a conversation do not uniformly promote forgetting. Some silences are more likely to lead to forgetting than others. People have more trouble remembering silenced memories related to what they or others talk about than silenced memories unrelated to the topic at hand. If President Bush wanted the public to forget that weapons of mass destruction figured in the build-up to the Iraq War, he should not avoid talking about the war and its build-up. Rather he should talk about the build-up and avoid any discussion of WMDs. And at a more personal level, when people talk to each other about the events of their lives, talking about happy memories may leave the unhappy memories unmentioned, but in the future, people may have more trouble remembering the unmentioned happy memories than the unmentioned sad memories.

Or to supply another example of the subtle relation between memory and silence: If your mother is asking you about your boyfriend and you tell her about yesterday's date, while thinking -- but not talking -- about the exciting ending of the date, that romantic finish may linger longer in your memory than if you just answered her questions without thinking about the later part of the evening.

"Silence has important implications for how we remember the past beyond just forgetting," Stone says. "In terms of memory, not all silence is equal."

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Whole exome sequencing identifies cause of metabolic disease

Islamabad, Feb 9 : Sequencing a patient's entire genome to discover the source of his or her disease is not routine -- yet. But geneticists are getting close.

A case report, published in the American Journal of Human Genetics, shows how researchers can combine a simple blood test with an "executive summary" scan of the genome to diagnose a type of severe metabolic disease.

Researchers at Emory University School of Medicine and Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute used "whole-exome sequencing" to find the mutations causing a glycosylation disorder in a boy born in 2004. Mutations in the gene (called DDOST) that is responsible for the boy's disease had not been previously seen in other cases of glycosylation disorders.

Whole-exome sequencing is a cheaper, faster, but still efficient strategy for reading the parts of the genome scientists believe are the most important for diagnosing disease. The report illustrates how whole-exome sequencing, which was first offered commercially for clinical diagnosis in 2011, is entering medical practice. Emory Genetics Laboratory is now gearing up to start offering whole exome sequencing as a clinical diagnostic service.

It is estimated that most disease-causing mutations (around 85 percent) are found within the regions of the genome that encode proteins, the workhorse machinery of the cell. Whole-exome sequencing reads only the parts of the human genome that encode proteins, leaving the other 99 percent of the genome unread.

The boy in the case report was identified by Hudson Freeze, PhD and his colleagues. Freeze is director of the Genetic Disease Program at Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute. A team led by Madhuri Hegde, PhD, associate professor of human genetics at Emory University School of Medicine and director of the Emory Genetics Laboratory, identified the gene responsible. Postdoctoral fellow Melanie Jones is the first author of the paper.

"This is part of an ongoing effort to develop diagnostic strategies for congenital disorders of glycosylation," Hegde says. "We have a collaboration with Dr. Freeze to identify new mutations."

Glycosylation is the process of attaching sugar molecules to proteins that appear on the outside of the cell. Defects in glycosylation can be identified through a relatively simple blood test that detects abnormalities in blood proteins. The sugars are important for cells to send signals and stick to each other properly. Patients with inherited defects in glycosylation have a broad spectrum of medical issues, such as developmental delay, digestive and liver problems and blood clotting defects.

The boy in this case report was developmentally delayed and had digestive problems, vision problems, tremors and blood clotting deficiencies. He did not walk until age 3 and cannot use language. The researchers showed that he had inherited a gene deletion from the father and a genetic misspelling from the mother. "Over the years, we've come to know many families and their kids with glycosylation disorders. Here we can tell them their boy is a true 'trail-blazer' for this new disease," Freeze said. "Their smiles -- that's our bonus checks."

The researchers went on to show that introducing the healthy version of the DDOST gene into the patient's cells in the laboratory could restore normal protein glycosylation. Thus, restoring normal function by gene therapy is conceivable, if still experimental. However, restoration of normal glycosylation would be extremely difficult to achieve for most of the existing cells in the body.

