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Ms Lagarde said the ongoing debt crisis in Europe has resulted in an uncertain outlook for the global economy.The IMF chief added that whilst efforts to solve the crisis were heading in the right direction, more needed to be done to restore confidence. Speaking in China, Ms Lagarde called upon Beijing to rebalance its economy. "Our sense is that if we do not act boldly and if we do not act together, the economy around the world runs the risk of downward spiral of uncertainty, financial instability and potential collapse of global demand," she said. "We could run the risk of what some commentators are already calling the lost decade," Ms Lagarde added. 'Clouds on the horizon' Ms Lagarde's comments come amid fears that the debt crisis in some peripheral countries may be spreading to some of the euro area's biggest economies. On Tuesday, Italy's cost of borrowing hit the highest level since the euro was founded in 1999. The yield on Italian 10-year government bonds rose to 6.77%, raising concerns about its capacity to service its debts.Many investors believe that Italy may have to bailed out just like Greece, the Irish Republic and Portugal. The fear is that as the eurozone debt crisis spreads, it will have a big impact on the international economy. At the same time, there have been concerns about a slowdown in the US as it struggles to boost growth and tackle stubbornly high rates of unemployment. Ms Lagarde said the combination of these factors were a big threat to global growth. "There are clearly clouds on the horizon," she said. "Clouds on the horizon particularly in the advanced
Photos: AP
IMF chief warns of a ‘lost decade' for global economy
The head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde, has warned that the global economy is at risk of being plunged into a "lost decade".
Christine Lagarde: "The world runs the risk of a downward spiral of uncertainty"
economies and particularly so in the European Union and the US." Domino effect While the US and eurozone economies have been struggling with their individual issues, Asian countries led by China have been growing robustly in recent years.
However, there is a realisation that in a globalised economy, Asia is not immune from troubles in the rest of the world. The US and the eurozone are the world's two largest economic regions and are the biggest markets for Asian goods.
Leonardo Da Vinci ‘blockbuster' opens in London Crowds of art lovers are visiting the National Gallery in London as its "blockbuster" Leonardo da Vinci show opens to the public. Culture
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But with their economies in the doldrums consumer demand for Asian goods has slowed. With exports being so vital to countries like China and Japan, that could really hurt growth. "Weakness in the export sector will be the main hindrance to economic growth in the coming quarters," Jing Ulrich of JP Morgan warned in a report. Data out earlier this month showed that China's new orders index fell to 50.5 in October from 51.3 the month before. Policymakers and analysts have
warned that a slowdown in China and other emerging Asian economies coupled with troubles in the developed economies will be detrimental to global growth. Ms Lagarde called upon China to alter its export-led growth policies and boost domestic demand to rebalance its economy and sustain long term growth. She said that Beijing needed to allow its currency to appreciate further in order to boost demand at home. www.bbcnews.com
Oscars producer Brett Ratner resigns after ‘gay slur' Director Brett Ratner has resigned as a producer of the 2012 Oscars after using a derogatory term in public. Entertainment
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The European Union has drastically cut its growth forecast for the eurozone in 2012, from 1.8% down to just 0.5%. "Growth has stalled in Europe and there is a risk of a new recession," said European Commissioner Olli Rehn. The low growth makes it harder for Europe to escape its debt crisis, with Italy's position seen as unsustainable. Italy raised 5bn euros from a new issue of bonds on Thursday, but had to pay an interest rate of 6.087% to borrow the money for one year. The financial markets remained jittery on Thursday as worries persisted about the high cost of borrowing faced by Italy. The Dow Jones share index opened higher in New York, regaining some of its hefty losses from Wednesday. The FTSE 100 in London and the Cac40 in Paris both ended the day lower, which the Dax in Frankfurt posted a gain. Earlier in the day, Japan's Nikkei share index had fallen by 2.9%, South Korea's Kospi shed 3.8% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng index dropped 5.3%. Cost of borrowing The interest rate on the one-
year Italian bonds was up from 3.57% in October and was the highest for 14 years. On Wednesday, yields on Italian 10-year bonds rose above 7%, to the highest rate seen since the eurozone began. The rate implied that if Italy were to borrow money today, with the aim of paying it back in 10 years, it would have to pay an interest rate of more than 7%, a rate seen as unsustainable by most analysts. On Thursday, the yield on Italy's 10-year bonds fell back to 6.90%. Announcing its revised growth forecasts, the European Commission predicted that if there was no change in political policy, Italian public debt would remain unchanged at 120.5% of GDP next year, before falling to 118.7% in 2013. The commission also forecast that next year, Greece would see its debt level rise to 198.3% of GDP. Commenting on the current eurozone crisis, UK Prime Minister David Cameron said that
eurozone leaders "must act now". "The longer they delay, the greater the danger," he added. The continuing problems in Europe also saw the International Energy Agency cut its forecast for oil demand. "The ever-present threat of a far-reaching financial collapse from the worsening quagmire in Greece and Italy generated a raft of daily headlines that injected a high level of trading volatility," it said. "Market attention has shifted to Italy where a weak financial reform package has triggered a dangerous rise in 10-year government bonds (yields). "Oil markets are inextricably linked to the deterioration in the European debt situation given the impact on financial markets, the heightened risk of global recession, and the corresponding potential loss of oil demand." 'Radical solutions' There were reports that the European Central Bank (ECB) had been buying Italian bonds on Thursday in order to bring their yields down. "While the ECB intervention has proven effective in the shortterm... the question is now whether the ECB can credibly protect yields from breaking again above 7%," said Sebastien Galy at Societe Generale.
What are bonds and what can they tell us about the borrowers who issue them?
Concerns remain that if the ECB does not do more to support Italy, there could be major problems to come. "There is a real risk that a 'disorderly' default could take place, triggering even bigger write-downs for banks and the risk of further contagion," said John Higgins at Capital Economics. "There could be a full-scale credit crunch as depositors shifted money out of Italian banks for fear of losing out from redenomination if Italy then left [the euro]." Euro recovers Last month, in an attempt to ease concerns about the Greek debt crisis, eurozone leaders
Hanging Out
Lucas Papademos named as new Greek prime minister Mr Papademos, 64, said he was taking over at a "critical point" for Greece.Leaders of the three main parties making up a new government of national unity had been meeting the Greek president to try to reach a deal. Greeks will hope the news provides the stability to get them through their debt crisis, correspondents say. Mr Papademos, who is not a member of parliament, will head an interim government until elections can take place in February. The govermment's main task will to ensure debt-laden Greece gets its latest bailout payment, by approving a new 130bn euro ($177bn; £111bn) international rescue package from eurozone partners and the International Monetary Fund. "The president, after recommendations by political leaders who attended the meeting, has instructed Lucas Papademos to form a new government," the president's office said in a statement. The new government will be sworn in at 12:00 GMT on Friday, a presidency official said. In other developments: •German Chancellor Angela Merkel denied reports that France and Germany were preparing for a scaled-down eurozone, insisting that the only goal was to stabilise the zone in its current form and make it more competitive
Photo: AP
Eurozone's growth has stalled, says EU Tourism & Evironment
Former European Central Bank vice-president Lucas Papademos has been named as Greece's new prime minister, following days of negotiations. •Officials in the EU drastically cut the eurozone growth forecast from 1.8% to 0.5%, and said there was a risk of a new recession •Amid ongoing concerns over Italy's crippling debt level and soaring interest rates, Italy raised 5bn euros from a new issue of bonds but at a one-year interest rate of 6.087% Speaking after the announcement, Mr Papademos said his job "will not be easy but I am convinced the problems will be solved... in a quicker and more efficient way if there is unity and consensus". He said the first priorities of the transitional government were to ratify the bailout agreed at an EU summit last month, and to implement the policies linked to it. That will involve another round of austerity measures, which have already proved hugely unpopular with the Greek public. Mr Papademos will replace Greece's outgoing Prime Minister George Papandreou, who was forced to step aside after a disastrous call for a referendum on the eurozone rescue package. The referendum plan was drop-
ped within a few days, but not before sparking the wider financial and political crisis which led to Mr Papandreou's forced withdrawal from the top job, even though he narrowly survived a confidence vote. The new PM will also face a confidence vote in parliament, which is expected to happen on Monday, Greek state TV reported. The Greek stock market jumped sharply when Mr Papademos arrived at the presidential palace to join the negotiations on Thursday morning.Reports say Mr Papademos has accepted that the current Finance Minister, Evangelos Venizelos, remains in place. The exact framework of the new coalition government is yet to be agreed.In Italy, meanwhile, there was increasing speculation that former European Commissioner Mario Monti would take over from outgoing Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. The markets appeared to calm amid hopes that the economist would take over the reins shortly, correspondents say, and borrowing levels fell back from the previous day's record highs.
www.bbcnews.com
Merkel: Aim is credibility for whole eurozone Her comments followed an earlier report that Germany and France were discussing a radical overhaul of the EU towards a more integrated eurozone. A senior EU official told Reuters news agency "intense consultations" had been taking place "at all levels" and that a smaller eurozone was one possibility.But Mrs Merkel said the whole eurozone needed to restore credibility. "We have a single goal and it is to stabilise the eurozone as it is today, to make it more competitive, to make progress in balancing budgets," she said, when asked about the possibility of debt-laden Italy leaving the bloc.
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Greece at risk
The risk of Greece defaulting on its massive debts has triggered intense speculation about Greece becoming the first country to exit the eurozone. France's President Nicolas Sarkozy has talked openly of a "two-speed Europe". The BBC's Europe editor, Gavin Hewitt, says it is now clear the financial crisis in the eurozone is spurring a debate about the future of the grouping. There are as yet no detailed plans, but the debate has promp-
Champions League www.bbcnews.com
asked banks to raise more capital to protect themselves against any losses resulting from future defaults by Greece. At the same time, banks also accepted a 50% loss on the money they had lent to Greece. The fear is that if Italy's debt crisis worsens, similar measures may have to be taken by banks that are exposed to its debt. Meanwhile, the euro recovered some of its recent losses on Thursday, gaining a third of a cent against the US dollar and a quarter of a penny against the pound.
ted a stern warning from European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso about the dangers of splitting the eurozone, our correspondent adds.
'Not an opt-out' But Mr Sarkozy made it clear on Tuesday that he favoured a twospeed Europe - and reiterated that allowing Greece to join the euro had been a mistake. Referring to the further enlargement of the EU, he said: "There are 27 of us. "Clearly, down the line... there will be 32, 33, 34 of us. No-one thinks that federalism, total integration, will be possible with 33, 34, or 35 states." "Clearly," he added, "there will be a two-speed Europe: one speed that moves toward more integration in the eurozone and one speed for a confederation in the EU." Mr Barroso hit back on Wednesday, warning about the economic costs of any split in the eurozone and urging Germany to show leadership. "The euro area is not an optout from the EU," he said in Berlin. "In fact, all the EU should have the euro as its currency." www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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International Photo: AP
November 11-17, 2011
EDF fined for spying on Greenpeace nuclear campaign A French court has fined energy giant EDF 1.5 million euros (£1.3 million) and sent two of its staff to jail for spying on Greenpeace campaigners. Nanterre heard that Kargus Consultants, then run by a former member of the French foreign secret service, had compiled a dossier on Greenpeace via means that included hacking into a computer belonging to former campaigns head Yannick Jadot. EDF maintained that it had just asked Kargus to monitor the activists, and that the consultants had exceeded their remit. But justice Isabelle PrevostDesprez disagreed, handing threeyear sentences to Pascal Durieux and Pierre-Paul Francois, head and
Russia rules out new Iran sanctions over nuclear report Britain, France and the US all said they would pursue new sanctions against Iran in the wake of the IAEA report. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu said the report showed the need for the world to stop Iran developing nuclear weapons. The US and its allies suspect Iran of trying to develop a nuclear bomb, which Tehran denies. The Iranian government insists that its nuclear programme is for peaceful means. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told Interfax news agency that extra sanctions "will be seen in the international community as an instrument for regime change in Iran". "That approach is unacceptable to us, and the Russian side does not intend to consider such proposals." The Russian foreign ministry later issued another statement saying that the report "does not contain fundamentally new information". However, Mr Netanyahu accused Iran of endangering world peace. "The significance of the report is that the international community must bring about the cessation of Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons which endanger the peace of the world and of the Middle East," he said in a statement. "The IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] report corroborates the position of the international community, and of Israel that Iran is developing nuclear weapons," Mr Netanyahu added. The IAEA said it had information indicating Iran had carried out tests "relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device".
4 The International weekly
The report - published on the Institute for Science and International Security website - says the research includes computer models that could only be used to develop a nuclear bomb trigger. It documents alleged Iranian work on the kind of implosion device that would be needed to detonate a nuclear weapon. On Wednesday, a defiant Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said his country would not budge "one iota" from its nuclear programme. He said the report was based on "empty claims" provided by the US.Addressing the US he added: "We will not build two bombs in the face of your 20,000. We will develop something that you cannot respond to, which is ethics, humanity, solidarity and justice. "You should know that no enemy of the Iranian people has ever tasted victory."
'Additional pressure' Britain and France voiced their "utmost concern regarding the military dimension to Iran's nuclear programme in the light of ... [the] IAEA report". In a joint statement, the two governments "made clear their determination to seek new powerful sanctions if Iran refuses to cooperate". "Our goal remains to ensure that Iran fully adheres to its international obligations," it added. Earlier, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said the seriousness of the report warranted a meeting of the UN Security Council. www.bbcnews.com
deputy head of EDF's nuclear security operation. Thierry Lorho, then head of Kargus, also received three years, and information specialist Alain Quiros two. All also have to pay compensation to Greenpeace. Through its ownership of British Energy, EDF runs eight nuclear stations in the UK and has plans to build four new reactors, two each at Sizewell in Suffolk and Hinkley Point in Somerset. www.bbcnews.com
Activists have targeted EdF repeatedly as it leads plans for new nuclear build in Europe
Haiti cholera victims demand UN compensation Several studies have found that cholera was probably brought to Haiti by UN peacekeepers from Nepal. The US-based Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti filed the demand on behalf of some 5,000 victims. It says the UN mission in Haiti failed to screen peacekeepers for cholera and allowed untreated waste from a UN base to be dumped into the main river. It also says the UN mission failed to respond adequately to the outbreak. The demand would be looked at by the "relevant parts of the UN system", spokesman Martin Nesirsky said. The UN was working "to do everything possible to bring the spread of cholera under control, to treat and support those affected by cholera and ultimately to eradicate cholera from Haiti," he said. More than 6,500 Haitians have died of cholera since the outbreak began in October 2010, according to the Haitian Ministry of Health, and nearly 500,000 have been made ill.
