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Kamal To Represent India At 7th ASEAN Summit

April 6, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Kamal Nath, union minister of commerce and industry, would be representing the Prime Minister at the 7th Association of South East Nations (ASEAN)-India Summit and the fourth East Asia Summit, which is scheduled to be held during April 11 12, 2009 in Thailand.

ASEAN held these summits on a yearly basis.

Leaders of state/government of the 10 ASEAN member nations in addition to its dialogue associates including India, China, Japan, Korea, etc attended the summits.

A key feature of the East Asia Summit, which comprises heads of ASEAN, India, China, Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand, this time, would be a focus session with heads of global agencies comprising World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF), Asian Development Bank (ADB), etc.

India would be looking forward to advancement in a variety of cooperation plans with ASEAN that consists of free trade agreement (FTA), open skies plan, science and technology fund, tourism etc.

India would also take up matters related to energy, atmosphere, disaster mitigation, financial partnership study, etc in the meeting of the 16 member East Asia Summit.

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Jordan Islamists cautiously optimistic over Obama’s policies

January 21, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Amman – Jordanian Islamists on Wednesday expressed cautious “optimism” over the policies the new US president Barack Obama was expected to pursue towards the Arab-Israeli conflict, but said the test would be how he was going to behave on the ground.

“We have optimism that Obama will come up with real changes and honour the promises in this respect he had made during his election campaign and in his inaugural speech,” Zaki Banir Ershaid, Secretary General of the Islamic Action Front (IAF), told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

“The real test for the changes Obama is going to make will be the Palestinian question – is he going to dissociate himself from the blind bias the Bush and the previous US administrations used to show for Israel’s aggression, terrorism and crimes, the latest of which was the Gaza massacre,” Bani Ershaid said.

The IAF chief also cited any steps to be taken by Obama to help the Arab and Islamic worlds to get rid of their “corrupt and despotic” regimes as an indication of “translating promises into facts on the ground”.

Bani Ershaid revealed that he sent a message on Wednesday to Obama through the US embassy in Amman setting forth what the peoples of the region expected from the new US president.

“Obama spoke in his inaugural speech Tuesday about forging good ties with the Islamic world and I say the shortest way for achieving this is opening dialogue with all powers which represent peoples in the region and not only with governments,” he said.

“I think starting real dialogue among faiths, civilizations and cultures is the best way to achieve this goal,” he added.

The IAF, the political arm of the influential Muslim Brotherhood movement, is Jordan’s largest parliamentary political party. (dpa)

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German investor confidence tipped to edge up

January 20, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Berlin – German investor confidence could edge up again this month, a key indicator to be released Tuesday is forecast to say, amid efforts from governments and central banks around the world to halt the downturn underway in the global economy.

Drawn up by the Mannheim-based Centre for European Economic Research, the ZEW index is forecast by analysts to post a marginal increase to minus 44.5 points in January after posting a bigger- than-expected rise to 45.2 in December.

An increase in January would represent the third consecutive rise in the index.

This is despite fresh evidence of the continuing turmoil in the global banking sector and the rapid contraction in world economic growth.

However, the build-up to the release of the ZEW index has been accompanied by a new wave of government economic stimulus packages announced around the world, including Germany, as well an on-going drive by central banks to cut rates.

European Central Bank (ECB) chief Jean-Claude Trichet warned in a speech in Paris on Monday that the bank’s governing council members believe that “world and European growth in 2009 will be substantially lower than the forecasts made at the beginning of December.”

This comes after the ECB last week again joined other central banks and delivered another hefty cut in borrowing costs with economists expecting the ECB to press on with its rate-cutting cycle in the coming months.

Nevertheless, many economists believe that the first signs of an economic recovery in Germany and Europe could start to emerge during the second half of 2009 paving the way for a pickup on 2010.

Based on a survey of about 290 analysts, the ZEW indicator often sets the scene for other major European economic sentiment surveys released later in the month, including Germany’s closely watched Ifo business confidence survey. (dpa)

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Germans flock to Green Week food fair

January 20, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Berlin – The mood at the 2009 International Green Week agricultural fair in Berlin is upbeat despite continuing concerns at the world food situation and the crisis in money markets.

Some l, 610 exhibitors from 52 countries are participating in the event, with Russia – for the second year running – again the largest foreign exhibitor, occupying more than
6,000 square metres of space.

