Friday, 17 October 2014

'Marvelous' Marvin Sonsona's attitude ruining his promising boxing career

Lanky southpaw and former WBO flyweight and reigning North American Boxing Federation featherweight champion “Marvelous” Marvin Sonsona is slowly but surely ruining what was once a promising career with his lack of focus as a fighter and his lack of discipline.
The “Marvelous” tag is soon disappearing and is being replaced by a sense of frustration among his handlers and fans who expected great things from the 24-year-old.
A planned fight against former world title challenger and WBC Silver champion Rocky Juarez scheduled for December 21 possibly at the Waterfront Hotel and Casino has been called off following Sonsona’s failure to report to the gym to begin training despite several promises to do so.
The Juarez fight was to serve as a final eliminator to determine the mandatory challenger’s slot for the title recently retained by Jhonny Gonzalez who hammered ageing veteran Jorge “Travieso” Arce to score an 11th-round TKO which sent Arce into retirement.
Sonsona failed to realize that the Juarez fight was a crucial step in his bid to win a second world title considering his skill and punching power which was premised on the imperative that he trained hard and maintained his focus.
But he failed to do that believing that a month’s training would be good enough to win. This attitude which sometimes borders on “cocky” has frustrated everybody involved with the fighter.
International matchmaker and promoter Sampson Lewkowicz’s Filipino partner Samson Gello-ani had provided Sonsona with airline tickets to fly to Manila from General Santos City, not once but twice, yet he failed to take the flight which resulted in Gello-ani ‘s financial loss because of the “no refund” airline policy.
Gello-ani has lost his patience with Sonsona whom he helped become a world champion when he dropped WBO flyweight champion Jose “Carita” Lopez en route to a unanimous 12-round decision in Ontario, Canada to grab the world title.
Just when Gello-ani and Lewkowicz thought Sonsona’ career was once again taking off following his sensational third-round knockout of former world champion Akifumi Shimoda of Japan in Macau last February 22, boxing fans as well as trainers spotted Sonsona drinking beer shortly after the fight, in full public view.
His showing against Shimoda won praise from Top Rank promoter Bob Arum who said his knockout of Shimoda was one of the very best he had ever seen.
The left uppercut which devastated the former world champion from Japan was as perfect as it was vicious and provided an insight into the skill, speed and punching power of the Filipino.
In his next fight which was a rematch following his fourth-round KO loss in a vacant WBO International super bantamweight title showdown to former world champion Wilfredo Vazquez Jr, Sonsona dropped the Puerto Rican in the opening round but had to eventually settle for a split decision win last June 7 as the lack of training became evident as Sonsona faded in the championship rounds and often resorted to holding.
The fight which started in sensational fashion ended in disappointment as the hope of a repeat of the Shimoda knockout by Sonsona quickly disappeared.
Ranked No. 3 in the featherweight division by the World Boxing Council, Sonsona was being matched in a mandatory NABF title defense against undefeated Jayson “La Maravilla” Velez of Puerto Rico sometime in December but the fight was scrapped because of Sonsona’s failure to train and his handlers’ refusal to take any chances not knowing what Sonsona would do.
With the big opportunity to fight Juarez, Sonsona again failed to change his attitude and remained in GenSan having a good time and refusing to train, resulting in the fight being called off.
In the past we ourselves have spoken to Sonsona and impressed on him the need to concentrate on his career because of his inborn talent.
He listened for a while, came to Quezon City to train at the gym of Dr. Rajan Yraola under veteran trainer Jun Agrabio and even studied a DVD of Shimoda which we obtained for him from our friends in the World Boxing Council.
We studied the fight tape with Sonsona, trainer Jun Agrabio and Dr. Rajan Yraola at the gym of Yraola in Quezon City. Although he trained for less than a month he looked good and demolished Shimoda as we had predicted.
Sonsona didn’t train as hard as he should have for the Vazquez fight and failed to impress even though he won. With the Juarez fight looming, Sonsona didn’t start training as required, forcing a frustrated Gello-ani to throw his hands up in frustration telling us, “Marvin has to change his attitude, otherwise its useless.”
All efforts to contact Sonsona have proved futile. He doesn’t answer calls or text messages.
Regrettably it seems, a truly talented fighter is wasting the opportunities given him and throwing away his chances of becoming a world champion once again. What a crying shame!