'Public apology' The Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) - a Bostonbased human rights group - is demanding $50,000 (£31,000) in compensation for each sick person and $100,000 (£62,000) for each death. As well as individual damages, it also wants a public apology and an adequate nationwide response including medical care, clean water and sanitation infrastructure. The group says it is prepared to go to court in Haiti or the US if the UN does not respond. "It is time for the UN to step up and do the right thing," IJDH direc-
Photo: AP
The company is hoping to build a new fleet of nuclear reactors in the UK.A court in Nanterre, near Paris, found that EDF employed security firm Kargus to spy on Greenpeace as it campaigned against new reactors in France. The court also sent two Kargus employees to jail and handed Greenpeace 500,000 euros (£428,000) in damages.Greenpeace's campaign targeted in particular the new reactor being built at Flammanville on the Normandy coast, one of the European Pressurised Water Reactors (EPRs) that EDF hopes to bring to the UK. Adelaide Colin, communications director for Greenpeace in France, said the decision "sends a strong signal to the nuclear industry: no-one is above the law". The Tribunal Correctionel de
Before the 2010 outbreak, Haiti had been cholera-free for nearly a century.
There isn't a Nobel Prize for education. But this month has seen the launch of an award that would like to have such a similar international status. tor Brian Concannon said. "The majority of our petition's facts come from UN reports. The UN developed much of the law we cite," he said. "Our clients are challenging the institution to act consistently with what it knows to be true and just". A UN report on Haiti's cholera epidemic - drawn up by by independent experts and published in May - found that the outbreak was the result of a "confluence of circumstances" rather than the fault of a group or individual. But it strongly suggested that the disease was introduced by UN peacekeepers from Nepal living on
a base where poor sanitary conditions allowed human waste to enter the Artibonite river system. A report by the US Center for Disease Control also linked the outbreak to Nepalese troops. The cholera epidemic provoked widespread demonstrations against the UN mission, which has been in Haiti since 2004. Haitians have little natural resistance to cholera, and the waterborne disease spread rapidly in a country whose already poor infrastructure was shattered by the January 2010 earthquake. www.bbcnews.com
International November 11-17, 2011
In 1868, Charles Darwin undertook a study to prove that humans, like animals, have an innate and universal set of emotional expressions - a code by which we understand each other's feelings. The Darwin Correspondence Project, which is working to publish and digitise thousands of the scientist's letters, has recreated the experiment nearly 150 years later - to test his results, and draw attention to his contribution to psychology. The experiment took place in the living room of Down House, Darwin's country home in Kent, during a series of dinner parties from March to November 1868, where he asked guests for their responses to photographs of a man with his face frozen into a range of different positions. This was followed by a questionnaire that was distributed around the world - one of the first questionnaires ever printed. "Mr Darwin brought in some photographs taken by a Frenchman, galvanising certain muscles in an old man's face, to see if we read aright [sic] the expression that putting such muscles in play should produce," wrote one of the guests in a letter to her sister. It was somewhat unscientific by modern standards, with no control group and a very small sample, but it was revolutionary for its time. He used 11 black and white photographs originally taken by French anatomist GuillaumeBenjamin Duchenne, to examine the movement of facial muscles. According to Duchenne, the
Photo: AP
Crowdsourcing Darwin's experiment on human emotions One of Charles Darwin's lesser-known experiments, on the expression of emotion, is being re-run as an exercise in online crowdsourcing - and anyone can take part. subject was "an old, toothless, man with a thin face, whose appearance, without being precisely ugly, was more or less nondescript". His "intelligence was limited", he added. Duchenne used electrodes to manipulate the muscles on the man's face and contort them into various expressions. While he appears to be in some pain, Darwin later wrote that the man was "little sensitive", as he had a medical condition that left his face numb. Shrugging and blushing Darwin showed the photographs to each of his guests individually, asking them what emotion the subject was feeling and collected their responses on a table, hastily scribbled on scrap paper. After the experiment Darwin distributed a questionnaire around the world - he couldn't send the pictures themselves as they were very valuable. He asked about facial expressions and gestures such as shrugging and blushing among different cultures. He had a vast network of correspondents - more than 2,000 in his lifetime - and received replies from travellers and missionaries as far as South Africa, India, China, North America, and Australia. Race and gender Darwin wanted to prove that
there is a series of "cardinal" emotions that are expressed and perceived by all humans in the same way, and that these are innate or biological. The study formed part of his 1872 book The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals in which he outlined his view that expression was a trait that humans shared with beasts. He wanted to disprove one of the arguments against his theory of evolution - that the ability to feel, express and read emotion is unique to humans (so they could not have descended from apes). But how accurate were his results? That is what Dr Pearn and her team have set out to discover. They have created an interactive online tool that allows the public to look at each of the 11 portraits and give their own interpretations of the Frenchman's expression. They will collate the responses and see whether the results from Darwin's small sample match their findings. One interesting feature of Darwin's experiment is that he seems to have honed his method as he went along. At the beginning he offered his subjects a Yes/No option, but as the study progressed he began soliciting a whole range of responses.
According to these notes, his subjects agreed almost unanimously on certain photographs - those that betrayed fear, surprise, happiness, sadness and anger.
His experiment evolved into a "single-blind" study - one which doesn't lead the subject to any particular response. For the modern incarnation of the project, which will have a vastly bigger sample unit, this raises some problems - how to group the findings when the list of responses is unlimited. To get around these issues the Darwin project has teamed up with the Computer Laboratory, another Cambridge-based project, which for the past two years has been using web-based tools to study people's response to facial expression. They are developing a bank of common human emotions which will be used to programme computer systems - such as teaching tools or satellite navigation - to recognise human expressions. Schizophrenia Today, few psychologists disagree with Darwin's theory of a universal set of expressions - it
has formed the basis for an entire canon of psychological study. But it was overlooked for nearly 100 years. It wasn't until the 1960s, that the experiment was revisited by psychologist Paul Ekman, who started out trying to disprove Darwin, but obtained results that merely backed him up. Ekman travelled around the world showing photographs of facial expressions to people in various cultures, the majority of cultures tested read the five core emotions in the same way. He has used Darwin's work to create a test for drugs developed to treat schizophrenia. The study has also formed the basis of modern research into disorders such as autism. "You can't help but realise when you study this that Darwin was absolutely an immense intellect," says Prof Snyder. www.bbcnews.com
The inaugural World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) Prize was announced in Doha, Qatar, with the $500,000 (ÂŁ310,000) award being given to Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, whose work has brought education to millions of children in impoverished families. Sir Fazle, the first education "laureate", has worked across decades and continents to help communities to escape the quicksand of poverty and to gain skills and self-reliance. Created in Bangladesh in 1972, his Brac project - formerly the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee - is now claimed as the biggest non-governmental organisation in the world.An estimated 10 million primary pupils have been taught in schools set up by Brac across 10 countries, in such tough territories as South Sudan and Afghanistan. It's a vast operation, running more schools in Bangladesh than the entire English school system, and it is claimed to be the "largest private, secular education system in the world".
Equal chances Working with the poorest, most disadvantaged rural communities, often blighted with conflict, exploitation and disease, this is the raw
edge of education, with one-room classrooms and basic skills. But speaking after the award, Sir Fazle says that the greatest challenge for global education applies as much to the more affluent countries as to the poorest. And that big problem, he says, is inequity, the stubborn link between family income and educational outcome. The Brac project works to alleviate poverty on a broad range of fronts from micro-credit to health schemes but he says that education is becoming ever more important."It's so important for our survival, our progress, that every country wants to put more resources into education." This isn't simply about economic progress, as he links education and literacy to the building of selfworth and self-help for individuals and communities. It provides the key to understanding "the power structure and how to change it".
Life changing His own commitment to development stemmed from the life-changing experience of the cyclone that hit Bangladesh in 1970. It turned an accountant into an activist. This was compounded by the "death and destruction" he saw
during the war that accompanied Bangladesh's independence. Such experiences profoundly affected him and pushed him to view his country "from the point of view of the poor". It made him "determined to achieve change", he says. The award of the first WISE Prize was part of a wider event, the World Innovation Summit for Education. This wants to be a kind of Davos for education, bringing together the great and the good to hear about innovation in schools and universities. It's supported by the Qatar Foundation, which has the succinct ambition to "convert the country's current, but temporary, mineral wealth into durable human capital". This translates as investing heavily in education and becoming a knowledge hub so that there's something of value left when the oil revenue eventually runs out. It's a fast-forward project with parallels to creating the infrastructure for the World Cup. There is a 1,000 hectare Education City being developed, attracting university partners from the United States, France and the UK. Missed goals But big international promises, played out under the photographs and rhetoric of summits, can also turn out to be hollow.
Photo: AP
Fairness challenge from first global education ‘laureate'
The winning project from Bangladesh is claimed as the biggest private education network in the world
Gordon Brown, former UK prime minister and one of the speakers at the WISE event, delivered a blunt recognition that some of the Millennium Development Goals for 2015 were going to be missed. "We know it is now impossible, I'm afraid, to achieve the Millennium Development Goal that would cut infant mortality by half - we are too far away." There were other goals, signed by leading countries, that were going to be missed, he said. But he called on governments, charities and philanthropists to mobilise to achieve the goal of universal primary education by 2015 - and proposed a "glo-
bal fund for education". Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales was among the WISE speakers and Mr Brown called on technology companies, such as Microsoft, Apple, Google and Facebook to play a part in bringing education to the "poorest part of the poorest country". There's a long way to go as one sobering statistic from Brac makes clear. In 2011, when international conferences in the Gulf can be broadbanded round the world in seconds, it's still more likely that a girl in South Sudan will die in childbirth than finish primary school. www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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International November 11-17, 2011
Photo: AP The export rise has helped to narrow the trade gap
US trade deficit shrinks as exports grow The US trade deficit narrowed for the third consecutive month in September on growing exports and shrinking imports. The monthly deficit fell to $43.1bn (£27.1bn; 31.7bn euros), according to figures from the Commerce Department. Exports hit their highest level this year, at $180.4bn, helped by exports of industrial goods and consumer goods. Imports totalled $223.5bn. The politically sensitive trade deficit with China shrank to $28.1bn from $29bn as imports of Chinese goods fell. Imports of consumer goods, including toys, clothing and cookwa-
The success of China's manufacturing sector has been key to its economic growth
China's export growth slowed further in October as the eurozone debt crisis and fears of a slowdown in the US dented demand for its goods, figures show. "Import growth is a bit higher than we expected, showing that domestic demand is still resilient," said Mr Wang.However, some analysts said the jump in import numbers was not a true indicator of domestic demand. They said that manufacturers were taking advantage of a drop in commodity prices to build up
stock levels and that was impacting the import numbers. "It's likely that the inventory building still continues, partly because of the declining global prices," said Li Cui of Royal bank of Scotland. "The producers take this opportunity to build their inventories."
re, declined in September, a month when retailers start getting ready for the holiday shopping season. Slower job and income growth could be harming household spending on non-essential goods, it added, after disappointing unemployment figures were released last week. Payrolls - the number of new jobs created in the US rose by 80,000 in October, the slowest rise in four months. www.bbcnews.com Photo: AP
Shipments from China rose 15.9% from a year earlier, down from a 17.9% growth in September and 24.5% in August. Meanwhile, imports grew 28.7%, resulting in a trade surplus of $17bn (£10.7bn) The data has raised fresh concerns about the impact of a global slowdown on China's export-led growth. "Export growth continued to drop last month against the backdrop of a sputtering economy in European countries, which is the largest export destination of our country," said Wang Hu of Guotai Securities in Shanghai. "With the euro debt crisis spreading, we expect export growth to further decline in the months ahead." Domestic boost? China's growth in recent years has been led by the success of its manufacturing and export sector, which has helped it become the world's second-largest economy. However, economic troubles in the US and eurozone, two of the biggest markets for Chinese goods, have led to a decline consumer demand, raising concerns about the prospects for China's economy. On Wednesday, Christian Lagarde, the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), called upon China to alter its export-led growth policy and focus on boosting domestic demand in order to sustain growth. Analysts said the latest data showed that demand in China was growing steadily.
Photo: AP
China's export growth slows down as global demand falls
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Anglo American sells stake in Chile mining operations
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Photo: AP
Airbus expects to deliver between 520 and 530 aircraft in total this year
But the deal could hit trouble after Chile's state copper miner Codelco said it would exercise an option to buy 49% of the business, Anglo American Sur. Anglo's sale of the stake to Mitsubishi means Codelco might not be able to buy more than 24.5% of the operation. Anglo American said it had made a "thorough assessment" of the sale. Anglo's properties in southern Chile include the flagship Los Bronces project, El Soldado mine, the Chagres smelter and Los Sulfatos and San Enrique Monolito exploration projects. Anglo has invested about $2.8bn to develop Los Bronces. The company said in a statement: "Anglo American has regularly reviewed its available alternatives and, following a thorough assessment, and in the interests of its shareholders, it entered into a process to explore the potential value of the Anglo American Sur (AAS) assets." Anglo chief executive Cynthia Carroll added: "We are free to sell any percentage of our shares in AAS at any time. We evaluated and continue to evaluate various alternatives."
Airbus owner EADS reports profits fall and A350 delays Airbus owner EADS has reported a 15% drop in third quarter operating profits to 322m euros ($435m; £274m) and says its A350 jet will be delayed.
Codelco says it will fight to protect its rights to buy a stake in Anglo American's operations in Chile
Mining giant Anglo American says it has sold a 24.5% stake in its operations in southern Chile to Japan's Mitsubishi for $5.39bn (£3.38bn). But Codelco said it was ready to fight to exercise what it believed was an option to buy almost 50% of AAS. "If this sale (to Mitsubishi) is confirmed, it does not affect Codelco's right over 49% of the
shares of Anglo American Sur," Codelco said in a statement. "Codelco will exercise all the actions that are necessary to safeguard its rights." www.bbcnews.com
The European aerospace giant also reported a 4% fall in revenues for the quarter to 10.75bn euros. EADS said it had taken a charge of 200m euros to cover production and delivery delays in its A350 long-range jet. Airbus said it was abandoning production of its A340 jet, which had competed with Boeing's 777 airliner.Finance director Peter Ring said: "We have accepted reality. We have not sold any A340s for nearly two years."
Forecasts raised Final assembly of the A350 will start in the first quarter of 2012.