Held annually since the 1930s, the Green Week offers a unique opportunity for the farm world to gauge trade fluctuations and trends.

“The world food situation is the central issue of our time,” said Gerd Sonnleitner, the president of the German Farmers’ Union (DBV), at the opening of the week-long exhibition on Friday.

The world, he said, could not be proud that the millennium target of halving the number of starving people in the world had, “not been reached by a long way.”

Safeguarding of world food supplies was now one of the key issues affecting the future of mankind, he added.

While the Green Week has always acted as a prism for the German food and agricultural sector, it also serves as a powerful marketing outlet for countries like Norway, Sweden, Finland, France, Austria, Poland, Bulgaria and Rumania.

Curiously Britain, the United States and Denmark do not have national displays this year, relying on German import firms to represent their interests.

Countries like Syria, Burkina Faso and, Kyrgyzstan, offer surprises at this year’s event.

Syria is seeking to gain European markets for some of its products, said Muawya Jaber, head of the export development division at the Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform in Damascus.

“We don’t seek to sell products directly over the counter to Green Week visitors. Our aim is to gain contact with German distribution companies and gain a foothold in the market,” said Jaber.

Cumin and aniseed oil, flower and rose water, pomegranate sauce, sesame paste and a wide range of assorted pickles are prominently displayed at its stand.

Burkina Faso provides a colourful return to the Green Week after a long absence. Its stand in Hall 18 attracts a constant stream of visitors.

Face and body creams, mango juices and jams, cashew nuts, sesame seeds, dried fruits, hibiscus marmalade and cotton and textile products are on display, against a background of live African music.

“We are absolutely delighted to have this opportunity at the Green Week,” said Pato Dondasse, who represents a Burkina Faso communications firm. “The German Technical Cooperation Agency (GTZ) made it possible through their backing and support.”

“Our staff is kept at full stretch dealing with customer enquiries about our foodstuffs and other products,” he said.

Burkina Faso, a landlocked nation in West Africa surrounded by six countries, has been making a big effort in recent years to overcome its image as one of Africa’s poorer nations.

Kyrgyzstan is represented at the Berlin event for the first time.

“Agriculture is a key industry and makes up a third of our gross domestic product,” noted Agriculture Minister Arstanbek Nogoyev. “We intend to promote this sector for exports.” (dpa)

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Obama might establish channel of communication with Hamas

January 9, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

London, Jan 9 (ANI): Sources close to US President-elect Barrack Obama’s transition team have said that he is likely to establish a channel for communicating with the Islamist organization Hamas in Palestine.

According to a report in the Guardian, the incoming Obama administration is prepared to abandon George Bush’s doctrine of isolating Hamas, by opening contacts with the organization.

The move to open contacts with Hamas, which could be initiated through the US intelligence services, would represent a definitive break with the Bush presidency’s ostracizing of the group.

The state department has designated Hamas a terrorist organisation, and in 2006, Congress passed a law banning US financial aid to the group.

There is no talk of Obama approving direct diplomatic negotiations with Hamas early on, but he is being urged by advisers to initiate low-level or clandestine approaches, and there is growing recognition in Washington that the policy of ostracizing Hamas is counter-productive.

A potential contender for a foreign policy role in the Obama administration suggested that the president-elect would not be bound by the Bush doctrine of isolating Hamas.

“This is going to be an administration that is committed to negotiating with critical parties on critical issues,” the source said.

A tested course would be to start contacts through Hamas and the US intelligence services, similar to the secret process through which the US engaged with the PLO in the 1970s.

Meanwhile, a UN resolution was agreed last night at the UN, calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire between Hamas and Israeli forces in Gaza.

The resolution was passed, though the US, represented by secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, abstained.

The two weeks since Israel began its military campaign against Gaza have heightened anticipation about how Obama intends to deal with the Middle East.

He adopted a strongly pro-Israel position during the election campaign, as did his erstwhile opponent and choice for secretary of state, Hillary Clinton.

But, it is widely thought Obama would adopt a more even-handed approach once he is president. (ANI)

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How cheating ants get caught red-handed

January 9, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

Washington, January 9 (ANI): While workers in ant society are known to physically restrain their peers from cheating the queen by having their own offspring, scientists have for the first time found how the cheaters get caught red-handed.

Jurgen Liebig and his colleagues at Arizona State University say that experimental evidence shows that chemical hydrocarbons produced by those sneaky sorts are a dead giveaway of their fertility status.