Meet the woman who killed over 100 ISIS men

Meet Rehana, a Kurdish female fighter who has allegedly killed over 100 members of Islamic State (ISIS) during the fight over the town of Kobani.
The fighter, known only as Rehana, was named in a tweet which has already been shared thousands of times since it was initially sent on 13 October.
Journalist Pawan Durani tweeted a photo of Rehana and encouraged others to share it as well. “Rehana has killed more than a hundred #ISIS terrorists in #Kobane,” the photo’s caption reads. “[Retweet] and make her famous for her bravery.”
Rumors are soaring that Rehana was possibly captured and killed by Islamic State militants, but the claim has yet to be confirmed.
No matter what, Rehana has become truly a hero in social media, and fans are making sure that her bravery should not go unnoticed. She’s just one of many female Kurdish fighters.
However, reports say that the news of Rehana's death and reports claiming she single-handedly killed over 100 ISIS jihadists cannot be independently verified.
Many Kurdish women are known for their bravery and fighting skills after various reported incidents where they showed great strength while attacking the militants belonging to the dreaded Islamic State organisation.

Canadian Soccer Association remains adamant turf isn't second-class, grass won't be considered

Canadian Soccer Association president Victor Montagliani took part in a media conference call Wednesday to detail what went into the formal response the association filed last week to the 2015 Women's World Cup turf lawsuit, and he made it clear the association isn't not going to back down. The call covered several of the key issues the CSA sees with the lawsuit and discussed their plans to fight it in court, but the most notable tidbit emerging from it may well be that as of right now (with less than eight months before the tournament's first game), the organization is not considering alternatives to turf surfaces and has not talked to their city or stadium partners about switching to temporary grass. The CSA is doubling down on their stance that holding the tournament on grass isn't discrimnatory, and betting that this lawsuit won't lead to an outcome that forces them to change.
Wednesday's call with Montagliani and lawyer Sean Hern (a partner in B.C. firm Farris, Vaughan, Wills and Murphy) was largely them taking questions from journalists, and their responses to questions about if they'd considered grass at any point in the process or were currently considering it were particularly notable. Montagliani said the CSA's bid for the tournament included FIFA 2-star turf and met the international organization's specifications, and the organization plans to stay the course with that approach despite this opposition from foreign players.
"We knew our facilities were world-class," he said. "We were very happy with our bid. FIFA was very happy with our bid."
Montagliani said the CSA's turf plan fufilled the bid guidelines FIFA handed out, and that they've seen no reason to alter it.
"Our bid was well within the scope that was provided," he said. "[Grass] is not something we've looked at because there's been no need. ... The playing surfaces are within the parameters allowed by FIFA." Montagliani added that they haven't talked to other stakeholders, such as city officials, stadium officials or CFL teams (who would be impacted by a surface change at a shared facility), about the possibility of changing surfaces, as the CSA doesn't see the need for that at this time.
"The discussions with our stakeholders have all been in preparation for where we are now," he said. "We haven't engaged in any discussions with them because we haven't seen the need to."
A key argument the players suing over this are making is that the men's World Cup has never been played on turf. However, Montagliani argued that plenty of high-profile men's tournaments (including the U-20 World Cup in Canada in 2007) have featured at least some turf surfaces.
"There are games being played by men's A-teams on FIFA two-star surfaces," Montagliani said, citing in particular a Canada-Mexico Gold Cup match in Seattle last July and last week's Turkey-Czech Republic Euro 2016 qualification match. "The core issue in the claim that's being advanced is that FIFA 2-star turf is somehow second-class, and it's not."
The players suing the CSA argue that a high-profile men's tournament in Canada would not be held on turf, but the U-20 World Cup was partly played on turf surfaces. The CSA intends to bid for the 2026 men's World Cup, so a reporter asked if the plan for that event would include grass or turf.
Montagliani responded by saying that the CSA can't comment there, as FIFA's bid requirements for 2026 likely won't be out until at least 2016.
"It's very early days in the process," he said. "We don't know what the parameters or scope of that bid will be. ...We're a long ways away from looking at that."
Another issue discussed was the specific identities and numbers of the players who have filed the lawsuit, which Hern said is not at all clear.