The lightweight composite plane will now enter service in the first half of 2014, up to six months late. Meanwhile, EADS raised its full-year order forecast for Airbus by 50% to 1,500 aircraft, and said it expected 2011 operating profit to be 1.45bn euros. EADS' net profit in the third quarter was 312m euros, up from 13m euros a year earlier. It also said that Airbus had delivered 376 aircraft during the first nine months of 2011. The company expects to deliver between 520 and 530 aircraft in total this year. www.bbcnews.com
Changes to the world's time scale debated Hanging Out
This week, scientists at the Royal Society are discussing whether we need to come up with a new definition of the world's time scale: Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). And the main issue up for debate is the leap second - and whether we should abolish it. The leap second came into existence in 1972. It is added to keep the time-scale based on atomic clocks in phase with the time-scale that is based on the Earth's rotation. The reason for this is that while atomic clocks, which use the vibrations in atoms to count the seconds, are incredibly accurate, the Earth is not such a reliable time-keeper thanks to a slight wobble as it spins on its axis. Rory McEvoy, curator of horology at the UK's Royal Observatory in Greenwich, explained: "Since the 1920s, it has been known, and previously suspected, that the motion of the Earth is not quite as constant as we'd first thought." This means that time based on atomic clocks and time based on Earth drift ever further out of phase over time.So every few years, before the difference has grown to more than 0.9 seconds, an extra second called the leap second - is added to snap the two back into synch. "The International Earth Rotation Service monitors the Earth's activity, and they decide when it is appropriate to add a leap second into our timescale," said Mr McEvoy.
Split second
But the call to get rid of the leap second is causing a rift within the international time community, and it will come to a head at a vote at the World Radio Conference of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in January 2012 in Geneva. An informal survey by the ITU earlier this year revealed that three countries - the UK, China and Canada, are strongly against changing the current system. However 13 countries, including the Unites States, France, Italy and Germany, want a new time-scale that does not have leap seconds. But with nearly 200 member states, this still leaves many others that have yet to reveal their position. The International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) in Paris is the international standards organisation that is responsible for maintaining the world's time. It thinks that the leap second should go because these one second adjustments are becoming increasingly problematic for systems that need a stable and continuous reference time-scale. Dr Felicitas Arias, director of the BIPM's time department and co-organiser of the meeting at the Royal Society, explained: "It is affecting telecommunications, it is problematic for time transfer by the internet (such as the network
time protocol, NTP) as well as for financial services. "Another application that is really very, very affected by the leap second is time synchronisation in Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS). "GNSS rely on perfect time synchronisation - and leap seconds are a nuisance." One problem is that because the changes in the Earth's rotation are not regular, leap seconds are also erratic, and only six months' notice is given for each one.
Atomic clocks are much better at keeping time than the Earth
Diverging time
ly diverge by an increasing amount of time. Something would have to be done to correct the increasing divergence." Over a few decades this would amount to a minute's difference, but over several hundred years this would mean the atomic clock time-scale and the time-scale based on the Earth's rotation would be out by an hour. In 2004, the idea of swapping leap seconds for a leap hour in a few hundred years' time was proposed. But Dr Whibberley said most scientists agreed that this would be even more problematic. He explained: "It was dropped quickly. The general feeling was that you could never implement a leap hour as they are much harder to do than the leap seconds, and if you can't cope with leap seconds, it would be much harder to cope with a leap hour."
But the countries that are against losing the leap second, including the UK, say the problems are being exaggerated. Peter Whibberley, senior research scientist in time and frequency at the National Physical Laboratory, in Teddington, said: "When the UK government did a survey of government agencies, they couldn't find anyone who was concerned with leap seconds. So we don't see the evidence presented for the problems caused by leap seconds as being all that serious." But decoupling civil time from the Earth's rotation could also have longer-term consequences. Dr Whibberley explained: "[If you lost leap seconds] UTC would drift apart from time based on the Earth's rotation, it would gradual-
Riviera Maya
2014 test flight for Nasa's Orion spaceship
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Champions League Photo: AP
For this particular mission, the capsule will be unmanned, however. It will see Orion make two highly elliptical orbits of the Earth before re-entering the atmosphere and splashing down in the ocean. The vehicle is being designed to take astronauts beyond the space station to destinations such as the Moon, asteroids and even Mars. Nasa is also developing a dedicated new rocket, known at the moment only as the Space Launch System (SLS), to put Orion and any associated equipment in orbit. Because the SLS will not be available until at least 2017, the Exploration Flight Test, or EFT-1, of Orion in 2014 will have to use an existing heavy-lift rocket. This is likely to be the DeltaIV Heavy rocket that is used currently by the United States Air Force to launch its big surveillance and communications satellites. The launch will take place from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The new capsule is being built by Lockheed Martin Space Systems. The EFT-1 will provide the company's engineers with important flight performance data. "The entry part of the test will produce data needed to develop a spacecraft capable of surviving speeds greater than 20,000mph (32,000km/h) and safely return astronauts from beyond Earth orbit," said Bill Gerstenmaier, Nasa's human exploration and
One possible solution, if the leap second is abolished, could be to tie in any changes with daylight saving changes - even though this would take place in a few centuries' time. "Countries could just accommodate the divergence by not putting their clocks forward in the spring, so you'd change your time zone by one hour to bring civil time back into line with the Earth's rotation," added Dr Whibberley. Dr Arias said it was looking increasingly likely that leap seconds may be voted out in January, but that the meeting at the Royal Society could help to thrash out ideas that could offset any problems this loss could cause. "The point is we can find a compromise, there are possibilities of leaving the time open for synchronisation in the future," she said.
Single-molecule ‘electric car' taken for test drive
The molecule has four branches that act as wheels, rotating when a tiny metal tip applied a small current to them. With 10 electric bursts, the car was made to move six billionths of a metre.The approach, published in Nature, joins recent single-molecule efforts, and seems to overcome the forces that often dominate at such tiny scales. The "batteries" of the electric car come by way of the tip of what is called a scanning tunnelling microscope - an extraordinarily fine point of metal that ends in just an atom or two. As the tip draws near the molecule, electrons jump into it.The motor of the approach lies with the four "molecular rotors" that act as the car's wheels; they undergo a change in shape when they absorb the electrons. The demonstration is a tour de force in what is called "bottom-up" nanotechnology. A wide array of machines has been demonstrated in recent years, incorporating parts etched to minuscule sizes from chunks of metals or semiconductors - a small version of traditional, "topdown" manufacturing. Building up from single, designed molecules is another matter, said Tibor Kudernac, a
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Orion is being developed for Nasa by Lockheed Martin Space Systems
operations associate administrator. "This test is very important to the detailed design process in terms of the data we expect to receive." The first manned flight of Orion may not occur until the 2020s. Much will depend on Nasa's future funding arrangements, which are being debated now by Congress and the White House.As yet there is no "roadmap" for where the SLS and Orion might take humans, or when. President Obama has
talked only about getting astronauts to an asteroid in the 2025 timeframe, and to Mars at some unspecified future date. Nasa officials have mentioned other possible targets for Orion, including missions to geostationary orbit, 36,000km (22,370 miles) above the Earth, to fix broken, high-value telecommunications satellites.
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Scientists have shown off what can be described as the world's smallest electric car made of a single, carefully designed molecule. chemist now at the University of Twente, the Netherlands, and lead author of the paper. "If you look around, in all biological systems are a vast number of molecular machines or rotors based on proteins that do important things very well; muscle contraction is based on protein motors," he explained.Dr Kudernac concedes that applications for molecular machines like the car are probably far in the future. The first task, he said, was to make it work under normal conditions; the current work has been done at a blisteringly cold 266C and in a high vacuum. And although each potential application will require a newly designed molecular machine, Dr Kudernac remains confident. www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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November 11-17, 2011
Sciencie & Techologic November 11-17, 2011
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Searching for the origins of life... and our future Hollywood is wrong about aliens. They don't have oddly shaped heads, bulging eyes or even an every green hue. Dimitar Sasselov is pretty convinced of that.
He's not even sure we'll know them when we see them. Prof Sasselov, an astrophysicist, thinks that if life exists elsewhere - and he believes it does it will likely be based on different building blocks than ours, and so may not even be recognisable as life. A project he's heading at Harvard University, called the Origins of Life, is trying to imagine what life would be like if it were based on different chemicals, conditions and history than we have on Earth. There's no reason life can only form under our set of circumstances, he says - or at least that's what he thinks and hopes the project will eventually prove. People have been asking questions like "How did we get here?" and "Are we alone?" since the time of Epicurus, around 300 BC, if not earlier. And Sasselov says we probably won't have a definitive answer in the next century either. But new tools and new data in a range of fields are allowing scientists to get closer to those answers than they ever have before. And major, interdisciplinary efforts like Harvard's Origins of Life project, and similar ones at Arizona State University, the University of Washington, and University College London are radically changing the way we search and what we are likely to find. Just as Copernicus revolutionised how people viewed themselves and their world 450 years ago, and Darwin did again 150 years ago, so Sasselov says we're getting close to another transformative moment. "One morning we'll wake up with
a fundamentally different view of the world and who we are," he says. Are we alone? This is a fertile time to be looking for life on other planets. The Kepler Space Telescope, launched by US space agency NASA in March 2009, has spotted hundreds of planets with Earth-like characteristics. This finding has energised the field of planetary scientists; if Earth-like planets are common, then it's more realistic to think that life could be, too, says Prof Sasselov, whose book on the subject "The Life of Super-Earths" is due out in January. He is now helping NASA design the next set of experiments for Kepler, as well as a next-generation telescope. Kepler's field of view is only about as big as a hand stretched up toward the summer night sky, fingers splayed. The land-based telescope Prof Sasselov envisions could help scientists scan a broader swath, identifying the closest hospitable planets.
Searching for origins The red and green lasers that Sasselov and his team pulse in the basement of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics allow them to calculate wavelength shifts that indicate a planet's chemical makeup. Sasselov compares it to using a GPS system, though instead of identifying the planet's position in space, the lasers reveal its position in frequency. But it will take a lot more than a fancy telescope and some bright
lights to answer the origins of life questions. At Harvard, the Origins team also includes a geneticist, a chemist, a geochemist, an environmental chemist, and a palaeontologist - and that's just the steering committee. The fact that scientists from all these different disciplines are sharing their progress is also big news in science, long famous for its silos. "Most universities are configured along the lines set down by Victorians - chemistry, math, physics and so on," says molecular biologist John Sutherland of the Medical Research Council in Cambridge. The only way to approach these giant questions, says Prof Sutherland, is for scientists from different disciplines to work together, learn from each other, and suggest solutions that would never occur to people immersed in a single field. At Harvard, team members share an informal lunch or dinner together once a month, and work meetings every week or two. Team members also have "day jobs" focusing on more short-term research, says steering committee member Andrew H. Knoll, a professor of Natural History who is now using his expertise in the environment of early Earth to help a NASA mission explore Mars. The Origins project started with about $1m a year in funding, half to buy lab equipment and half to support graduate students. With major equipment purchased, the group now spends about $500,000 a year, mainly on stu-
dents. Sasselov directs the team in part because he volunteered, and in part because his pleasant demeanour, scientific enthusiasm and "generosity of spirit" made him a natural choice, Prof Knoll and others say. Prof Sasselov was born in 1950 in Bulgaria, on the tiny resort island of Nesebar in the Black Sea. He is too young and lived too far from the United States to have strong memories of Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon; he can't remember when the skies first captured his imagination. The sea that surrounded him was far more interesting, as were the ancient Greek, Roman and Ottoman ruins in which he played and helped his father, an architectural historian, dig. Perhaps growing up surrounded by so much ancient history makes it easier for Sasselov to accept the time-space continuum - the idea that the farther out he looks in space, the more history he sees. "Not everything is about today and now," he says. What is life? As Prof Sasselov peers outward, Harvard Origins co-founder Jack Szostak looks in. The focus of Szostak's lab is to understand how life - which depends on self-replication and Darwinian evolution emerges from chemistry. For decades, scientists have tried to understand the basics of life by taking existing life and trimming it back to its essence. But their experiments all failed. In the past decade, origins researchers began to try building it from scratch. Jack Szostak, a Nobel Prizewinning professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School, first showed how a simple membrane could form from clay available on the early Earth. More recently, he and others have been searching for a simple series of steps that can explain how primitive genetic material replicated itself. If they succeed, "then, since we know there are probably hundreds of millions of Earth-like planets in our galaxy alone, it would make it seem pretty darn likely that there's life in other places out there," he says.
If lab experiments show that the process of turning chemistry into life is extremely complicated or unlikely to have happened, "then it would be possible that maybe life only started here. Maybe there's only life on Earth." Prof Szostak and the other Origins researchers say they are nowhere near actually creating life, so they don't think their work poses any ethical concerns. Lawrence Krauss, a physicist who leads the Origins Project at Arizona State University, says trying to figure out how the universe came from nothing doesn't tread on religious ground, either - at least no more than Copernicus and Darwin did.
Technological benefits Origins work, like most other longterm "pure science" initiatives will invariably lead to innovations along the way that will help science - and perhaps life on this planet. "Detecting alien life in the form of an HIV virus in the human patient is not much different than detecting alien life" on another planet, says Steven Benner, a distinguished fellow with the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution in Florida, which is searching for alien life forms on Saturn's moon Titan, as well as developing test kits for HIV and hepatitis. Prof Sasselov says chemists transformed industry, medicine and daily life by mastering chemical synthesis and control. Now the Origins of Life work has the potential to allow biologists to synthesise and control the building blocks of life. Those spin-off benefits, though, are not what motivate Origins research. "For sure it will spin out all sorts of unexpected technological benefits, which will make money for someone somewhere - but that's not why it's being done," says Prof Sutherland. Instead of building the metaphorical buildings that most threeyear scientific grants afford today, he says, the Origins researchers are constructing a cathedral. It may take them a century to find answers, but what they build will still be standing in a millennium. www.bbcnews.com
US dismantles ‘massive' cyber crime syndicate The FBI alleged that the gang infected more then four million computers in 100 countries with code that redirected users to online ads.The six arrested are Estonian nationals while the seventh member of the gang, a Russian, remains at large. Security firms hailed the arrests as the "biggest cyber criminal take down in history". About 500,000 of the affected computers were in the US and many of the millions inadvertently enrolled in the fraud scheme were in government offices, scho-
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ols, and corporates. Aiding the investigation into the scale of the scheme was US space agency Nasa which first discovered the malicious software on 130 of its computers. Security firm Trend Micro also provided key intelligence during the long investigation. The FBI claimed that the "massive and sophisticated internet fraud scheme" revolved around servers set up to surreptitiously reroute traffic to websites where the gang would get a cut of
the advertising revenue. Victims would start out trying to visit sites such as Amazon, Netflix and ESPN but instead end up on sites displaying adverts put together by the gang, said the FBI in a statement. Describing the gang as "cyber bandits", Mr Bharara alleged they collected "millions in undeserved commissions for all the hijacked computer clicks and internet ads they fraudulently engineered". FBI documents detail the scheme the gang is accused of running
which employed rogue copies of the net's address books to re-direct people to the fraudulent sites. The FBI has produced a software tool that people can download and run to see if they had been hit by the gang and were being redirected. The gang reportedly tricked people into installing the malicious code that hijacked their PC by disguising it as a codec required to watch adult movies. More than 100 computers were seized in raids conducted at the same time as the arrests.
