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Germany convicts leader of far-right party of sedition

May 3, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Berlin – A Berlin court convicted Udo Voigt, the leader of the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), on sedition charges Friday and handed him a suspended seven-month prison sentence.

The court ruled that he was responsible for a racist NPD calendar, which called for Germany’s national football team to be made up of whites only and insulted a black player on the team.

He was convicted of criminal insult and a sedition provision making it a crime to stir up hatred. The district court also convicted two other NPD national executive officials, handing them suspended prison sentences of seven months and 10 months.

Their nationalist and anti-foreigner party, which has many neo-Nazi supporters, is represented in two of Germany’s 16 state parliaments, but has never won seats at federal level.

All three men were also ordered to donate 2,000 euros (2,700 dollars) apiece to the UN children’s fund UNICEF.

The front page of the fold-up planner calendar showed a shirt marked with the player number of Patrick Owomoyela on the German team at the World Cup tournament in 2006. A slogan that called for a whites-only team was an implicit insult to the black player.

The party is in serious financial trouble after suffering a fine of 2.2 million euros (2.8 million dollars) for accounting irregularities. An attempt to ban the party was thrown out by Germany’s constitutional court in 2003. (dpa)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: accounting irregularities, berlin court, Constitutional Court, convicts, executive officials, financial trouble, Fund Unicef, German Team, National Democratic Party, National Democratic Party Of Germany, national executive, National Football Team, Nazi Supporters, npd, Patrick Owomoyela, planner calendar, prison sentence, Prison Sentences, sedition charges, State Parliaments, UNICEF

Fish oil could help prevent Parkinson’s disease

April 20, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 20 (ANI): Incorporating an omega three fatty acid- found in fish oil- in the diet could help prevent diseases like Parkinson’s and Huntington’s.

Dr. Nicolas Bazan, form the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center, showed that the omega three fatty acid, docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), prevented the misfolding of a protein resulting from a gene mutation in neurodegenerative diseases.

For the study, researchers developed a cell model with a mutation of the Ataxin-1 gene.

The defective Ataxin-1 gene induces the misfolding of the protein produced by the gene, which fails to get properly processed by the cell machinery and thus results in tangled clumps of toxic protein that eventually kill the cell.

The Ataxin-1 misfolding defect could cause Spinocerebellar Ataxia- a disabling disorder that affects speech, eye movement, and hand coordination at early ages of life.

Researchers found that DHA could protect cells from this defect.

Previously, researchers had discovered that neuroprotectin D1 (NPD1)-a naturally occurring molecule in the human brain that is derived from DHA-also promotes brain cell survival.

In this system NPD1 could set free the dying cells with the pathological type of Ataxin-1, keeping their integrity intact.

“These experiments provide proof of principle that neuroprotectin D1 can be applied therapeutically to combat various neurodegenerative diseases,” said Bazan.

He added: “Furthermore, this study provides the basis of new therapeutic approaches to manipulate retinal pigment epithelial cells to be used as a source of NPD1 to treat patients with disorders characterized by this mutation like Parkinson’s, Retinitis Pigmentosa and some forms of Alzheimer’s Disease.”

The study was presented at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, Nouvelle C Room, at the American Society for Nutrition, Experimental Biology 2009 Annual Meeting. (ANI)

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UPDATE 2-U.S. video games sales fall 17 pct in March-NPD

April 18, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Sales of U.S. video games fall 17 pct in March

* Nintendo’s Wii top-selling console again (Adds analyst comment, additional earnings details, byline)

By Gabriel Madway

SAN FRANCISCO, April 16 (Reuters) – Overall U.S. video game sales fell 17 percent in March to $1.43 billion, research group NPD said on Thursday, a revealing figure for an industry that had so far shown resilience in the economic downturn.

Video game software sales dropped 17 percent to $792.8 million in the month, while hardware sales fell 18 percent to $455.6 million.

Analysts said the size of the decline was a bit surprising but also misleading due to a difficult comparison with March of 2008, which saw a major game release in “Super Smash Bros. Brawl.”

“March was just such an outsized month last year,” said Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter.

However, he said the data does reveal some weakness in the market, and he expects April sales to be flat.

NPD also attributed some of the decline to the fact that Easter fell in March last year, boosting purchases for gifts.

For the first quarter of 2009 as a whole, video game sales were flat at $4.25 billion.

Although Nintendo’s (7974.OS) Wii won the month, Microsoft Corp’s (MSFT.O) Xbox 360 was the only console to achieve year-over-year growth.

The Wii sold 601,000 units in March, while the Xbox was No. 2 with 330,000 units, followed by Sony’s (6758.T) PlayStation 3 (PS3) with 218,000 units.

“If there was one area that surprised me this month, it was hardware sales,” said NPD analyst Anita Frazier in a release. “While it’s not unusual for March hardware sales to be lower than February, I thought we’d see higher unit sales on most platforms.”

Although the Wii far outsells the Xbox 360 and the PS3 globally, in the important Japanese market PS3 sales outstripped those of the Wii in March for the first time in 16 months.

Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime said in an interview the company has a number of important new games on the way for Wii and “we’re confident that we’ll continue to see very strong hardware sales behind those launch titles.”

Sony recently cut the price of its older console, the PlayStation 2, by 23 percent to $99.99 in an attempt to lure new buyers.

Only a few days of the lower-priced PS2 were included in NPD’s March numbers. NPD recorded PS2 sales of 112,000 units.

In an email statement, Sony Computer Entertainment America said it is “seeing exciting preliminary numbers for PlayStation 2 with the recent price cut.”

Capcom’s (9697.T) “Resident Evil 5″ was the best-selling video game in the month, selling 1.5 million units for the Xbox and PlayStation 3, according to NPD.

Nintendo’s “Pokemon Platinum Version” sold 805,000 units, good for second place, while Microsoft’s “Halo Wars” was No. 3 with 639,000 units sold.

Nintendo’s DS was the top-selling U.S. handheld console, with 563,000 units, ahead of Sony’s PSP, which sold 168,000.

Nintendo released the next generation of its DS franchise, the DSi, in the United States on April 5. The company said it sold 435,000 units in the first week. (Reporting by Gabriel Madway; Editing Bernard Orr, Richard Chang)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: america president reggie fils, april sales, economic downturn, game release, hardware sales, japanese market, microsoft corp, MSFT, New Games, npd, playstation 3, reggie fils aime, smash bros, software sales, Sony Playstation, Super Smash Bros, super smash bros brawl, video game sales, video game software, Wedbush Morgan, wii, xbox 360

U.S. video games sales fall 17 pct in March: NPD

April 18, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Overall U.S. video game sales fell 17 percent in March to $1.43 billion, research group NPD said on Thursday, a revealing figure for an industry that had so far shown resilience in the economic downturn.

Video game software sales dropped 17 percent to $792.8 million in the month, while hardware sales fell 18 percent to $455.6 million.

Analysts said the size of the decline was a bit surprising but also misleading due to a difficult comparison with March of 2008, which saw a major game release in “Super Smash Bros. Brawl.”

“March was just such an outsized month last year,” said Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter.

However, he said the data does reveal some weakness in the market, and he expects April sales to be flat.

NPD also attributed some of the decline to the fact that Easter fell in March last year, boosting purchases for gifts.

For the first quarter of 2009 as a whole, video game sales were flat at $4.25 billion.

Although Nintendo’s Wii won the month, Microsoft Corp’s Xbox 360 was the only console to achieve year-over-year growth.

The Wii sold 601,000 units in March, while the Xbox was No. 2 with 330,000 units, followed by Sony’s PlayStation 3 (PS3) with 218,000 units.

Although the Wii far outsells the Xbox 360 and the PS3 globally, in the important Japanese market PS3 sales outstripped those of the Wii in March for the first time in 16 months.

Sony recently cut the price of its older console, the PlayStation 2, by 23 percent to $99.99 in an attempt to lure new buyers.

Only a few days of the lower-priced PS2 were included in NPD’s March numbers. NPD recorded PS2 sales of 112,000 units.

In an email statement, Sony Computer Entertainment America said it is “seeing exciting preliminary numbers for PlayStation 2 with the recent price cut.”

Capcom’s “Resident Evil 5″ was the best-selling video game in the month, selling 1.5 million units for the Xbox and PlayStation 3, according to NPD.

Nintendo’s “Pokemon Platinum Version” sold 805,000 units, good for second place, while Microsoft’s “Halo Wars” was No. 3 with 639,000 units sold.

Nintendo’s DS was the top-selling U.S. handheld console, with 563,000 units, ahead of Sony’s PSP, which sold 168,000.

Nintendo released the next generation of its DS franchise, the DSi, in the United States on April 5. The company said it sold 435,000 units in the first week.

(Reporting by Gabriel Madway; Editing Bernard Orr, Richard Chang)

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German far-right leader in court over racist football slur

March 24, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Berlin – The leader of the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), Udo Voigt, went on trial Tuesday accused of sedition and insult of a black player in Germany’s national football team.

The charges, brought by footballer Patrick Owomoyela and the German Football Federation (DFB), relate to a calendar of events published by the NPD ahead of the 2006 World Cup in Germany.

The planner pictured the host country’s white football shirt alongside the statement, “White. Not just a shirt colour! For a real NATIONAL team!”

According to the prosecution case, the football shirt bore the number 25, worn at the time by Owomoyela, who is black.

Owomoyela, who is a German citizen, at the time played for the first division club Bremen and now plays for the first-division club Borussia Dortmund. Born in Hamburg in 1979, he has a German mother and Nigerian father.

Voigt is being held responsible for the calendar, distributed as a leaflet and offered for download via the internet, alongside two co-accused NPD party members.

At the time, police seized several thousand of the leaflets after the DFB invoked legal procedures to halt their spread.