"We have raised questions about who is in the applicant group, because there are some discrepancies," he said. "It was filed as 'players on national teams participating in FIFA Women's World Cup 2015'.
That's obviously not accurate; it's not all players."
Hern said 16 players were mentioned in the suit, but only seven are listed on the consent form to release their names, and some of those players may have withdrawn.
"We'd like to know who is involved," he said.
Another issue is whether the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal that the case has been brought to has jurisdiction over a multi-province event run by a Swiss body (FIFA). Hern said the CSA plans to raise jurisdictional arguments.
"It's unclear whether the Ontario tribunal has any jurisdiction.over stadium conditions in other provinces," he said. "We would say it doesn't, but that has to be argued."
Speaking of FIFA, it's been noted that they haven't filed a formal response yet. Hern said that's because they haven't been properly served with the suit.
"FIFA has not been served with the complaint under the relevant international treaties, known as the Hague conventions," he said.
Comparisons have been drawn between this case and the ski jumping one ahead of the 2010 Olympics, where a B.C. judge ruled that female ski jumpers were discriminated against, but that the International Olympic Committee was beyond the court's reach. Hern said there are some common points in the cases. "There are some similarities, with the IOC being international and FIFA being international," he said. However, this case is before a provincial human rights tribunal, rather than a provincial court, so the legal process is rather different. It's not likely to be a quick one, though. The plaintiffs have filed for an expedited hearing, but Hern said the CSA's position is that the claims about turf's safety in particular can't be settled without a lot of expert testimony.
"Our view that the case be argued on its merits is that it's going to require extensive evidence." So, there's likely a long legal road ahead. The start of the World Cup is drawing ever closer, but it's clear the CSA is not planning to concede and look at temporary grass options. They appear determined to fight this out in court. We'll see how that goes.

Warner Bros. Announces 10 DC Movies, 3 Lego Movies and 3 'Harry Potter' Spin-Offs

Congratulations, Marvel: you now have a fully-fledged superhero competitor. Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tuijihara announced the studio’s plans for its DC Entertainment properties this morning, naming ten DC movies between 2016 and 2020, in addition to three Harry Potter spin-offs and three Lego movies.
In August, Warners announced dates for nine untitled DC releases for those years at the same time as it moved Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice from May 2016 to March that year in order to avoid a showdown with Marvel’s Captain America 3. Some of the projects had been rumored and quasi-announced (Dwayne Johnson confirmed the existence of a Shazam project when he announced that he would be playing Black Adam last month, for example), but today’s announcement is the first time all 10 movies have been named.
RELATED: 'Batman V Superman': First Official Superman Image Released
Those 10 DC movies named are:
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice directed by Zack Snyder (2016)
Suicide Squad directed by David Ayer (2016)
Wonder Woman starring Gal Gadot (2017)
Justice League Part One directed by Snyder, with Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill and Amy Adams reprising their roles (2017)
The Flash starring Ezra Miller (2018)
Aquaman starring Jason Momoa (2018)
Shazam (2019)
Justice League Part Two directed by Zack Snyder (2019)
Cyborg starring Ray Fisher (2020)
Green Lantern (2020)
In a press release following Tuijhara’s announcement, Warners noted that the DC slate consisted of “at least” these 10 movies, “as well as standalone Batman and Superman films.” It’s worth noting that each of the solo movies feature characters who are currently members of the comic book incarnation of the Justice League, although whether or not the same will be true in their movie incarnations remains unknown (For example, Gal Gadot isn’t listed as appearing in the Justice League movie, interestingly enough, but Amy Adams’ Lois Lane is).
Outside of the DC properties, the studio will also further explore J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter mythology with three movies to be released in 2016, 2018 and 2020 based on her Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them novella. The first movie, which features Rowling’s screenwriting debut, will be directed by Potter veteran David Yates.
Warners’ Lego plans include three releases over the next four years, starting with the Charlie Bean-directed Ninjago in 2016, followed by The Lego Batman Movie in 2017 (as exclusively revealed by THR last week) and The Lego Movie 2 in 2018.