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In Afghanistan, teaching music to overcome war's percussion

Kabul, Feb 8 : When insurgents launched a brazen attack that turned into a nine-hour siege in the heart of the capital, many government and Western offices shut down for the day. Down the road from the attack, young Afghan students at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music were playing Bach and Mozart, punctuated by the occasional thud of an explosion.

“Why we should shut down? Give up to the Taliban?” the institute’s director, Ahmad Sarmast, said incredulously a day after the attack. “When I came, I was amazed to see 137 students at the school. They came from all over town. It’s a nice way to say ‘no’ to violence.”

Sarmast is the founder and driving force behind the music institute. Six days a week, young Afghans come to learn and play Western and regional music. Next month, more than 50 students from the school will embark on a two-week U.S. tour that includes dates at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center.

Sarmast, an animated musical crusader who chased his education from the Soviet Union to Australia as Afghanistan crumbled, has made it his quest to rebuild his country’s musical heritage. The institute, which opened in June 2010, grew out of his Revival of Afghan Music project, which he launched in 2006.

Most of the teachers at the school come from abroad, including a large contingent from the U.S.

The school has about 140 students, half of whom are either orphans or who were working on the street selling trinkets and chewing gum. There are plans to greatly expand in the coming years. Tuition is free for all students and the school compensates families of former street kids so they don’t have to work during their studies. While Sarmast set out to re-establish music education, his goals are much broader.

“Music has got a strong healing power,” he said. “In a post-conflict country like Afghanistan, where the majority of people are badly traumatized, definitely they need music for their healing.”

In the bustling hallways of the school, anyone who has spent time in Kabul is struck by one aspect: Girls and boys study together, still a rarity in Afghanistan and something on which Sarmast has been insistent. Students are also carefully picked from across Afghanistan and from the country’s different ethnic groups, which Sarmast says is aimed at building national unity. He hopes his project helps build not only the country’s music scene but the foundation of a democratic future.

“You can’t establish a civil society or democratic society or contribute [to] human rights when you’re ignoring cultural rights,” he said.

Many of the students at the school harbor hopes that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago: They aim to become professional musicians. Whether that will be possible in Afghanistan remains to be seen, but there’s no lack of optimism among the students.

Confident, curly haired Sapna, 10, came to the institute from an impoverished family. Her father is dead and her mother struggles to support her five siblings. Sapna said she was immediately drawn to the piano when she came to the institute two years ago.

“It has a very sweet voice,” she said.

Now a top student, Sapna will be representing the school on the U.S. tour, and aims to become a concert pianist.

“I can teach a lot of people about Afghanistan,” she said. “Just yesterday, there was fighting in Afghanistan, and we don’t want this fighting in Afghanistan. We are the future of Afghanistan, and we continue to change the future.”

Faiz Sultani, 18, a violin student, said he looks forward to the cultural exchange between Afghans and Americans on the tour.

“I’m sure American people think just about war and fighting (in Afghanistan), but I think they should know we can do something else,” he said.

The school is supported in part by about $500,000 per year from the U.S. State Department that goes toward both English language programs and a winter music academy. The State Department is also spending about $355,000 on the institute’s U.S. tour.

It’s part of a U.S. Embassy Kabul cultural affairs program that also included funding for the short film “Buzkashi Boys,” which was shot entirely in Kabul using Afghan actors and recently snagged an Oscar nomination.

The tour is not only a good opportunity for the students to experience the U.S. but can provide an opening for Americans to learn more about a country they hear about mostly through the prism of war, said Michelle Jones, a cultural affairs officer at the U.S. Embassy Kabul.

“I think it will incite people to want to know more about Afghan music and Afghan culture,” she said.

Sarmast has another goal: to show Americans that their 11-year venture in Afghanistan has meant something.

“One of the major ideas behind the tour of the United States is to show the taxpayers who have been supporting the army in Afghanistan — people who supported the fight against terrorism in Afghanistan, people who have been eager to help the Afghan people stand on their own feet — to show the investment is not gone,” he said. “I believe musicians are the best ambassadors of the nation.”

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