Published online in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, the findings represent the first direct evidence that cuticular hydrocarbons are the informational basis for the ants” reproductive policing.

Liebig”s team had previously shown that workers used hydrocarbons to discriminate between eggs laid by workers and queens, and also for nestmate recognition and sexual attraction.

Since hydrocarbon profiles play important roles in communication, he and his colleagues had a strong suspicion that they would also help catch reproductive cheaters.

With an eye on testing the idea in one ant species called Aphaenogaster cockerelli, the research team mimicked reproductive cheaters by applying a synthetic compound typical of fertile individuals on non-reproductive workers, and that treatment attracted nestmate aggression in colonies where a queen was present.

The researchers said that the same treatment in colonies without a queen, and where workers had begun to reproduce, failed to attract nestmate aggression.

Liebig says that this system for catching cheaters plays an important role in maintaining harmony in the ant world, and it sets an example that we might learn from ourselves.

“The idea that social harmony is dependent on strict systems to prevent and punish cheating individuals seems to apply to most successful societies,” he said.

“Understanding what mechanisms are employed within ant societies, which are perhaps the most successful and widespread among all animals, provides a model for understanding the fundamental basis of successful cooperation,” he added. (ANI)

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Runaway stars create weird ‘cosmic sculptures’

January 8, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

London, Jan 8 (ANI): The Hubble Space Telescope has discovered 14 runaway stars speeding through dense interstellar gas, creating weird cosmic sculptures known as ‘bow shocks’.

Astronomers led by Raghvendra Sahai of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory had been searching for ageing, bloated stars with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys in 2005 and 2006, before the instrument failed permanently in 2007.

But, according to a report in New Scientist, when the researchers studied the images, they noticed 14 young stars that were shooting through interstellar gas, creating ‘bow shocks’ in front of them that resemble the water waves created at the bow of a speeding boat.

The bow shocks form where particles streaming from the stars in stellar ‘winds’ plough into surrounding gas.

“When I first saw the images, I said, ‘Wow, this is like a bullet speeding through the interstellar medium’,” Sahai said in a statement.

Similar bow shocks had been observed in the 1980s by the Infrared Astronomical Satellite. But, those bow shocks were much larger than the ones observed by Hubble, suggesting they were produced by more massive stars with more powerful stellar winds.

“The stars in our study are likely the lower-mass and/or lower-speed counterparts to the massive stars with bow shocks detected by IRAS,” said Sahai.

He added that low-mass stars outnumber their higher-mass counterparts, suggesting the newly found stars represent most of the universe’s stellar runaways.

The stars’ winds suggest they are just millions of years old, and their bow shocks suggest they are traveling through the interstellar gas at more than 180,000 kilometers per hour, about five times as fast as most young stars.

As to what accelerated them to such speeds, scientists cite one possibility as that the stars began their lives in pairs, but got boosted to high speeds when their partner exploded in a supernova.

Alternatively, the stars may have been involved in a gravitational run-in with two or three other stars and got kicked out in the process.

It is estimated that if they are just a million years or so old and are moving at about 180,000 km/h, they must have traveled about 160 light years from their birthplace.

The team plans to search for more such runaway stars and will also continue to scrutinize the existing Hubble observations to see if the stellar speedsters have much of an effect on the gas clouds they are traveling through, since turbulence can prevent gas clouds from condensing into new stars. (ANI)

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Flintoff, Strauss refusal forced Pietersen to resign

January 8, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Jan 8 (ANI): Kevin Pietersen was forced into resigning as England Test and one-day captain after all rounder Andrew Flintoff and new skipper Andrew Strauss refused to back him and ECB’s Managing Director Hugh Morris hinted at divisions in the team.

The England and Wales Cricket Board could not forgive Pietersen who was demanding Moores to be axed for issuing his ‘back me or sack me’ ultimatum last week and Pietersen had no idea that several senior England players such as Flintoff and Strauss also refused to back him when asked to do so by England boss Morris.

The role of Andrew Flintoff in his downfall will be keenly discussed. Flintoff and Strauss — named KP’s replacement — are understood to have stuck the knife in.

And England boss Morris hinted at divisions in the team when he said: “Kevin recognised that, in the present situation, it was impossible to restore dressing-room unity.”

Pietersen’s fate was sealed during a conference call between the 12-man ECB management board on Tuesday evening when it was agreed he and coach Peter Moores must go, The Sun reported.