Red Cross president: 'The Ebola crisis will grow'

The head of the International Red Cross is warning that the Ebola crisis will likely only get worse with the real threat of a "global health catastrophe."
“The Ebola crisis will grow," Peter Maurer, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, told Yahoo News Deutschland. "Until now, there is no vaccine on-site, and more and more people die.”
The outbreak, which has already infected 8,997 people and killed 4,493 in West Africa, is an “epidemic of global dimension and global threat," Maurer said.
"In a globalized world it is an illusion to think that such a disease can be contained locally," he continued. "Every local collapse of a system like we see now in Liberia includes the threat of a global health catastrophe. That’s what we risk.“
His comments echo those of Anthony Banbury, chief of the U.N.'s Ebola mission, who this week warned that if the global community does not step up its efforts to stop Ebola by Dec. 1, the world will "face an entirely unprecedented situation for which we don't have a plan."
“Ebola got a head start on us,” Banbury told the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday. “It is far ahead of us, it is running faster than us, and it is winning the race."
According to the World Health Organization, health officials could soon start seeing 10,000 new cases per week in Ebola-ravaged West Africa. There have been about 4,000 new cases in the past four weeks, according to the WHO.
“The virus is still moving geographically and still escalating in capitals, and that’s what concerns me,” Dr. Bruce Aylward, assistant director-general of the WHO, told reporters on Tuesday as the organization downgraded the chances of recovery from an Ebola infection to 30 percent.
Maurer called for nations to act and accelerate the delivery of resources to the region.
"There are a lot of announcements," he said. "But when I ask my colleagues [in West Africa] about the aid already arrived, then this result is less than all the warm words."
The ICRC president also reiterated his criticism of U.S.-led airstrikes against Islamist State militants in Iraq and Syria.
“The situation has not gotten better," Maurer said. "When bombs are deployed in densely populated areas, the civilian population always suffers."

China, Russia mull high-speed Moscow-Beijing rail line: report

Beijing (AFP) - China and Russia are considering building a high-speed rail line thousands of kilometres from Moscow to Beijing that would cut the journey time from six days on the celebrated Trans-Siberian to two, Chinese media reported Friday.
The project would cost more than $230 billion and be over 7,000 kilometres (4,350 miles) long, the Beijing Times reported -- more than three times the world's current longest high-speed line, from the Chinese capital to the southern city of Guangzhou.
The railway would be a powerful physical symbol of the ties that bind Moscow and Beijing, whose political relationship has roots dating from the Soviet era and who often vote together on the UN Security Council.
They have strengthened their relationship as Western criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin mounts over Ukraine and other issues.
The two signed a memorandum of understanding earlier this week during Premier Li Keqiang's visit to Moscow in which Beijing expressed interest in building a fast rail link between the Russian capital and Kazan in the oil-rich Tatarstan region, state broadcaster China Central Television reported.
The 803-kilometre line would be the first stage of the route to Beijing, CCTV said.
At present, trains between the two run along the Trans-Siberian railway that links Moscow and Vladivostok, before switching to a branch line heading south through the Mongolian capital Ulan Bator.
Direct passenger trains between Beijing and Moscow went into operation in 1954 and there are still two services per week, CCTV said.
The new link would cut the train travel time from six days at present to under two days, the Beijing Times quoted Wang Mengshu, a tunnel and railway expert at the Chinese Academy of Engineering, as saying.
"If the funds are raised smoothly... the line can be completed in five years at the quickest," he added.
The paper cited a research report that put the cost of one kilometre of Chinese-built fast rail at $33 million.
The country has the world's largest high-speed rail network, built from scratch in less than a decade, relying on technology transfer from foreign companies, including France's Alstom, Germany's Siemens and Japan's Kawasaki Heavy Industries.
Its reputation was tarnished after a bullet train collision in July 2011 near the eastern city of Wenzhou that killed at least 40 people and injured hundreds.
But China is now keen to promote the export of its technology, and has been building high-speed rail networks in Turkey and Venezuela.

