Stockholm city officials have warned that a failure to build enough homes to meet the demands of a growing population could have serious consequences for the capital. … Read More
At least 23 killed in Pakistan bus bombing, hospital siege (PHOTOS, VIDEO)
The siege of a hospital in the city of Quetta has ended after security forces stormed the building, freeing 35 people trapped inside. Four attackers were killed during the siege, while another arrested, while there is no information on their identities, said Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Associated Press reports. Khan added that four security forces and one senior government official were killed in the siege. The first bomb in the capital of Balochistan province went off in a bus with students near a women’s university, causing 12 fatalities and injuring about 20. “The dead were all female students,” the local police chief Zubair Mahmood told AFP. An “improvised explosive device” was planted on the bus and exploded just as the bus was leaving the university, he added. Police are investigating if the device was remotely activated. Another explosion rocked a corridor of the city hospital, where the dead and the injured were taken, reportedly upon arrival of local government and police officials. A top government official was killed in the blast and two other people wounded, said head of police operations, according to AP. Around this time, parts of the hospital were besieged by militants. The armed men were stationed on rooftops and surrounded the building as intermittent gunfire was heard, said the head of police operations in Quetta, Fayaz Sumbal. Several people were taken hostage. Frontier Corps troops and police commandos have been called in while the hospital’s security officials were trying to clear the building, Sumbal added. No group has yet taken responsibility for the explosions. It is also not clear yet whether the two events are related. Balochistan province borders Afghanistan, and the region has seen a surge in militant attacks in recent months. While no one has yet taken responsibility for the recent blast, violent attacks on Pakistani women have been carried out by both separatist and Islamists groups, who oppose women’s education. … Read More
Philadelphia ‘Can’t Afford’ Schools, Buys $400 Million Prison
http://www.youtube.com/v/9ZcP-Lok7fE?version=3&f=videos&app=youtube_gdata This article is from: Philadelphia ‘Can’t Afford’ Schools, Buys $400 Million Prison
Law enforcement officials hope kill switches will deter phone theft
Law enforcement officials and consumer advocates have come together as part of a new initiative called Secure Our Smartphones. The goal here is to help to curb rising phone thefts by getting manufacturers and wireless carries on board with the idea of implementing a kill switch that would render stole… … Read More
Ecuador – New media law – mix of good principles and bad provisions
After several years of controversy and delays, Ecuador’s Organic Law on Communication begins the final stage of approval by the National Assembly today. An international NGO that defends freedom of information, Reporters Without Borders contributed to the debate when the law’s first draft was being discussed in 2010 and it would like to update its comments now. Reporters Without Borders has never questioned the principle of a new media law, one that matches the changes in the national media (…) … Read More
Just this side of perjury: Congressmen irritated by intelligence smokescreens
Intelligence officials have scheduled several closed briefings with lawmakers this week amid heightened media interest in data collection by the NSA and FBI. Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden has leaked details of alleged widespread domestic surveillance to the press. Officials from the DoJ, FBI, NSA, and office of the Director of National Intelligence discussed the leak with members of the house on Tuesday, though many lawmakers were unsatisfied with the discussions. A confidential briefing to the Senate is scheduled for Thursday. Some officials have been on the defensive amid the public furor over the allegations, citing the security benefits of surveillance. NSA Director and US Cyber Command head General Keith Alexander said during a hearing on cyber security in the Senate that it has “helped thwart dozens of terrorist events. “When I say dozens, what I’m talking about here is that these authorities complement each other in helping us identify different terrorist actions and help disrupt them,” he added. As officials offer clarity on the scope of PRISM and other surveillance programs, and deal with public outrage over its revelations, they insist that the public had oversight on the controversial practice via legislators. The Obama administration has said that members of Congress were filled in on the programs 22 times in the 14 months to December last year. Those sessions included hearings, meetings with individual members, and meetings of the judiciary and intelligence committees. However, some of representatives are saying that the intelligence community is complicating their task. “One of the most important responsibilities a senator has is oversight of the intelligence community. This job cannot be done responsibly if senators aren’t getting straight answers to direct questions,” said Senator Ron Wyden as cited by Reuters. Wyden was among the senators who questioned National Intelligence Director James Clapper during a hearing in March. When asked whether the government had collected data on millions of US citizens, he answered “not wittingly.” After the exposure of PRISM, Clapper referred to the question as a “when are you going to start – stop beating your wife” kind of question, adding that his negative answer was the “least untruthful” he could give at the time. Evasive tactics, of which this episode could be said to be an example, are frowned upon by some legislators. “Sometimes these briefings are a game of 20 questions. If you don’t ask exactly the right question, you don’t get the answer,” former Representative Jane Harman said when describing the situation. Things are complicated by the secretive nature of such meetings, which exclude experts advising lawmakers from participating. Without the help of tech-savvy staffers, many lawmakers are simply not capable of asking the right questions. Intelligence officials appear to have had second thoughts before disclosing details of their work to Congress. “In the aftermath of 9/11, I got the impression that they were telling us as little as they could without perjuring themselves,” said former senator Bob Graham, who chaired the Senate intelligence committee from 2001-03. Edward Snowden, the whistleblower behind the scandal, remains in Hong Kong. In his latest interview with the local newspaper The South China Morning Post, he reiterated that he plans to expose more US intelligence secrets. In the interview, Snowden accused the US of using its cyber capabilities to hack targets in China, and particularly Hong Kong, as well as using “bullying” to force his extradition back to the US. He added that he trusts the autonomous city’s authorities to “do the right thing.” … Read More
NGOs find loopholes in Foreign Agents’ Law, officials urge corrections
One possible option is to register an ordinary commercial company that would receive funds from abroad and employ NGO staff as workers to pay their salaries, Kommersant daily wrote quoting the head of a Russian NGO who spoke on the condition of total anonymity. The source noted that about 15 Russian groups had already switched to this method. Another possible way, suggested by the daily itself, is to set up an endowment that would properly register as a foreign agent and receive foreign funding which would then be transferred to one or several Russian groups, allowing them to skip the registration as they are formally sponsored by a Russian company. The third way has been outlined in a recent report by the Civil Initiatives Committee, an influential expert group chaired by former finance minister Aleksey Kudrin, which said that under growing pressure Russian NGOs could re-register in neighboring states. Some Russian officials already called for changes in the recently approved law, saying that the flaws of the original bill are being exposed as it is applied. Mikhail Fedotov, chairman of the Presidential Council on Human Rights, said that the practice was only showing one thing – that the law had been poorly written and that it was in need of corrections. Fedotov added that the council had already prepared several suggestions on corrections, but he did not go into detail. Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich has said that the law needs changes and called for activists to draft their amendments. But Dvorkovich added that the law is in force and must be observed by all members of the community until it is altered in the desired way. Russia introduced the so-called Foreign Agents Law in November last year. It requires all NGOs engaged in political activities and receiving funding from abroad to register as “foreign agents”. Failure to do so is punishable by a fine and may bring about an extensive inspection by prosecutors and the Justice Ministry. These two departments launched a major nationwide program in March this year in order to check how the fresh law is being applied. The inspections caused protests from NGOs, rights activists and the international community, which claimed they were a form of government pressure on independent critics. Russian officials, including the president, have repeatedly stated that the law is not banning any NGOs and simply requires disclosure of the sources of their income. Such transparency would give Russian citizens and voters some clues about possible motives of the groups’ political actions, the officials added. Currently no organization is registered as a foreign agent in Russia. … Read More