After a day of frantic negotiating on Wednesday, Pietersen was finally allowed to save some face by announcing that he had resigned.

Morris added: “Kevin Pietersen is highly valued as a senior and experienced player and we are delighted he has indicated he wishes to continue to represent England in all forthcoming matches.

“I have an extremely high regard for Kevin but this has become an impossible situation given the irretrievable breakdown of the relationship between captain and coach.”

Pietersen arrives back in England this morning from his holiday in Africa and he could scarcely conceal his fury. (ANI)

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Punjab’s Badal village produces shooting stars for Indian sports

January 7, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

By Avtar Gill /Karan Kapoor

Abohar/Ludhiana, Jan.7 (ANI): Punjab, which has produced many national and international sportspersons, holds a big pool of talent in its rural areas. With proper training it could be harnessed to represent the country.

Badal Village in the southwest Punjab is a one such place, which has one of the best and ultra-modern sports infrastructure. Its shooting range today acts as a nursery for all budding female shooters, as it prepares them for national as well as international championships.

Today, Badal Village has established its name for being a centre for quality education and sports. Chief Minister Prakash Singh Badal also hails from this village.

The village also empowers women by taking care of their educational needs at Dashmesh Girls” College. But the major attraction of the college is its state-of-the-art shooting range which was established in 2,000. Recently, for its upgradation, 300,000 USD were spent.

With air-conditioned and soundproof facilities, it provides excellent facilities to girls to prepare for national and international championships. The world-class sports infrastructure and quality education enables the girls here to become confident and competitive.

“Shooting requires a good concentration. As when the child starts taking the game seriously, his or her power of imagination and personality start growing. In other sports, children need to concentrate more on their diet and have to workout properly. With that they are not able to spare more time for their studies,” said Virpal Kaur, the shooting coach, Dasmesh Girls college of Education.

“Comparatively, shooting is more a mental game rather than physical. This sport helps children in their studies and they are able to improve their power of concentration,” Virpal added.

Supported by the Sports Authority of India (SAI), the academy takes in 50 girls from the north Indian states.

Among the seven international sportspersons from the academy,

Avneet Kaur Sidhu, one of the seven international sportspersons from the academy, represented India in the 10m Air Rifle at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Besides training the academy also provides free accommodation, food and other facilities like weapon, ammunition and targets to the students. The academy enrolls girls belonging to rural India and those who are economically deprived.

Rishu Tomar, one shooter, said: “Girls in villages normally face restrictions Whereas girls in the cities openly express their views. I believe, village girls have talent and they also want to achieve their goals and express their views. The villagers should encourage girls and definitely they will perform better than boys.”

India”s gold in the shooting at the Beijing Olympics has boosted the morale of the shooters in the country. And, to promote sports Punjab, as a State, is making a huge contribution.

The State recently organized 18th All India G.V. Mavlankar Shooting Championship that attracted over 1600 shooters.

Though shooting is an expensive sport, but with academies and the government giving it good financial support, a good future for sports can be anticipated.

(ANI)

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How to go to space using a broomstick

January 7, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

London, Jan 6 (ANI): If scientists have their way, future astronauts would be literally going into space by a broomstick, in the form of a 100,000km long tether anchored to the Earth as a “space elevator”.

According to a report by BBC News, Raymond Riise of the European Space Agency demonstrated the device at a space elevator conference in December last year.

First mooted by Russian scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in 1895, the space elevator idea has captured imaginations as what would be the greatest space mission ever conceived.

The idea rests on making use of the outward centrifugal force supplied by the Earth’s rotation.

If the centrifugal force provided by the Earth is balanced with its gravitational force, by making use of a space elevator cable or tether whose centre of mass is at geostationary orbit, the tether would be held taut permanently, providing a means to propel people and cargo into space.

A long-standing critical issue is how to power the “climber” that would ascend the cable into space.

Prevailing ideas include delivering microwave or laser power to the climber beamed from the Earth’s surface, or even from orbiting solar power collectors.

But, European Space Agency ground station engineer Riise provided a markedly more simple idea.

He proposed sending power mechanically, effectively by providing a carefully timed jerk of the cable at its base.

To demonstrate, he employed a broomstick to represent the cable held in tension, and an electric sander to provide a rhythmic vibration to the bottom of the stick.