US Nurses On Ebola: 'We've Been Lied To'

Reuters / Arnd Wiegmann Infection control nurse Marc Dangel (R) assists his colleague Heinz Schuhmacher to wear a protection suit during a media presentation at an isolation ward for possible Ebola patients at of the Universitaetsspital Basel hospital in Basel October 15, 2014.
Healthcare workers across the nation are ill-equipped to handle patients with the Ebola virus, according to reports from workers affiliated with the National Nurses United nurses union . Not only do many US nurses lack proper protective gear — like sealed gloves, masks, and protective goggles — healthcare workers are not being trained to use these materials in a way that would prevent transmission of the virus, union workers say.
"This situation has been a nightmare," National Nurses United executive director RoseAnn DeMoro told reporters on Wednesday. "We've been told a lot of things wrong. We've been lied to. And we know this because the nurses have told us this."
The attention is currently on Dallas, where critical errors at the hospital where the first patient in the US was found to have Ebola may have contributed to the infection of two healthcare workers with the virus. One of them boarded an airplane shortly before showing symptoms.
But what happened in Texas could happen anywhere, nurses say.
Some 85% of nurses say they haven't been provided with the proper instruction on how to use protective clothing, according to a national survey of 2,300 registered nurses at facilities in 46 states. Another 41% said their hospital did not have plans to properly equip hospital isolation rooms for Ebola patients; 40% said they lacked goggles or face shields.
Instead of the hazmat suits that the nonprofit organization Doctors Without Borders says it requires for treating Ebola, nurses in hospitals across the country have only generic gowns, gloves, and surgical masks.
Those leave skin at the wrists, neck, and face exposed to the virus. (The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just recently updated their guidelines for protective gear so that the neck is not exposed.)
These gaps in skin coverage are especially concerning because the virus is transmitted via direct contact, meaning that a worker could become infected if some of the virus (in the saliva, blood, or vomit of an Ebola patient) survived on the worker's skin and eventually got in his or her eyes or mouth or in a wound. Healthcare workers also haven't been provided with booties to cover their shoes, allowing virus particles that splash or leak to be carried outside the room, DeMoro said.
CDC director Tom Frieden, who is leading the charge against Ebola in the US, said on a call with reporters on Tuesday that he was aware of the problems. "I've been hearing loud and clear from healthcare workers around the country that they're worried, they don't feel prepared, they're distressed," Frieden said. A Tuesday news release from the CDC said the agency was " setting up a dedicated CDC Response Team that could be on the ground within a few hours at any hospital that receives a confirmed patient with Ebola."
As of Wednesday, conditions for hospital nurses remained unimproved.
Far from comprehensive Ebola training, most nurses are simply getting emails with links to the CDC website or flyers with basic information about the disease typed in bullet points, registered nurse Yadira Cabrera, who works at a hospital in El Paso, told reporters on Wednesday.
"Hospitals say they are ready, but my experience is they are not," Cabrera said. "Nurses at my hospital are reporting a very different story. We received a 10-minute training on Ebola."