The rogue address books have now been switched for servers that direct people to where they wanted to go. Domestic ISPs are also being told about the people that were infected to give them a chance to clean up. The defendants have been charged with five counts of wire fraud and computer intrusion crimes. If found guilty they face heavy jail sentences. www.bbcnews.com
November 11-17, 2011
'Wrong' diagnosis Professor Owen's team at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge previously showed that it was possible to communicate with some vegetative patients using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). But many brain injured patients cannot be assessed in these scanners because they have metal plates or pins, or they are unable to remain still.
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Writing in The Lancet medical journal they describe how they measured electrical activity in the brain to detect consciousness.The technique, known as EEG, is painless and involves attaching electrodes to the head. Doctors hope it can be used as a diagnostic tool in homes and hospitals. The trial involved 16 patients at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge and the University Hospital of Liege in Belgium. All had been diagnosed as being in a vegetative state - a condition where a person is awake, but has no sense of awareness of themselves or their surroundings. The patients were asked to imagine wiggling their toes or squeezing their right hand. The brain activity of three of the 16 patients showed they were repeatedly able to follow commands. The report author, Professor Adrian Owen, from the Centre for Brain and Mind, University of Western Ontario, Canada said: "Many areas of the brain that activate when you perform a movement also activate when you imagine doing it. "We know these three patients were conscious as they were able to respond repeatedly to the instructions we had given them. One of the patients was able to do it more than 100 times."
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New hope for head Riviera Maya injury patients Light ‘promising' Champions League in cancer fight A study, published in Nature Medicine, showed how a drug could be created which sticks to tumours, but is then only activated when hit by specific waves of light. It means a treatment can be highly targeted and not damage the surrounding tissue. A cancer charity said the treatment showed early promise. Currently, treatments for cancer can be separated into three categories: blasting it with radiation, surgically removing a tumour or using drugs to kill the cancerous cells. All have side effects and scientists are trying to come up with more precise therapies. In this study, researchers at the National Cancer Institute, Maryland, used an antibody which targets proteins on the surface of cancerous cells. They then attached a chemical, IR700, to the antibody. IR700 is activated when it is hit by near infrared light. This wavelength of light can penetrate several centimetres into the skin. To test the antibody-chemical combination, researchers implanted tumours, squamous cell carcinoma, into the backs of mice. They were given the drug and exposed to near infrared light. Shrinking tumour The study said: "Tumour
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Neuroscientist Adrian Owen explains how the system works
A method of communicating with brain damaged patients who appear to be in a vegetative state has been discovered by scientists in the UK and Belgium. The EEG device is comparatively cheap and portable. Professor Owen said: "This is exciting because it means we can get out into the community, take it to patients in nursing and care homes, and assess many more patients at the bedside to see if we can detect covert awareness." Helen Gill-Thwaites, a consultant in the diagnosis of low awareness states at the Royal Hospital for Neuro-disability (RHN) in Putney said: "For a small proportion of patients EEG could be a very useful tool in the diagnostic process. "It would however be a useful addition and not a replacement, to current methods of assessing severely brain-injured patients.
Culture "Sadly, in my work outside of the RHN I meet many patients who have never had a proper assessment and have been wrongly diagnosed as being in a vegetative state."Paul Matthews, Professor of Clinical Neurosciences, Department of Medicine, Imperial College, London said: "The approach suggests a simple, practical way in which some of these patients might be helped to communicate. "This innovative work has taken fundamental brain science right to the bedside. Efforts to further evaluate this and related approach in the clinic should be prioritised."
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volume was significantly reduced... compared to untreated control mice and survival was significantly prolonged. "This selective killing minimises damage to normal cells." The authors said the combination was "a promising therapeutic and diagnostic agent for the treatment of cancer". "Although we observed no toxicity in our experiments, clinical translation of this method will require formal toxicity studies," they added. Dr Laura McCallum, Cancer Research UK's science communications officer, said the research was promising. "Using antibodies or photodynamic therapy to specifically target cancer cells have both been successful for treating some cancers, so combining the two together is certainly an exciting plan. "But it's important to remember that this work was done in mice, so it's much too early to tell if it will work in people with cancer. "This potential treatment has promise as scientists - including our own - are also looking at using antibodies to deliver other knockout punches, such as radiation, directly to cancer cells www.bbcnews.com
Clock change ‘stops outdoor play'
Fashion & People
Not putting the clocks back would help in the fight against child obesity, a study suggests. According to research, children are more influenced by daylight than the weather when deciding whether or not to play outside. UK researchers report that not changing the clocks would give more opportunities for active play. It strengthens the public health arguments for proposed changes to daylight saving, they say. The research, published in the Journal of Physical Activity and Health, studied the activity levels of 325 children in south-east England
aged between eight and 11. The children wore accelerometers to record the amount of exercise they did, and kept a record of their activities in a diary. A team from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and University College London found the children did more exercise outside on longer days, particularly at the end of the day during summer. This happened regardless of the likes of rain, cloud or wind.
Outdoor play was a bigger factor in overall physical activity than other factors such as structured sport sessions and cycling or walking to school, the team says. Co-researcher Dr Anna Goodman, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told the BBC: "This provides the most direct evidence yet that changing the clocks so that there is more daylight in the afternoon could increase children's physical activity." She added: "The fact that kids spend more time playing outdoors and are more physically active overall on these longer days could be important at a population level for promoting their fitness and in preventing child obesity.
"This strengthens the public health argument for the Daylight Saving Bill currently under consideration by the House of Commons, which proposes putting the clocks forward by an extra hour all year round." The clocks were moved forward by an hour during World War II to increase productivity at munitions factories and help people get home safely before the blackout. But some health experts argue that a change to this tradition would give children more opportunities for outdoor play, as well as making it safer for them to travel home from school. 'Safe space' Tam Fry, a spokesperson for the
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National Obesity Forum, said: "The longer the daylight hours, the longer kids will play. They really don't seem to care much about the weather but they do care about the dark. "They need clearly to see the environment in which they can roam unfettered, and it should be no surprise that longer summer evenings provide that environment. "They will be healthier and fitter from their outdoor play. Pack them all off to a safe space until bedtime." Ministers are writing to counterparts in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to seek a UKwide consensus on a trial. www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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Health November 11-17, 2011
Myths about our minds Here are just a few of the many myths about our brains and how they work. PEOPLE USE ONLY 10% OF THEIR BRAINS I remember first hearing that we used just a 10th of our brains in the 1970s when I was at school. And how amazing, I thought, that there might be a way to unlock that whopping 90% of unused brain capacity. What would not be possible with all of my grey matter in action? It was nonsense back then, and technological leaps in brain scanning has now proved this for all to see. "Functional imaging has shown us that there are very few parts of the brain that can't be activated by something," says Prof Sophie Scott of the Institute of Cognitive Science at University College, London. Even doing something simple, such as clenching your fist, uses much more than 10% of the brain. A functional brain scan reveals that a vast number of brain cells spring into action as they plan and initiate the contraction of muscles in your fingers and palm. THE LEFT BRAIN VERSUS THE RIGHT BRAIN Anatomically, the brain is divided into two halves - the left hemisphere and the right one. There is some division of labour between them. "There are really big differences between the left and the right sides of the brain," says Prof Scott. "But that's never what people actually mean when you hear the terms used out in a wider discourse. That's very frustrating." From some self-improvement books and business management courses, you might think the two hemispheres are in effect two separate entities. The left is portrayed as the seat of logic and rationality. The right is described as the font of intuition and creativity. Therefore, if you are a logical person, you use your left brain more. If you are more touchy-feely and artistic, you are right-brained. According to the myth, we would all be more successful and fulfilled people if we learnt to tap the full potential of both hemispheres. Prof Scott says individuals do differ in the way they think through problems and
The human brain is the most complex entity in the known universe and despite the best endeavours of scientists, there are still many mysteries about the 1.5kg (3.3lb) crinkled blob between our ears. reflect on the world, but this has nothing to do with different balances of power between their hemispheres. "Some people have really good visual imagery. Some people have good auditory imagery. There is lots of variation out there in how we take information in and process it. "But boiling it down into a left brain 'logical' and right brain 'creative' approach does not follow from what we see in how the brain operates. Also it also suggests you could be using one hemisphere more than the other and that's not really how it works." The two sides communicate with each other and work together via a complex wodge of neural cabling known as the corpus callosum. The two sides of the brains are complementary and work in concert. A FULL MOON INCREASES ABNORMAL BEHAVIOUR In folklore, a full moon is associated with insanity - hence the word lunacy werewolves and all manner of unpleasant happenings. However, when psychologists and statisticians have looked into the matter, a lunar influence on the human brain and behaviour remains elusive. Overwhelmingly they have failed to discover a correlation between the timing of a full moon and events such as assaults, arrests, suicides, calls to crisis centres, psychiatric admissions, poisonings and vehicle accidents. Eric Chudler, who has compiled a long list of the research says: "Most of the data - and there have been many studies - find that there is not an association between the phase of the moon and any of those abnormal behaviours." Many believers of the full moon myth work in law enforcement and health professions. Police officers and hospital staff frequently witness horrific and upsetting events.
Mr Chudler suggests that when these traumatic things happen, workers are much more likely to notice a full moon shining in the sky than they are to register more modest half or quarter moons. Consequently, they only make a connection with accidents or crimes when the moon is at its most obvious and symbolically significant. LISTENING TO MOZART MAKES YOU MORE INTELLIGENT Classical composer Amadeus Mozart is at the heart of an idea which blossomed in the 1990s. People started to believe that playing the music of Mozart to young children would enhance their brain development and make them more intelligent. And unlike the other myths this one had a notion of truth about it.The neuro-nonsensical notion became known as the Mozart effect. And the IQ claims started with a science paper in the journal Nature in 1993.
The research described an experiment in which Californian university students did a series of spatial reasoning tasks. The students who heard a Mozart piano piece before the testing began did a bit better than those who listened to relaxation tape music or silence. But the sonata-charged enhancement disappeared after about 15 minutes. Within a couple of years, the media had snowballed this interesting observation into the concept that playing Mozart to young children made them brainier. Companies marketed and sold CDs of the musical genius' works for this purpose. In the USA in 1998, the state of Georgia issued mothers of newborn babies with their own Mozart discs. Some people theorised that the musical structures of Mozart's compositions had a special biological influence on the brain's wiring. In subsequent studies, the truth turned out to be more mundane. It emerged that any piece of stimulating music just before a series of brain teasers makes you more alert and enthusiastic so you perform a little better.
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Stayin' alive - does music have a role in CPR? Can a bit of the Bee Gees help people perform CPR after someone's heart has stopped beating?
Following the beat of Stayin' Alive has been recommended in the past to help people perform the correct number of chest compressions each minute - as has Nellie the Elephant. However, using these tracks can lead to compressions which
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are too shallow, studies show. Experts now argue that better alternatives are now available. They want research into the field to come to an end. Correctly performed CPR (cardio-pulmonary resuscitation - or mouth-to-mouth) is lifesaving and
is thought to triple survival rates. The UK Resuscitation Council recommends that the chest is compressed by 5-6 cm and at a rate of 100-120 compressions per minute.
Look elsewhere Performing CPR to Stayin' Alive was recommended in the US as the song contains 103 beats per minute. Nellie the Elephant had been recommended in the UK. A study published in 2009 showed that using the song as an aid did increase the number of people getting the right rate. But there was a drop in those hitting the correct depth. Now a study, published in Emergency Medicine Journal, has investigated Achy Breaky Heart, by Billy Ray Cyrus, and Disco Science, by Mirwais. It showed more than a third of compressions were still too shallow. The authors concluded: "When considering the combined importance of correct depth and rate, the authors are unconvinced
that music provides any benefit in improving the quality of CPR compared with a metronome or audible feedback, suggesting that this interesting but unproductive area of resuscitation research should be discontinued." The St John Ambulance said training aids can prove helpful. "Although first aid training doesn't advocate using music to perform CPR, we have found that sometimes people struggle to get the correct number of chest compressions needed per minute and that a training aid, such as a certain musical beat, can help people identify the rate. "To be effective, both the rate and depth of chest compressions have to be right and we use other training aids to ensure that individuals get the right depth." The lead author of this study, Prof Malcolm Woollard, said music was not necessarily a bad tool and that "anything that encouraged people to intervene was a good thing". "Any form of CPR is better
than none at all," he added. However, he said technology was moving on and devices can sense the pressure and rate of chest compressions, even some smartphones, could be used. Dr Jasmeet Soar, chair of the Resuscitation Council (UK), said: "I agree with the authors that alternative prompt and feedback devices are probably better than music for improving the rate and depth of chest compressions given to patients with cardiac arrest. "More importantly, if someone has collapsed, is unconscious and unresponsive, and not breathing or just making occasional gasps, dial 999 and start chest compressions. Push hard at about two compressions per second. "After 30 chest compressions, give two rescue breaths if you are trained - if not, just carry on giving chest compressions until expert help arrives." www.bbcnews.com
November 11-17, 2011
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Tourism
The last Mayan rulers maintained themselves safes from conquest in the territory which is now Quintana Roo until well into the colonial era When the natives were finally subjugated by the conquistadores, the unhealthy jungles and swamps of this part of the Peninsula provided a refuge for Mayan rebels. Threes fighters created a small independent nation which survived through the second half of the 19th century in the eastern sector of what is now Quintana Roo State. This violence period in history saw a curios rebirth of some pre-Hispanic cities such as Tulum and Cobá.