Around the broomstick’s circumference, he tied three brushes representing the climber with their bristles pointing downwards, meaning it took slightly more force to lower the brush assembly than to raise it.

The vibration from the sander allowed the assembly to slide upward along the broomstick as it moved slightly downward, but grip it as it moved slightly upward.

The net effect was that the assembly rose against gravity straight to the top of the stick.

The prototype’s approach would make for a bumpy ride in practice, but according to Riise, the rhythmic tugging on the cable could be smoothed out.

“It would be possible to make a suspension system that completely decouples the cabin where the passengers are,” he told BBC News. “For them, it would be a linear movement with very little disturbance,” he added. (ANI)

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‘Ancient necklaces’ reveal early man’s intelligence

January 5, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

London, Jan 5 (ANI): Researchers have determined that necklaces dating back to almost 100,000 years, found in southern Africa and the Middle East, represent intellect among early modern humans that allowed them to migrate out of Africa and determined their evolutionary success.

According to a report in The Times, perforated seashells from Blombos Cave and possible shell beads from Sibudu Cave, both in South Africa, date from 70,000-75,000 years ago.

Also, perforated shells bearing traces of red ochre are known from the Grotte des Pigeons in Morocco at 82,500 years and from Qafzeh in Israel at 90,000 years ago.

The latter were in layers that also had burials of anatomically modern humans of Homo sapiens type, while at Skhul, near Qafzeh, the Mousterian layers usually associated with Neanderthal man yielded two perforated shells.

“It has been repeatedly argued that personal ornaments are one of the innovations that emerged in Africa among early modern humans, and that they represent behaviors that allowed them to migrate out of Africa and determined their evolutionary success,” according to archaeologist Solange Rigaud and her colleagues.

“The use of personal ornaments by Mousterian Neanderthals and earlier hominids is a controversial issue,” Rigaud added.

One possibility, they suggest, is the use of naturally perforated small fossil sponges of the species Porosphaera globularis, a calacareous sponge that often occurs in chalky rocks.

Since the mid-19th century, it has been suggested that they were modified or used by humans, partly because collections found together could have been strung as necklaces and were also unlikely to be chance collocations.

Recently, Robert Bednarik has argued that the size, shape and perforation frequency of Porosphaera found in archaeological contexts differ from natural assemblages, and that micro-flaking around the holes was caused by hominid action to enlarge them.

Dr Rigaud’s team compared some of these early archaeological specimens from the Pitt-Rivers Museum in Oxford and the Natural History Museum in London with later archaeological uses of the sponges in Bronze Age and Roman times, and also with a large sample of natural Porosphaera from the Baltic coast of Germany.

The archaeological samples were larger, and had larger holes, than the control sample at a fairly high level of statistical significance.

There was insufficient stratigraphic dating evidence from the 19th-century excavations, however, to confirm that the sponges had been collected by hominids, rather than accumulated in the same deposits as man-made tools by chance.

Nevertheless, some kind of sorting clearly occurred in the ancient collections to produce such different ranges of size and shape from the natural sample. (ANI)

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Obama plans an inaugural ball exclusively for the military

January 2, 2009 By Rajiv Gupta Leave a Comment

Washington, Jan 2 (ANI): President-elect Barack Obama is planning an inaugural ball exclusively for members of the military, and his Presidential Inauguration Committee is working with the Defence Department to have the bash broadcast around the world.

The worldwide broadcast would be a first. The new president and his wife, Michelle, are likely to drop by the event for a dance and brief remarks, Politico.com reported.

The Commander-in-Chief’s Ball, to be held at the National Building Museum, will be one of 10 official inaugural balls. The military-only ball continues a tradition started in 2005 by President George W Bush.

Organizers said the ball will honor the country’s active duty and reserve military, and invited guests will include Purple Heart recipients and other wounded warriors, families of fallen heroes, and spouses of deployed military. Tickets will be free to those invited, the website said.

Obama said: “It is a privilege to honor our men and women in uniform during our inaugural festivities by continuing the tradition of the Commander-in-Chief’s Ball.”

“Our troops represent the best America has to offer, and without their dedication and sacrifice we would not be able to enjoy the freedoms that we are coming together to celebrate on Jan. 20. They deserve our thanks and our gratitude. Michelle and I look forward to attending the Ball and sharing this special evening with representatives of our armed forces,” he added.

The ball will be held the evening of January 20 at the National Building Museum, the website said. (ANI)

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