The lawyer of the DFB and Owomoyela, Christian Scherz, said on Tuesday they wanted to “set a sign that racism has no place in sport.”

The defence argued that Owomoyela was not depicted on the World Cup planner. They further alleged that the trial was merely an attempt to reduce the NPD’S political success in this year’s elections.

A general election is due in September, as well as European and state elections throughout the year.

The German crime of sedition includes stirring up hatred against other ethnic groups, and carries a sentence of up to five years’ prison. Insult can also be a criminal offence in Germany.

The two aides charged alongside Voigt are Klaus Beier, who is party spokesman and NPD chairman in Brandenburg state, and Frank Schwerdt, a member of the national executive and chairman in Thuringia state.

Judge Monika Pelcz turned down a defence request Tuesday for the trial to be aborted. A judgement is expected on April 7.

The NPD, which is overtly hostile to both immigrants and ethnic minorities, is represented in two of Germany’s 16 states, Saxony and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.

An attempt to ban the NPD was quashed by Germany’s top court in 2003. (dpa)

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Germany’s neo-Nazi party using meltdown to rebuild Reich

March 9, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Berlin, Mar. 8 (ANI): Members of Germany’s radical neo-Nazi party plan to rebuild Hitler’s Reich using the current economic crisis, a report has disclosed.

To build-up their exposi on the increasingly influential neo-Nazi National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), the authors of the report spent two years infiltrating Germany’s far right. They interviewed party leaders and defectors who have quit the organization in disgust, The Independent reports.

“The NPD is a dangerous organization. It pretends to be democratic, but make no mistake about it: these people are genuine Nazis,” warned Olaf Sundermeyer, one of the two journalists who wrote In the NPD, published in Germany last week.

Despite government attempts to ban the party, the overtly racist NPD has already won seats in two of Germany’s 16 regional state parliaments. It has some 220 members on local councils, and expects to consolidate its political power base in a series of regional and local polls this year.

In their book, Sundermeyer and his co-author, Christoph Ruf, make it clear that the economy and unemployment are playing into the hands of the NPD.

“The party has infiltrated militant jobless groups, and is winning support. Germany’s ability to cope with such developments is going to be on trial in 2009. It will be a test of the country’s political maturity,” they wrote.

Some of the most disturbing revelations about the NPD, which began life in the mid-1960s, are provided by former members who were shocked by the violence of its members and their hero-worship of Adolf Hitler.

Furthermore, the party’s regional headquarters in Jena is deliberately called the “Brown House” after Hitler’s Munich HQ. The cellars of the building contain a weapons cache, and are adorned with photographs of SS men.

Luthardt described how the party is funded by donations from expatriate Nazis and their families who fled to South America after the Second World War.

“A new organisation of stormtroopers would take revenge on anyone who disagrees with them. The concept is simply: let’s kick out all the foreigners, then Germans will have jobs again. The are convinced that they will win an election one day, and that then things will really get going,” Luthardt said. (ANI)

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Neo-Nazis plotting ‘Fourth Reich’ in Germany

February 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Feb.27 (ANI): A defector from Germany’s hard-core neo-Nazi party, the NPD, has given a chilling picture of the rise of new Hitler worshippers and their plans to build the “Fourth Reich”.

Uwe Luthardt, who was a senior member of the NPD, quit to inform on the party that Germany tried unsuccessfully to ban several years ago.

The Telegraph quoted him as telling about weapons stores and how members greet each other with “Heil Hitler” salutes, sing the banned songs of the Third Reich and relish the idea of a new Holocaust against the Jews.

Last year neo-Nazi attacks in Germany reached an all-time high and the authorities are battling to stop youngsters from being attracted to the politics of the right, particularly now that Germany is in a deep recession and jobs are being lost by the thousands every day.

Luthardt, a former board member of the party, said he was threatened that he could “disappear” if he informed on its inner workings.

“Someone who just quits usually gets a lot of problems, and can find himself waking up in intensive care. It wasn’t really my world. When you went along to evening meetings, you saw all the shaven heads, and a black sun or other Nazi symbols tattooed on arms. They usually just boozed or were abusive. If there’s no opponent around, they just fight among themselves,” he was quoted, as saying.

“Many have an IQ close to my shoe size. Most of them are simply failures: failed pupils, people who dropped out of school or their apprenticeships, alcoholics that can’t find a foothold anywhere else, thugs. But every local organisation has three to five men who don’t have criminal records. They’re the ones sent to face the press or man information stands,” he added.

“I joined because I wanted to do something for Germany, I wasn’t interest in a Greater Germany. And suddenly everyone was saying we’ll take back Silesia in Poland and then we’ll give the communists a thrashing,” he said, adding that old Nazis living in South America still donate to the party and other funds come from the staging of skinhead-music concerts.

He went on: “The simple aim is the restoration of the Reich in which a new storm trooper organisation takes revenge on anyone who disagrees with them.

“The dream is of the German Reich. They’re totally convinced that they’ll win an election one day and that things will really get going. Everyone can imagine what would happen then,” he said. (ANI)

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