Once more the smoke of ceremonial fires rose from the temples, and some buildings were even rehabilitated for human occupation. Here history borders on legend. The buildings of the ancient city of Tulum, surrounded by and impressive stone wall, stand atop a rocky cliff battered by the ceaseless waves of the turquoise Caribbean Sea. Apparently, various Mayan cities had fortifications of this type, but Tulum is the
only city where they have survived until today. In the center of the front wall there is a passage allowing access through the barricade. As we emerge, we are met buy the panorama of the House of the Chultún, the Temple of Frescoes and the Tomb of the Cross, as well as the so-called Inner Precinct or Inner Wall. The pyramids at Tulum are small and do not produce the same overwhelming sensation as other Mayan Cities. However, the modest dimensions make one feel in a city made to measure for human recreation, given its closeness to beautiful beaches. Moving forward , we come to the first group of structures: the Tomb of the Cross, the House of the Chultún and the Temple of Frescoes. The Tomb is a small stone rectangle with a cross-shaped opening in a center. There is nothing remarkable about this: it is not a Christian symbol, but rather a stylized representation of the Tree of Life, a common element in
pre-Hispanic mythologies. The Temple of the Frescoes, this building is in front of the House of the Chultún, and between the two there is a commemorative stele which has led to hundreds of conjectures as to the meaning of its undeciphered symbols. The temple is a two story building with some surviving mural paintings in the interior. The first floor is an elongated structure with a portico of columns, and the second is a shrine. On both floors, the façade has a niche in the central section, containing as bas-relief of the Descending God. This figure appears on t most of the important buildings at Tulum and may represent the setting sun, although it could also symbol of rain, lightning or even a god of apiculture, Ah Mucen Cab. The corners of the façades are formed by colossal heads of the creator god Itzamá. On the facades are surviving traces of the red and blue pigments with which the Maya colored their buildings.
November 11-17, 2011
The Inner Precinct, form the first group of temples we can tour the area enclosed by the Inner Wall, in which the most notable structure is the Castle of Tulum. Most buildings here have been eroded by the sea breezes, but two which stand out from the others are the Castle itself and the Temple of the Descending God. Between them stands and beautiful yet very simple square shrine no more than six feet in height; and almost in the center walled a space is a high, solid platform, also square in shape. if we climb up onto it, we can see the surrounding buildings and, beyond the Castle, the deep blue of the sea. The Castle is the dominant structure, not only of the group that surrounds it, but of the whole site. Like other buildings it is the result of a series of superimpositions and modifications which have produced a pyramidal base. It is flanked on the first level by two small structures, and the second by chambers with inner rooms. The temple was modified in the center where a section was filled in, leaving a narrow passage between the fill and the rear wall of the first corridor, where we can see remains of mural paintings in the characteristic style of Tulum. LATER THE Mayan architects built a platform whit a single sloping section and a wide staircase, bordered by balustrades that end in large cubes. On the upper terrace the constructed a temple. The builders of the Caste most have had the large model of Chichén Itzá in mind. Temple of the Descending God is located almost in the corner of the Precinct, is a small building with a single room standing on a pyramidal platform. The door of the temple, which is slightly wider at the bottom than at the top, and has a sunken lintel, leads to a narrow chamber with a barrel roof. Inside, on the rear wall , there survives a rather faded mural with painting similar to those in the Temple of Frescoes. There are still horizontal and vertical bands which suggest intertwined serpents; together they form a kind of square which frames seated female figures. www.bbcnews.com
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November 11-17, 2011
‘No substitute' for virgin forest An international team of researchers analysed more than 100 existing studies comparing wildlife in forests that had been modified and those that had not. Nature, notably birds, does much better in virgin tracts, they report.The researchers conclude in the journal Nature: "When it comes to maintaining tropical biodiversity, there is no substitute for primary forests". The study feeds into one of the major debates going on in environmental circles: whether it is better to exploit lots of land relatively gently, or to develop intensively in some areas and leave others as wild as possible. "Primary forests are truly unique and have exceptional value for biodiversity," said study co-leader Luke Gibson from the National University of Singapore. "So if you can minimise the destruction of primary forests, then that might be the best strategy for tropical biodiversity. "And if you have to use agricultural intensification of areas that are already used for agricultural production instead of focusing more on other forms of agriculture that attempt to maintain some levels of biodiversity, such as agrofrestry, that strategy might be more effective for maintaining the highest levels of biodiversity overall," he told BBC News. 'Marked' impact The researchers reviewed 138 studies that included 2,230 examples where biodiversity had been compared between tracts of virgin forest and areas where something had changed. Those changes ranged in severity from complete clearance for agriculture, through plantations and agroforestry, to selectively logged forests where only certain types of tree had been extracted. In all but the selectively logged areas, the impact on biodiversity was marked.The variety of plants and animals was depleted more severely than the sheer number of organisms present. Overall, there was one surprising finding; mammals actually do better under some kinds of forest modification, although the team warns this may be down to the fact that some animals such as rats can multiply, even as the diversity of mammals goes down. Birds, insects and plants undergo an unequivocal loss. The effect of losing forest emerged as particularly profound in Asian studies, compared with those in Africa and the Americas. Although Asian deforestation has slowed markedly in recent years, this is largely being driven by an expansion in treeplanting across China - which creates modified forests rather than preserving virgin stands.
The crucial role that virgin forests play in conserving nature is confirmed in a study that spans the tropics. "Southeast Asia, representing most of the Asian studies, emerged as a conservation hotspot and must be one of our top priority regions," said the study's other coleader Tien Ming Lee from the University of California in San Diego.
Sparing the land The debate over how best to preserve nature across the tropics where most of humanity's population growth will occur, and where the most rapid human development is taking place compares the effects of "landsharing" and "land-sparing".
In the first, farming and other development takes place in such a way that nature can share the same space. In the second, nature gets its own entitlement, and humanity uses other bits as intensively as it likes. Just a few weeks ago, a separate study concluded that landsparing results in higher benefits to biodiversity and to society, with greater protection for nature and higher farm yields. The new research is pointing in the same direction, said Simon Lewis from the UK's Leeds University, who was not involved in the study. "It's confirming what we already knew, but in a very statistically careful and systematic way," he said.
"It fits with the idea that we should be doing more land-sparing; but one of the limitations of the study it that it doesn't look at where biodiversity will be moving in the future (under climate change). "The places where plants and animals are appearing today are not going to be the same in 2030 or in a 100 years time, and we need to plan for that." The biggest source of funds for forest protection in the near future may be the UN's Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (Redd) initiative - and the researchers on the new paper say it will be crucial for Redd funds to prioritise the intact preservation of primary forest.
Tourism & Evironment
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Culture November 11-17, 2011
Quetzalcoatl Real Estate among the Maya Fashion & People Restaurantes
One of the most obvious of the mythological relationships between the Maya and Nahua is exhibited in the Maya cult of the god Quetzalcoatl. It seems to have been a general belief in Mexico that Quetzalcoatl was a god foreign to the soil; or at least relatively aboriginal to his rival Tezcatlipoca, if not to the Nahua themselves. It is amusing to see it stated by authorities of the highest standing that his worship was free from bloodshed. But it does not appear whether the sanguinary rites connected with the name of Quetzalcoatl in Mexico were undertaken by his priests of their own accord or at the instigation and pressure of the pontiff of Huitzilopochtli, under whose jurisdiction they were. The designation by which Quetzalcoatl was known to the Maya was Kukulcan, which signifies "Feathered Serpent," and is exactly translated by his Mexican name. In Guatemala he was called Gucumatz, which word is also identical in Kiche with his other native appellations. But the Kukulcan of the Maya appears to be dissimilar from Quetzalcoatl in several of his attributes. The difference in climate would probably account for most of these. In Mexico Quetzalcoatl, as we have seen, was not only the Man of the Sun, but the original wind-god of the country. The Kukulcan of the Maya has more the attributes of a thunder-god. In the tropical climate of Yucatan and Guatemala the sun at midday appears to draw the clouds around it in serpentine shapes. From these emanate thunder and lightning
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and the fertilising rain, so that Kukulcan would appear to have appealed to the Maya more as a god of the sky who wielded the thunderbolts than a god of the atmosphere proper like Quetzalcoatl, though several of the stelĂŚ in Yucatan represent Kukulcan as he is portrayed in Mexico, with wind issuing from his mouth.
Difficulties of Comparison Unluckily the accounts of Spanish authors concerning Maya mythology do not agree with the representations of the gods delineated in the codices. That the three codices have
a mythology in common is certain. Again, great difficulty is found in comparing the deities of the codices with those represented by the carved and stucco bas-reliefs of the Maya region. It will thus be seen that very considerable difficulties beset the student in this mythological sphere. So few data have yet been collected regarding the Maya mythology that to dogmatise upon any subject connected with it would indeed be rash. But much has been accomplished in the past few decades, and evidence is slowly but surely accumulating from which sound conclusions can be drawn. Traditional Knowledge of the
GodsThe heavenly bodies had important representation in the Maya pantheon. In Yucatan the sungod was known as Kinich-ahau (Lord of the Face of the Sun). He was identified with the Fire-bird, or Arara, and was thus called Kinich-Kakmo (Fire-bird; lit. Sun-bird). He was also the presiding genius of the north. Itzamna, one of the most important of the Maya deities, was a moon-god, the father of gods and men. In him was typified the decay and recurrence of life in nature. His name was derived from the words he was supposed to have given to men regarding himself: "Itz en caan, itz en muyal" ("I am the dew
of the heaven, I am the dew of the clouds "). He was tutelar deity of the west.Chac, the rain-god, is the possessor of an elongated nose, not unlike the proboscis of a tapir, which of course is the spout whence comes the rain which he blows over the earth. He is one of the best represented gods on both manuscripts and monuments, and presides over the east. The black god Ekchuah was the god of merchants and cacao-planters. He is represented in the manuscripts several times. Ix ch'el was the goddess of medicine, and Ix chebel yax was identified by the priest Hernandez with the Virgin Mary. There were also several deities, or rather genii, called Bacabs, who were the upholders of the heavens in the four quarters of the sky. The names of these were Kan, Muluc, Ix, and Cauac, representing the east, north, west, and south. Their symbolic colours were yellow, white, black, and red respectively. The corresponded in some degree to the four variants of the Mexican rain-god Tlaloc, for many of the American races believed that rain, the fertiliser of the soil, emanated from the four points of the compass. We shall find still other deities when we come to discuss the Popol Vuh, the saga-book of the Kiche, but it is difficult to say how far these were connected with the deities of the Maya of Yucatan, concerning whom we have little traditional knowledge, and it is better to deal with them separately, pointing out resemblances where these appear to exist. www.bbcnews.com
Culture November 11-17, 2011
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The devil's face is tucked away in one corner of a block of swirling clouds
Devil's face revealed in Giotto fresco in Italy An Italian art historian, Chiara Frugoni, spotted the devil's profile in the fresco's clouds, high up in the Basilica of St Francis in Assisi.The face, with hooked nose and an evil smirk, is hard to see from the ground. The fresco, featuring the death of St Francis, dates from the 13th Century. Giotto di Bondone is seen as one of the finest Early Renaissance artists. Ms Frugoni said it was previously thought the first artist to conceal a portrait in
clouds was Andrea Mantegna, in the 15th Century. His painting of St Sebastian, done in 1460, has a cloud from which a mysterious knight appears. The Assisi basilica was last restored after suffering severe damage in an earthquake in 1997. The basilica's chief restorer, Sergio Fusetti, said the devil image may have been a joke by Giotto aimed at somebody he had quarrelled with. www.bbcnews.com Photo: AP
The exhibition, which runs until 5 February, is expected to be one of the most popular in the gallery's history and is sold out until midDecember. Leonardo: Painter at the Court of Milan focuses on his formative years as a court artist in the 1480s and 1490s. It features nine paintings and many more drawings by the legendary artist. The paintings include his acknowledged masterpiece The Lady with an Ermine and two versions of The Virgin of the Rocks, hanging together for the first time. The Portrait of a Musician, La Belle Ferronniere and Salvator Mundi - only recently authenticated as a Da Vinci - are also featured. The Louvre in Paris, the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg and the Vatican Art Gallery in Rome are among the institutions to loan works to the exhibition. Organisers say it is "the most complete display of Leonardo's rare surviving paintings" ever brought together in one place. Members of the press got their chance to inspect the exhibition on Tuesday and have been lavish in their praise. "It's the hottest ticket in town," wrote Richard Dorment in the Daily Telegraph in his four-star review. "London's latest blockbuster art show confirms Leonardo da Vinci as a Renaissance rock star," opined Jill Lawless in the Huffington Post. The collection of drawings, writes the Los Angeles Times' Culture Monster, "comprise an extraordinary show within a show". The Arts Desk's Fisun Guner, meanwhile, described the exhibition as "unmissable", saying it would "do much to increase your engagement with this great master of the High Renaissance".
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Leonardo Da Vinci 窶話lockbuster' opens in London
Oxford University professor Martin Kemp describes why Da Vinci's works are so engaging
Crowds of art lovers are visiting the National Gallery in London as its "blockbuster" Leonardo da Vinci show opens to the public. The National Gallery is limiting visitor numbers to the exhibition in an attempt to prevent large crowds detracting from the viewing experience. Admissions will be fixed at 180 every half hour - 50 fewer people than the gallery is legally
allowed to let in. Even so, the audio guide accompanying the exhibition frequently advises visitors to "step back" from paintings to allow other art lovers a better view. www.bbcnews.com The cleaner had been told to keep at least 20cm away from the art
Works by Rembrandt and Caravaggio and items once belonging to Russia's tsars will be among around 120 items on show.The Hermitage's director said there had "never been such an exhibition, of and about the Hermitage, outside Russia". Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said the collection represented "the pride and glory of civilisation's cultural heritage". Artworks by Spanish artists Diego Velazquez, Pablo Picasso and Diego de Rivera will temporarily return home, flanked by famous pieces by Matisse, Cezanne and Kandinsky. Faberge jewels and gold items dating from as early as the fifth Century BC will also be on display. The Hermitage in the Prado opens to the public on Tuesday and will run until March. It is the second part of an exchange of collections that has taken place between the two museums which began earlier this year with the exhibi-
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Prado to host Hermitage exhibition
Caravaggio's Lute Player is one of the artworks on loan from the Hermitage
tion The Prado in the Hermitage, held in St Petersburg. "It is a good taster," said sculptor Alejandra Majewski, who attended a preview of the exhibit in Madrid. "The Hermitage is so huge it is
really difficult to give an accurate depiction of its collection, but this is a great attempt made up of examples of extraordinary quality." www.bbcnews.com
$1m artwork damaged by cleaner The patina was meant to look like a puddle beneath a rubber trough placed under a stacked tower of wooden slats. Artist Martin Kippenberger's When It Starts Dripping From the Ceiling remains on display in Dortmund's Ostwall Museum, where the damage occurred. The work is on loan to the museum. The private collector who owns the installation by Kippenberger - who died in 1997 - has agreed that it remain on display despite the incident. Dortmund city spokesperson Dagmar Papajewski said it had not been decided whether the patina would be restored. "It will be up to the collector to decide," Ms Papajewski
told AP. "We can't consult Kippenberger about it." Ms Papajewski said the company that employed the cleaning staff had been working with the museum since October last year and had told their staff to stay at least 20cm away from the artwork. Kippenberger was a prolific artist who produced work in a wide range of styles and media. His portfolio included sculpture, paintings, prints and installations. His works have been displayed at New York's Museum of Modern Art, London's Tate Modern and London's Saatchi Gallery. www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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November 11-17, 2011
The Forbes list says that Barrymore's films earned 40 cents (25p) for every dollar (67p) she was paid, while Murphy's returned about $2.70 (£1.68). Reese Witherspoon, Denzel Washington and Will Ferrell complete the top five. The 40 highest paid actors had their pay measured against the budget and earnings of their last three movies. Everybody's Fine, a 2009 film starring Drew Barrymore and Robert De Niro, earned only $16m (£10m) globally according to Forbes. And while Eddie Murphy may be well known for box office hits like The Nutty Professor, his recent films have not done well. His 2009 comedy-drama Imagine That only earned $22m (£14m) from its $55m (£34m) budget. Will Ferrell may be number
three in the countdown, with mixed success meaning he only made $3.50 (£2.18) for every dollar, but it's not all bad - the last two years the comedian was number one on the list. Legally Blonde star Reese Witherspoon - at number four with a return of $3.55 (£2.21) has seen her value hit by the failure of 2010's How Do You Know. The film, which also starred Owen Wilson and Jack Nicholson, only brought in $50m (£31m) worldwide from its $120m (£75m) budget. Denzel Washington is perhaps an unexpected face at number five, with recent movies like The Book of Eli banking $157m (£98m). However, the star's pay which Forbes estimates at up to $20m (£12.5m) - suggests he may not always be the best value. The actor's average return on his last three films was $4.25m (£2.65m). Rounding out the Forbes top 10 are Nicolas Cage, Adam Sandler, Vince Vaughn, Tom Cruise (after 2007 film Lions for Lambs only made $63m £39m), and Nicole Kidman.
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"As painful as this may be for me, it would be worse if my association with the show were to be a distraction from the Academy and the high ideals it represents," he said in an open letter. His departure follows his use of the word "fags" in a Q&A session last week. In a statement, Academy president Tom Sherak said Ratner was "a good person" who had made "unacceptable" comments. "Words have meaning, and they have consequences," he continued. "We all hope this will be an opportunity to raise awareness about the harm that is caused by reckless and insensitive remarks, regardless of the intent." Ratner, whose films include Rush Hour and Red Dragon, was appointed as a co-producer of the 2012 Academy Awards in August. One of his first acts was to
recruit Eddie Murphy, the star of his most recent film Tower Heist, to be its presenter. 'Hurtful' It was while discussing Tower Heist last week in a Los Angeles cinema that the director made what he has since called "hurtful and stupid" remarks. Asked about his working methods, he responded by saying: "Rehearsal is for fags" - a derogatory term for gay men. "Everyone who knows me knows that I don't have a prejudiced bone in my body," the director said in an initial statement on Monday. "But as a storyteller I should have been much more thoughtful about the power of language and my choice of words." That was followed by an "open letter to the entertainment industry" in which he apologised "publicly and unreservedly... to
Ratner's films include Rush Hour and XMen: The Final Stand
everyone I've hurt and offended". US TV producer Don Mischer will remain as producer of the 84th Academy Awards, to be held in Los Angeles on 26 February.
Hanging Out Filming for new Scarlett
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Harry Potter and Glee up for People's Choice Awards The film franchise is nominated in nine categories including favourite movie and ensemble movie cast. Katy Perry is up for seven prizes and Glee also has seven nods, including six in TV acting categories, as well as for favourite network TV comedy. Voting for the awards show at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles in January ends on Tuesday 6 December. Daniel Radcliffe is up against Johnny Depp, Robert Pattinson, Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman for the favourite actor prize. Favourite movie actress nominees include Emma Stone, Jennifer Aniston, Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway and Reese Witherspoon. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 competes against
Director Brett Ratner has resigned as a producer of the 2012 Oscars after using a derogatory term in public.
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, The Help and Bridesmaids for the best film title. Katy Perry's seven nominations span the music, movies and TV genres, including favourite animated movie voice as Smurfette in The Smurfs and favourite TV guest star as Honey on CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother. The People's Choice Awards, which will take place on 11 January, come at the start of Hollywood's annual season of film and television honours leading up to February's Oscars. Organisers say more than 40 million people voted online or via mobile phones and social media websites like Facebook or Twitter, for their nominees last year in 43 categories.
Johansson film to stop traffic Transport Scotland has granted permission for filming south of Loch Ba on the A82 in Glencoe until Thursday. The government agency said the road would be closed for 10 minute periods to allow queuing traffic to clear before the next closure was made. The film Under the Skin is based on a novel of the same name by Michel Faber. Running from central Scotland to Inverness, the A82 is a key route in the Highlands. It was understood that the section of road would be closed for about 20 times on Wednesday and 10 on Thursday. Stewart Maclean, of the A82 Partnership which campaigns for improvements to the route, said the filming was welcome. However, he said local communities had not been consulted by Transport Scotland on the temporary closures.
Mr Maclean told BBC Radio Scotland that they came on top of roadworks and other disruption. He said: "We have always been fantastic hosts of film companies in Lochaber. "What we are highlighting is decisions made by bureaucrats sitting in Glasgow without any consultation." Transport Scotland said it had consulted with the police and the film's production company before agreeing to the closures. It said advance notice of the filming was placed in the Oban Times newspaper on 3 November. In a statement, Transport Scotland said: "Wider consultation with local communities along the A82 was not considered necessary due to the minimal delays and low traffic flows in this particular area. "The police will hold the traffic out of shot, and then release it to clear any backlog before the next 10 minute closure.
Riviera Maya
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Drew Barrymore and Eddie Murphy have topped a list of Hollywood's most overpaid actors.
Photo: AP
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Oscars producer Brett Ratner resigns Tourism & Evironment after ‘gay slur'
Barrymore and Murphy top Forbes ‘overpaid' actors list
A road sign warning of delays on the A82 because of the filming
"Variable message signs will be set up in advance of the works advising motorists of possible 10 minute delays." www.bbcnews.com
Entertainment November 11-17, 2011
Conrad Murray guilty of Michael Jackson manslaughter 'Drug addict' The jury - made up of one African American, six whites and five Hispanics - deliberated on Friday and through the morning on Monday. Outside the court, fans of Michael Jackson were cheering and chanting, "Guilty! Guilty!" in the run-up to the verdict being announced. During the six-week trial, 49 witnesses and more than 300 pieces of evidence were presented to the court.
Michael Jackson, who had been out of the public eye for several years, died in 2009 as he was preparing for a series of comeback performances at the O2 arena in London. In his closing argument last Thursday, the prosecution said Dr Murray had caused the star's death through negligence, depriving Jackson's children of their father and the world of a "genius". The defence argued that Jackson was a drug addict who caused his own death by giving himself an extra dose of propofol while the cardiologist was out of the room at the star's rented mansion in Los Angeles. However, lawyers for Dr Murray dropped a key argument midway through the trial - that the pop superstar had drunk the propofol. But they continued to argue that Jackson had somehow dosed himself otherwise. Each side of the trial called their own expert witness on the anaesthetic drug. There is no law against administering propofol, but the prose-
Photo: AP
Explaining his decision, the judge said Dr Murray was now a convicted felon and had considerable ties outside the state of California, meaning he could not guarantee that the doctor would remain in the state. Dr Murray sat silently in court, shifting slightly in his seat as the verdict was read out. Court officers began to handcuff the physician as the judge made his final announcements, before leading him away into custody.
Michael Jackson's personal physician, Dr Conrad Murray, has been found guilty of the involuntary manslaughter of the star by a jury in Los Angeles.
cution's case rested on the argument that Dr Murray was grossly negligent by doing so outside a hospital setting and without the proper monitoring equipment. In some of the more shocking moments of the trial, the jury heard Photo: AP
A panel of seven men and five women took two days of deliberation to reach a verdict. Michael Jackson died on 25 June 2009 from an overdose of the powerful anaesthetic propofol. Murray, 58, could now receive a maximum prison term of four years and lose his licence to practise medicine. There was a shriek in the courtroom as the verdict was read. Outside the courthouse, the BBC's Peter Bowes said that at the moment the verdict was read, the crowd along the street erupted with cheers and chanting. Jackson's family sat in the courtroom, weeping quietly. LaToya Jackson told the Associated Press news agency the family was overjoyed at the verdict. "Michael was looking over us," she said. During the trial, Dr Murray's lawyers argued that Jackson selfadministered a lethal dose of the drug while he was out of the room. Dr Murray was remanded in custody without bail until he receives his sentence, set for 29 November.
Director Julie Taymor sues Spider-Man producers Julie Taymor, the original director and co-writer of the Spider-Man musical, has sued the producers of the fraught Broadway show over unpaid royalties. Michael Cohl and Jeremiah J Harris parted ways in March, after which Philip William McKinley who directed the hit The Boy From Oz starring Hugh Jackman was brought in. The musical's book - which lays out the narrative structure was revised and the show officially opened on 14 June this year. It has since gone on to fill houses and meet the $1.2m (£748,000) weekly takings required to meet costs. Taymor is pursuing half of all profits from the original SpiderMan show and a permanent ban of the use of her name or likeness in connection with a filmed documentary made about the troubled early days of the musical. According to Taymor's lawyer,
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Robert De Niro to star as disgraced financier Bernie Madoff Robert De Niro is to play disgraced financier Bernie Madoff in an HBO movie he will produce, according to reports.
Taymor (centre) joined U2's Bono and the Edge at the show's official opening in June
Taymor is seeking $1 million (£621,000). She claims her creative rights were violated and that she hasn't been compensated for her work. She was fired in March after delays, injuries to the cast and poor reviews. Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark began previews in November 2010 before finally opening in June 2011. Taymor, known for the 2002 Oscar-winning film Frida and the hit stage adaptation of Disney's The Lion King, began work on Spider-Man in 2007. U2's Bono and The Edge wrote music and lyrics for the $75 million (£47 million) production one of the most expensive in Broadway history. The show's elaborate aerial stunts led to several cast members being seriously injured during rehearsals. That, coupled with some poor reviews, kept the show in preview for more than 180 performances. Taymor and producers
a recording of Jackson, sounding incoherent and slurred, speaking about his upcoming concert series, as well as viewing a photo of a lifeless Jackson on a gurney.
Laurie Sandell's book, Truth and Consequences: Life Inside the Madoff Family, will be used as source material, The Hollywood Reporter says. Diane Henrique's best seller, The Wizard of Lies: Bernie Madoff and the Death of Trust, will also be used. Madoff is in prison for fraud in the US after conning £41bn from thousands of investors. The film will be written by John Burnham Schwartz, who wrote the novel Reservation Road, which was turned into a film in 2007 starring Joaquin Phoenix.
Sandell's book was written with the co-operation of Madoff's son Andrew and other family members. Andrew and his mother Ruth helped promote the book on TV, including an in-depth interview on CBS programme 60 Minutes. In 2009, Bernie Madoff admitted defrauding investors through a Ponzi scheme, which paid out using their money rather than any profits. He said the scheme had been running since the early 1990s. www.bbcnews.com
Charles Spada, "producers have failed to compensate Ms Taymor for their continued use of her work to date". Taymor is also suing Glen Berger, her former co-writer. She said revisions to the book were made "without her approval". Her lawsuit said her contract called for no changes to be made without her consent. In a statement, producers have denied Taymor claims, saying "the production has indeed compensated Ms Taymor for her contribution as a co-book writer". They added, "the court system will provide, once and for all, an opportunity to resolve this dispute". www.bbcnews.com
De Niro's Tribeca Productions will make the film
The International weekly
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November 11-17, 2011
The brand has been sold to car company Group Lotus, sponsor of the Renault team, it was announced on Wednesday. It is part of a plan that will see Team Lotus, owned by Malaysian businessman Tony Fernandes, change its name to Caterham F1 in 2012. BBC Sport understands Renault's new name will be Lotus F1 Team. That name-change, although yet to be revealed officially, means the Team Lotus brand will once again disappear from the sport. Last Thursday, the two teams were officially granted leave to change the names of the chassis they run, an agreement that is part of a wider deal to settle a long-running legal dispute over the use of the Lotus name in F1. The row was between car company Group Lotus, owned by the Malaysian company Proton, and Fernandes, who owns the Caterham sportscar company. An announcement on Wednesday said the dispute between the two parties had "ended amicably". It added they would "work together on future projects in the automotive field". The dispute over the Lotus name in F1 began in 2009, when Fernandes entered a team in F1 using the name Lotus Racing, under licence from Group Lotus. At that time Group Lotus had made it clear to Fernandes that it did not own the rights to the name Team Lotus.
Photo: AP
Team Lotus brand to disappear from Formula 1 next season The historic Team Lotus brand will disappear from Formula 1 in 2012 following the resolution of the dispute over the Lotus name in the sport. But the two parties soon fell out, with Group Lotus deciding it wanted to promote its brand in F1 with a more established team. It agreed a sponsorship deal with the Renault team for 2011 and terminated its licensing agreement with Fernandes. Fernandes then reverted to the historic Team Lotus name, having bought the rights from businessman David Hunt - brother of 1976 world champion James Hunt - who had purchased the rights to the name following the winding-up of the original Team Lotus in 1994. Both decisions were the subject of a lawsuit which was finally resolved in London's High Court in May. A judge ruled Team Lotus could continue to race under that name but that Group Lotus retained the right to use the Lotus marque on its road cars, and in F1 if it chose to enter its own team. Fernandes, however, had already begun formulating a back-up plan by buying English sportscar manufacturer Caterham in April. That led to new talks with Group Lotus, which ended with them submitting the joint request to change their names that was agreed by F1 decision-makers on Thursday.
The permission to change the names of the cars produced by the teams - and under which they are officially entered in the championship was granted by the F1 Commission, a body of senior figures in the sport. Chassis names have an impact on the amount of prize money a team can receive, which is partly distributed on grounds of historical results. Official permission from rivals is needed to change a chassis name because it has an effect on the amount of money all teams receive. Last week, it was revealed that the cars run by the team currently known as Team Lotus would be known as Caterhams, and that the cars run by the team currently known as Renault would be called Lotus. On Wednesday, Fernandes announced that his team would be called Caterham F1. Group Lotus has, BBC Sport understands, decided that Team Lotus as a brand will disappear hence the decision to call the F1 outfit Lotus F1 Team. Group Lotus bought the rights to the Team Lotus name to ensure it had control over it and to prevent the possibility of a similar dispute occurring in the future. The team has been racing
Team Lotus will race as Caterham F1 and Renault will become Lotus F1 Team
under the official title of Lotus Renault GP this year, but is widely referred to as Renault to avoid confusion with Fernandes' Team Lotus, and because that is the official name of the cars it makes. However, Renault, the French car company, no longer has any involvement, following the team's takeover by the Luxembourg-based venture capital group Genii Capital. Genii boss Gerard Lopez has recently become a shareholder in Group Lotus and Genii is believed to be considering a full takeover of the car company. Group Lotus chief executive officer Dany Bahar said in a statement on Wednesday: "We understand that this has been a very difficult and con-
fusing time for the fans of the sport and the Lotus brand, so we are glad to have reached a clear resolution on this important matter." Team Lotus chief executive officer Riad Asmat added: "We are proud of what we have achieved by bringing the Team Lotus name back to Formula 1 when many tried and, although we are sad to say goodbye to Team Lotus, we are excited about owning our own future and being in control of our own destiny. "Now we have no-one to be compared to. We make our own history and we will remain green and yellow. "We look forward to an exciting future racing under our new team name of Caterham F1 Team."
Tourism & Evironment
Alvaro Bautista replaces Marco Simoncelli at Team Gresini Suzuki rider Alvaro Bautista has been named as Marco Simoncelli's replacement at Team Gresini from next season. Italian rider Simoncelli, 24, died in a crash at the Malaysian MotoGP in Sepang on 23 October."I am very sad to be leaving Suzuki after the two great years that I have had here," Bautista, 26, told the Suzuki team website. "It has been a great team to work in and I have learnt a lot of things from everyone in the team." The Spaniard added: "It was a fantastic experience working with an English-Japanese team and we have become like a big family, except we have never had any arguments and no-one falls out with each other. "I want to thank everybody personally for the last two years, sometimes it has been difficult, but nobody ever gave up and I felt like I
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always had their full support and commitment." Team manager Fausto Gresini is confident that Bautista will be a success for the team. "He is a very fast rider and I also hold him in high regard for his personality," Gresini told gresiniracing.com. "I am sure that he will integrate swiftly into our group and that we will enjoy some pleasant experiences together in the future." Bautista, who has suffered two injury-hit seasons with Suzuki, has 16 grand prix victories to his name at 250cc and 125cc level but has yet to open his account in MotoGP. The Spaniard won the 125cc World Championship in 2006 and challenged for the 250cc title from 2007-2009 until making the step up. He joined Suzuki in 2010, scoring 85 points on his way to finishing 13th in the drivers' standings. This year, he matched that finishing position with a score of 67 points, his best finish being fifth at the British Grand Prix in June.
Gabon host Brazil as Nations Cup arena opens The Gabonese are co-hosting the tournament along with Equatorial Guinea and inaugurate their new stadium in Libreville on Thursday. "This game is one to show that we are able to resist a big team," said Rohr. Gabon have been drawn against surprise qualifiers Niger and former champions Morocco and Tunisia. And Brazil will provide a stern test as the 2012 co-hosts finally get the chance to play a match at home - an event that has been rare with the construction of the Stade de l'Amitie in the capital. Rohr has complained about the lack of friendlies at home before, but now the stadium that will host the Nations Cup final on 12 February is finally ready. "The possibility to play at home is the chance to show to everyone that we have a good team and a good spirit," the German told BBC Sport. Despite the absences of big names like Real Madrid duo Kaka and Marcelo through injury, hosting the five-time world champions represents a glorious opportunity for Rohr.
Hanging Out www.bbcnews.com
Gabon coach Gernot Rohr believes the clash against Brazil will provide the perfect test for his side ahead of the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations. "This is really exciting for us because these games are very seldom," added Rohr. "Brazilian players are the most technical in the world and it's a chance for us to have a big test against one of the world's big teams." Gabon, who have never won the Nations Cup nor qualified for a World Cup, get their 2012 campaign underway when hosting Niger in Libreville on 23 January. They play Morocco in the same venue four days later before moving to Gabon's second venue, Franceville, for their final Group C tie against Tunisia on 31 January. Brazil, meanwhile, will host the next World Cup in 2014. www.bbcnews.com
Sports November 11-17, 2011
Tributes paid to former boxing champion Joe Frazier Frazier will be best remembered for being the first man to beat Ali
Muhammad Ali has led tributes from around the world for former heavyweight boxing champion Joe Frazier, who has died aged 67 from liver cancer. "The world has lost a great champion," said 69-year-old Ali, who fought Frazier three times. "I will always remember Joe with respect and admiration. My sympathy goes out to his family and loved ones." Former heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis said of Frazier: "He was one of boxing's greats. He was legendary." The Briton added: "He has made his mark in boxing, everyone knows his history. "Without him, other boxing heroes wouldn't be great either because they really tested his talent against him.
Frazier, who won Olympic gold in 1964, became world champion in 1970 after Ali had been stripped of his titles in 1967 for refusing to fight in the Vietnam War. When Ali tried to reclaim his belts, Frazier beat him, winning their much-hyped clash in 1971. It was Ali's first loss as a professional, but a defeat he avenged. Frazier and Ali met a further two times in the ring, Ali winning both contests, including the epic "Thrilla in Manila" in 1975. The American also fought compatriot George Foreman, another of boxing's heavyweight greats. They met twice, Foreman winning on both occasions. Foreman told BBC Radio 5 live: "Once I heard the news about Joe Frazier I found myself saying:
'Down goes George Foreman'. "He was a wonderful man and a wonderful friend and the world won't be the same without him. "Joe Frazier was the most amazing fighter. He never stood any more than 5ft 9in, some say 5ft 10in, but he was not that tall. Every big man in boxing was afraid of little guys. "He was such a terror. Muhammad Ali and George Foreman were big guys but when we went in the ring with Joe Frazier, we had to have respect. "I hoped I never had to fight him. He wouldn't back down. If you hit him, he liked it. "The first thing I remember is when he missed [hitting] me. Just missing scared me so much that I knocked him down six times. "Even when they stopped the boxing match to award me the championship of the world he was still on his feet. "When Ali and Frazier fought, there will never be a spectacular moment in sport like that again. It was big." Other boxing names, past and present, were also quick to pay their respects. Joe Bugner, who lost to Frazier five months after being beaten by Ali in 1973, told BBC Radio 5 live: "Joe Frazier was relentless. Here was a man about 5ft 10in, he weighed about a stone lighter than myself, but he was so courageous and ferocious. You literally had to hit him with a sledgehammer to put him away. "In 1973, I was 23 years old. I became a man after that fight because I realised you can't go through a career like boxing without seeing and feeling the power of the greats. "I happened to have the privi-
Rubens Barrichello refuses to give up hope on F1 career Ex-champion Kimi Raikkonen and Force India's Adrian Sutil have been linked with the Brazilian's Williams seat. But Barrichello, 39, said in Abu Dhabi: "I might go to Brazil without any confirmation but I'm not saying goodbye to my fans. "I want to be here next year and taking the risk. I'm waiting for an answer." Barrichello did not directly answer a suggestion that it might be better to know about his future before preparing for what could be his final home race in Sao Paulo on 27 November. BBC Sport understands Williams are unlikely to keep Barrichello on for a third season in 2012. Raikkonen has revealed in the Finnish press that he has been talking with Williams about returning to F1 after a two-year absence from the sport. Sutil is also understood to have held talks with the team.
Pastor Maldonado, who is sponsored by Venezuela's national oil company, is expected to keep his seat with Williams for 2012. Barrichello, who has scored two points this season to Maldonado's one, remains philosophical about his chances of winning a new contract. "Everyone that is in contention has something good to give to the team," said Barrichello, a former race-winner for Ferrari and Brawn Grand Prix. "I can not talk anything bad about Kimi, I cannot talk anything bad about anyone really. We all are in contention. I just hope I'm the better option. "F1 has become a business in a way and I think situations have been considered by the team. I just have to wait and see. "I'm positive. If God wishes, I will be on the grid for my 20th year." Sutil could come into the frame for Williams as he finds his Force
India seat under pressure from former Williams driver Nico Hulkenberg, while Scotland's Paul di Resta is expected to stay on at Force India after a solid rookie season. When asked in Abu Dhabi about his future at Force India, Sutil said there had been "no real progress". And pressed on his talks with Williams, the German said: "I'm not sharing it with you." He added that there had been "no real progress" on this future ahead of this weekend's penultimate race in Abu Dhabi. "I don't think after so many years doing a good job in this team I have to shiver and think about my future," said Sutil, who is in his fourth season for Force India. "I'm relaxed. I like this team but if it doesn't work out then I'll find something else." www.bbcnews.com
lege of fighting Frazier and Ali, and a few others, but those two to me were the greatest. "Joe took everything away I thought I had and made me realise I needed more. If I was going to succeed I needed a lot more. "It hit me like a lightning bolt when I heard he died." Former world champion Chris Eubank added: "In boxing, you look for an intense rivalry with men who are of the highest calibre in their abilities to fight. "Muhammad Ali could not have been the mammoth character, fighter and man he became without Joe Frazier. He just couldn't have. "You need someone to bounce off. You need another great. The operative word is great and indeed he [Frazier] was." WBC champion Vitali Klitschko said: "He was a huge fighter, huge champion and a huge personality. "I didn't have a chance to meet him personally, but I heard about him and that's why he is always in the memory of the next generation of great fighters. "From me and my brother [fellow world champion] Wladimir, I want to say sorry that he has died. He was one of the great champions." Eight-time world champion Manny Pacquiao said: "Boxing lost a great champion and the sport lost a great ambassador." And five-time divisional world champion Floyd Mayweather added: "RIP Smokin Joe. My thoughts and prayers go out to the Frazier family. We lost an alltime great tonight." Promoter Frank Warren believes Frazier's fights with Ali and Foreman mean the American will
be remembered as one of the sport's finest. "He was part of that era when we had the best heavyweights there had ever been," said Warren. "People talk about Mike Tyson at the age of 21 - Joe Frazier, when he was a young fella, was every bit [as good as], if not better than, Tyson."WBC light-heavyweight champion Bernard Hopkins, a fellow Philadelphia fighter, said Frazier was an icon in the city and that he should have his own statue. "There's no way in the world you should come to Philadelphia and not recognise who Joe Frazier is," he commented. "It's the perfect time to build the biggest statue in appreciation for all the heart and love he gave to Philadelphia. We didn't realise we had a super-special person among us that we all, in a way, took for granted. I said this when he was living, I say this now." Former welterweight and lightwelterweight world champion Ricky Hatton said that it is a very sad day for the world of boxing. "The word 'legend' is sometimes passed around too easily in sport nowadays but the word 'legend' really does sum Joe Frazier up," Hatton told BBC Sport. "He was a real throwback fought the best, took on allcomers and was as brave as they come. They don't make heavyweights like Joe Frazier any more. He would always come forward, everything was always a hook, hugely exciting and the era he boxed in was probably the most dangerous competitive era in heavyweight history." www.bbcnews.com
Paula Radcliffe keeps marathon record after IAAF ruling Paula Radcliffe has won her battle to prevent her marathon world record being downgraded to "world's best" status. In August, the International Association of Athletics Federations decided to recognise only times from single-sex events as world records.Radcliffe, 37, broke the world record at the 2003 London Marathon with two male pacemakers. However, athletics body IAAF has now ruled that existing records will continue to be recognised. But, following an IAAF Competition Commission for women's world records for road events, new records will only be recognised and ratified if they come from single-sex races
from the start of next year. Radcliffe went to Monaco to lobby IAAF president Lamine Diack about the matter in October. She had been adamant that her time of two hours, 15 minutes and 25 seconds, which beat her previous world record by 1:53 mins, should still count. The 2003 London Marathon was one of only two occasions when Radcliffe has run a marathon in a mixed field and she has always argued that she gained no advantage from the two male pacemakers she ran with. IAAF council member Helmut Digel said: "The record will stay. Nobody will cancel the record of Paula. That is sure. Her record will never be diminished. "It was not against old records at all. We realise that these performances were excellent performances." www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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Fashion & People November 11-17, 2011
elise overland Restaurantes ready to wear Boho with sophistication
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nspired in Antonioni´s 1966 film Blowup and old African colonial uniform, Elise Overland presents this collection with mini-dresses, ruffles and military-inspired separated, leather dresses and jackets. Either you rather a casual look, or even a innocent, this collection shows a perfect combination between a sophistication and elegance with a touch of simplicity in forms, paths. You can miss the color palette in pea green-yellow, cream, black, white with gold, electric blue, khaki and emerald.
Hoteles
All you need for feeling fresh, edgy and if you are the floppy hair style with a sassy pair of boots you can make a pretty boho but sophistic look.
Business
Tourism
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Fashion & People November 11-17, 2011
Photo: AP
William and Kate opt for Kensington Palace home The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have decided to take the former home of the Queen's sister, Princess Margaret, as their permanent London residence. St James's Palace said the couple had chosen an apartment in Kensington Palace to be their base in the city. However, they will not move in for two years because structural improvements are needed to make it habitable. Margaret and Lord Snowdon lived in the apartment after they wed in 1960, the last time major work was carried out. The princess remained in the property after she and her husband divorced in 1978. It
The Kensington Palace apartment will not be ready for the couple to move into until at least mid-2013
had a variety of uses after she died in 2002. Large amounts of asbestos need to be removed and repairs must be carried out on the heating and hot water systems, as well as electrical wiring, before William and Catherine can move in.
Taxpayer funding The estimated cost of the structural improvements is not known because survey work has not yet been carried out. The cost will be met by the government's grant-in-aid budget provided to the Royal Household
Prince William to be deployed to Falklands
Prince William will complete a routine deployment as a Royal Air Force search and rescue co-pilot. Flt Lt Wales - as he is known - from 22 Squadron, RAF Valley, will be part of a crew of four RAF personnel. The deployment will form the latest stage of his training programme, RAF officials said. His tour of the remote islands in the South Atlantic - a British overseas territory - was announced this summer, but details and timings have only just been finalised.
'Career progression' The dates of his tour have been chosen to avoid a clash with the Queen's 2012 Diamond Jubilee celebrations, which William is expected to attend over an extended four-day bank holiday weekend in June. The MoD said in a statement: "This deployment forms part of a normal squadron crew rotation and will form part of Flt Lt Wales' training and career progression as a search and rescue pilot within the RAF." The 30th anniversary of the Falklands War will also be commemorated next year. William's uncle, the Duke of York, served in the 10-week conflict in 1982 as a Sea King helicopter pilot. William, who will be posted without his wife Catherine, qualified as an RAF Search and Rescue Force (Sarf ) helicop-
The Duke's tour was first announced in the summer
ter co-pilot last September and is based at RAF Valley, in Anglesey, north Wales. Observers say he has increased his workload recently as he seeks to qualify as a captain. Tensions between Argentina and Britain over the disputed islands remain. This summer, Argentine president Cristina Kirchner accused David Cameron of "mediocrity bordering on stupidity" when the UK prime minister said the islands should remain a British territory if that was what its inhabitants wanted. She insisted the two countries should negotiate over the islands. BBC royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell said Argentine officials have already indicated they consider the deployment "insensitive", given recent history. But he said the RAF, backed by the government, felt it would be wrong for the Duke not to go simply because of his identity. www.bbcnews.com
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Zara Phillips wedding: Policing cost £400,000 Photo: AP
The Duke of Cambridge will be posted to the Falkland Islands for six weeks next February and March, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has announced.
for the upkeep of residences - and the sovereign support grant, which will replace it from 2013. The plans have been approved by the Queen and the Prince of Wales. William's household will follow him from their offices at St James's Palace to the historic
building, which has been a royal residence since 1689. The Duke and Duchess currently live in another, smaller property at Kensington Palace when in London. Prince Harry is expected to move there, from an apartment at Clarence House, when the royal couple take up their new home. William is an RAF Search and Rescue Force helicopter pilot and - when working - lives with Catherine close to his RAF base in north Wales.A St James's Palace spokesman said the apartment into which they are moving is currently managed by the charity Historic Royal Palaces and is used for purposes such as offices, classrooms and storage. "The extent of the work needed to turn the apartment back into a home is not yet known but it is expected that the apartment will not be ready for occupation until at least the middle of 2013," he said.
The cost of policing the wedding of Zara Phillips and England rugby star Mike Tindall in Edinburgh was £400,000. Figures from Lothian and Borders police board showed the cost was almost as high as the £543,000 bill for Pope Benedict's visit to Edinburgh. The Queen and Duke of Edinburgh watched their granddaughter get married at Canongate Kirk in July. Strathclyde Police has also raised concern about the cost of policing major events such as religious parades. Hundreds of wellwishers turned out on the Royal Mile to watch the first royal wedding in Scotland for 20 years. Other prominent guests included Prince Charles and Camilla, Prince William and Catherine, and Prince Harry. Buckingham Palace said the wedding was a "private family affair". The cost of the policing operation, referred to only as Operation Opal, is disclosed in a single paragraph of a report prepared for the police board by Chief Constable David Strang. The document - Capital City Funding and Policing Major Events - also reveals that £1.32m was spent on policing the Climate Camp protest the previous year, while the Nato parliamentary assembly in 2009 cost £429,000. The chief constable warned the cost of policing major events was likely to rise in future and urged the board to seek increased Scottish government funding. The SNP MSP Christine Grahame said private individuals or families should face
Mike Tindall and Zara Phillips emerge from Canongate Kirk
charges for additional policing as is already the case with large-scale commercial events such as football matches. She said: "I look at democratic marches which I think shouldn't be charged for, because already they've had a licence to march."But private functions and commercial functions that incur additional policing costs, I think those holding them should be forewarned there may be additional charges to them." A Royal Family spokeswoman said it would be inappropriate to comment.A spokesman for tourism agency VisitScotland said the wedding boosted visitor numbers. He said: "It helped to contribute to a bumper summer season for a number of Scotland's regal attractions, with many reporting a spike in visitor numbers as a result of the royal fever which swept the country." Strathclyde Police has also raised concerns about the cost of policing operations for major events such as religious or political marches, which totalled £1.6m last year. www.bbcnews.com The International weekly
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What to do November 11-17, 2011
What to do NOVEMBER Exhibit By: Cecilia Alonso Until November 14 City Hall Tulum Avenue Cancun Photo Exhibit “Vida y muerte” (Life and Death) Until November 15 Luxury Avenue Cancun Exhibition “Calaveras” All November Centro Maya Playa del Carmen Collective Exhibit “Calaveras” Until November 30 House of Culture Chetumal Monday to Friday - 8 am to 8 pm
Exhibit “Casualidad” By Pérez Gutiérrez "el Coze" Drawing-painting urban art Until December 30 (Wednesday to Sunday) Artezissimo Gallery Puerto Morelos. 2pm to 6 pm.
Friday 11 Art Showcase “Arte en deconstrucción” Dir: Fernanda Montiel Dancers: Adriana Olguín and Edgar Pasos Place: Jardín El Edén Calle 95 and Constituyentes Avenue Playa del Carmen. 8 pm
Saturday 12 Opening Festival internacional de Cultura del Caribe “La mar de las artes” Date: 12-19 November Las Palapas Park Cancun. 7 pm
Sunday 13 Cultural Sunday Musical Concert “Mi propia voz” 28 de Julio Plaza Playa del Carmen. 6:30 pm Festival internacional de Cultura del Caribe “La mar de las artes” Date: 12-19 November Las Palapas Park Cancun. 7 pm
Theater “El primer Mestizaje” Dir: Julieta Casavantes- Q. Roo House of Culture Cancun. 5 pm Music Symphony Orchestra Quintana Roo Las Palapas Park Cancun. 6 pm
Monday 13
Theater “Cuentos de Payo Obispo, Donde no pasa nada” House of Culture Cancun. 10 am “Cuentearte” Dir: Matilde Altomaro- Q. Roo House of Culture Cancun. 12 pm
Festival internacional de Cultura del Caribe “La mar de las artes” Date: 12-19 November Las Palapas Park Cancun. 7 pm Mayan Cuisine Chef Xavier Pérez Stone Chef Isaías Pérez
Exhibit Musical Instruments- Q. Roo Universidad La Salle Cancun. 12 pm
Traditional Cuban Cuisine Chef Eddy Fernández/Cuba
Conferences “Cultural Influences to the Mexican Caribbean Gastronomy” By:: Chef Luis Galicia Cabrera “Myths and realities of the lionfish” By: Chef Napoleón Calderón Cata Maridaje “Cuban Ron and Mexican chocolate” By: Yamir Pellegrino y Opening Mtro. Tirso Juan Ordaz Coral Gastronomic “Pastry shop with Chocolate” Chef Sergio Rios “Lionfish Cooking” Napoleon Calderon Chef Conference and Tasting The high Mexican Cafe By Mónica Tello “History of pre-Hispanic Mayan cuisine” By Chef Isaiah Perez Traditional Cuban cuisine By Chef Eddy Fernandez Universidad Tecnológica de la Riviera Maya Playa del Carmen. 8 am to 6
Mignon McLaughlin Quotes American Journalist (June 6, 1913 - December 20, 1983) “A sense of humor is a major defense “It's the most unhappy people who most fear change.” against minor troubles.” “Courage can't see around corners but goes around them anyway.”
“Learning too soon our limitations, we never learn our powers.”
“Even cowards can endure hardship; only the brave can endure suspense.”
“Love is the silent saying and saying of a single name.”
“For the happiest life, days should be “Many are saved from sin by being so rigorously planned, nights left open to inept at it.” chance.”
“No one has ever loved anyone the way every“Hope is the feeling we have that the feeling we one wants to be loved.” have is not permanent.” “No one really listens to anyone else, and if you try it for a while you'll see why.”
“If you are brave too often, people will come to expect it of you.”
“In the arithmetic of love, one plus one equals everything, and two minus one equals nothing.” “It's innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn't.”
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The International weekly
“What you have become is the price you paid to get what you used to want.” “Youth is not enough. And love is not enough. And success is not enough. And, if we could achieve it, enough would not be enough.”
November 11-17, 2011
Weekly Horoscope
Sudoku
November 11-17, 2011
Aries Your mental and spiritual ones could be replenished however. These few days may prove beneficial for healing activities and for putting right wardrobe chaos! Latent forensic skill should surface enabling you to work out what's useful and what really needs to go. At a different level entirely this would be a good time to deal with legacies, wills and insurance. It might also find you in the mood to resign and or make clear working boundaries. It would be wise to check that what you hear on the grapevine midweek is accurate - openings discussed then might not be as 'open' as inferred. .
Libra As of the start of this week you would surely benefit from perspective. Though one part of you might not wish to stray far from home, another part will know that only by being away can you recharge batteries. Saturn (still in your sign) reaches a new phase with Pluto - presently passing through an area associated for you with home and emotions. It may be that you need to acknowledge the passage of time and that there are some items (and people?) you need to leave behind. It's these that make clear that it's time to leave the past behind.
Taurus Irritation with others could recharge energy levels however! There's also the high probability that a team of professionals (health-care?) are working hard to assist you in rebalancing. News reaching you and could make such a difference. It's even possible you'll feel that the ball has at last landed back in your court. True, this might result in you rejecting some expert advice (with all the hassles that brings). There's possible introduction to a diet, system or regime that would detoxify on many levels.
Gemini Each Sudoku has a unique solution that can be reached logically without guessing. Enter digits from 1 to 9 into the blank spaces. Every row must contain one of each digit. So must every column, as must every 3x3 square.
Margarita Cake Ingredients
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 (18.25 ounce) package
1/4 cup tequila
orange cake mix
2 tablespoons triple sec liqueur
1 (3.4 ounce) package instant
1 cup confectioners' sugar
vanilla pudding mix
1 tablespoon tequila
4 eggs
2 tablespoons triple sec liqueur
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 tablespoons lime juice
2/3 cup water
To prepare Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 10 inch Bundt pan. In a large bowl combine cake mix, pudding mix, eggs, oil, water, lemon juice 1/4 cup tequila and 2 tablespoons triple sec. Beat for 2 minutes. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake in the preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes; remove to rack and pour glaze over cake while still warm. To make the glaze: In a small bowl, combine confectioners' sugar with 1 tablespoon tequila, 2 tablespoons triple sec and 2 tablespoons lime juice. Mix until smooth.
It's probable that an idea (might even have been one of your own, has really captured imaginations. The question then is how to implement this against a stifled cash flow. In a sense you couldn't be choosing a rode week. In your case, family responsibilities could get in the way of plans. And yet: it may be that joining forces with someone younger would make a very real difference to an outcome. It might not be necessary to ditch your dream: perhaps it just requires a different timetable?. From then the heat builds and should bring the energy to deal with even the most complex of situations.
Cancer Being as sensitive as you are, you could feel this coming. You may sense an era coming to an end. True, this could be something as 'minor' as someone space-clearing and ridding themselves of mementos (not something you'd find easy to do perhaps!). At a bigger level it may be that a partnership is coming to a painful conclusion. Whatever, it would be unsurprising if there were moments when you felt all at sea and wanted to escape. Yet it's likely you have a small army of support around you. Even if the person you'd really like to be around just can't be there, the fact that others are giving practical assistance should be reassuring. Actually, by the end of this week you could feel that the cosmos has given you promotion acknowledging that you really can handle natural rhythms without being blown apart emotionally.
Leo You don't have to be one of them. True, you may be riding the crest of a creative wave as the week begins. You might also feel you've found the perfect person to do business with. But no-one is perfect! If you're to avoid probable disillusionment, then you need to keep one foot on the ground! Here you may have reason to thank a Virgo whose wise and timely advice helps hugely. It's possible that you could become embroiled in the financial affairs of someone who's a natural born worrier and who, at least to your mind, seems to have created an extraordinary muddle. Resolving this might be a project you start and conclude in December.
Virgo Later this week Mars moves into your sign for an extended stay (through June 2012). This suggests you - and those close to you - will be in the spotlight. This promises much if you're in training for a sports event but could be a tricky energy to handle otherwise. The problem is really that whereas others want to take time out to take stock, that's the very last thing you want: you're ready for lights, camera and action. Of course much of this depends on your state of health and here you might decide to give greater thought to using food as medicine. It might also become clear that there are accounting procedures you could manage better: a fact that's pointed out by an expert.
Scorpio It's not every year that the Sun passes through your sign as Mars moves across the top of your solar chart. This particular mix brings drive and determination. It's probable you're ready to draw one of those lines in the sand over which others simply dare not cross. There's more too: Saturn and Pluto (one of your ruling planets) reach a new phase angle even more firmness and persistence. It's probable you won't be taking prisoners and more likely that something you've determined would become reality will be pushed toward that goal. However much others tease your vision, let's hope they're ready for the stance you're about to take.
Sagittarius There's a little accent on Fire signs at the start of this week which should bring out your more adventurous side (perfect for travelling or breaking through old barriers). There is however a decided mood change so you may need to confront tricky issues - possibly related to health but also, perhaps, related to how you look after yourself and a partner (business or otherwise) generally. It may be that there's a small storm to deal with before you can move forward. Aware perhaps of the passage of time and/or because you're with people significantly older than yourself, thoughts could turn to legacies, wills and even major property issues. .
Capricorn Three significant planet events this week suggest you'll be faced with choices: whether you stay or go, accept responsibility and/or get involved in a training scheme. All this may be driven by news from afar reaching you. Your expertise may be put to the test. A big issue seems to be who you're prepared to work with. It may be that a certain person is moving on. Perhaps you don't want to fill their position but that in the short-term that becomes necessary? A clash with a Libra is possible: indeed, it could be a time-line they've constructed that causes you most anguish.
Aquarius For over a decade Neptune has been moving through your sign - bringing with it the potential for loss and deception. This week Mars leaves your opposite sign. You might like to think of this as a last cloud burst before the Sun comes out (hopefully!). You might need someone wise (a lawyer?) to plead your case. It's probable though that you'll attract someone who understands exactly where you're coming from. Though it could take until the solar eclipse on 25th for this matter to be fully resolved, you could end the week feeling that an end is in sight.
Pisces Another possibility is a flurry of emails and phone calls that require tasks to be finished completely (i.e. this isn't a time for loose ends). There's also the high probability of someone deciding that it's time to move on and you needing to understand completely what it is that they've been doing before they leave. Packing, archiving and generally tidying up are all big themes. No less important may be coming to an agreement about the value of something. This could prove a hard task - especially if you're negotiating with someone born under one of the other mutable signs of Gemini, Virgo or Sagittarius. Virgos especially might try to beat you down in price.
The International weekly
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Cancún & Riviera Maya
November 11-17, 2011
www.elquintanarroense.com/international
Week in Pictures
A polar bear shakes off water from its body at the St-Felicien Wildfire Zoo, Quebec. Canada us believed to be the home to about 15,000 of the estimated 20,000 polar bear population.
The last of the summer roses, in specialist rose nursery in Cheshire, are dusted with a coating in frost as the first freezing temperatures arrive in Britain.
Russian servicemen in historical uniforms take part in a military parade in Moscow´s Red Square. The parade marks the 70th anniversary of a parade in 1941 when Soviet soldiers through Red Square towards the front lines during World War II.
The Sun-Drop Diamond during a press preview of a Sotherby´s auction in Geneva. One of the world´s largest diamonds, a pear-shaped 110.3 –carat yellow rock, it will go under the hammer on 15 November.
Brazilians watch the Indigenous Nations Games in Porto National in the Amazonian state of Tocantins.