'Clipboard Man' Without a Hazmat Suit at Ebola Flight Explained

The man seen not wearing a hazmat suit while standing just feet away from the second nurse with Ebola as she was transported to Emory University hospital did not need to wear the protective gear, the medical airline said.
The nurse, identified Wednesday as Amber Vinson, was flown from Dallas to Atlanta on medical airline Phoenix Air.
She was seen being transported to and from the ambulance by three people in full-body hazmat suits, but the fourth person by her stretcher was wearing plainclothes and holding a clipboard.
The airline confirmed to ABC News that the man was their medical protocol supervisor who was purposefully not wearing protective gear.
"Our medical professionals in the biohazard suits have limited vision and mobility and it is the protocol supervisor’s job to watch each person carefully and give them verbal directions to ensure no close contact protocols are violated," a spokesperson from Phoenix Air told ABC News.
"There is absolutely no problem with this and in fact ensures an even higher level of safety for all involved," the spokesperson said.

Ebola: Death of Arriving Arik Passenger Triggered Cleaning Crew Strike At JFK Int’l Airport In New York

The death of a 63-year-old passenger on an inbound Arik Air flight caused an Ebola scare that led to a cleaning crew's refusal to clean the aircraft headed for Lagos yesterday.
The unnamed passenger reportedly died in his seat after vomiting several times, according to airport officials. However, officials of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), who boarded the plane to remove the dead body, ruled out Ebola as the cause of death.
The death scared Arik Air cleaning company workers, who refused to board the plane to perform any cleaning work, causing a significant delay on an outbound flight yesterday.
The flight scheduled to leave JFK International Airport at 1:30 p.m. did not depart until 6:52 p.m. after changing its departure gate at least once.
Saharareporters learned that Arik’s flight attendants and other crew members joined together to clean the outbound plane before departure to Lagos yesterday. The flight was still airborne en route to Lagos at the time of publishing this report.

Birthday meat: Two friends arrested for goat theft in Ondo state

Officials of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, Ondo state command, have arrested two friends, Segun Agagu and Gbenga Adedipe (pictured above) for stealing a goat which they intended to use for a birthday celebration.
According to Vanguard, the young men who reside in Akure, stole the goat in the middle of the night and hid it at 2 Ijigba street, Oda road in Akure, the state capital. When the goat owner realized her goat had been stolen, she raised an alarm and a search by the NSCDC men led them to these two men.
The state Commanded of the NSCDC, Andrew Igwe Ugwumba said after proper investigations, the suspects will be charged to court for prosecution. Funny story!

Friday, 10 October 2014

Pakistani Child Education Activist Malala Yousafzai Wins Nobel Peace Prize

At just age 17, Pakistani child education activist, Malala Yousafzai has made history as the youngest person to ever win the Nobel peace prize.

Kailash Satyarthi, an Indian child rights campaigner, has also won the prize, BBC reports.

As you will recall, Yousafzai was shot in the head in October 2012 by Taliban gunmen because she was campaigning for girls’ education rights.

Satyarthi, 60, campaigns for children’s rights by using Mahatma Ghandi’s model of peaceful protests to inspire change. He is well known in humanitarian circles, for his campaigns against the exploitation of children for financial gain.

The Nobel committee lauded Yousafzai and Satyarthi’s “struggle against the suppression of children and young people”.


Redeemed Church Pastor Abducted by Boko Haram Escapes 10 Months Later

A Redeemed Christian Church of God Pastor who was kidnapped by Boko Haram insurgents 10 months ago escaped from Borno on Tuesday.

According to Sahara Reporters, the pastor, Rotimi Obajimi , was serving in the rural area of Borno/Yobe. One day, while on his way to Maiduguri, on January 6th, the insurgents abducted him and took him to Sambisa forest, where he was held captive for many months.

He was moved from Sambisa temporarily and taken to a new location. However, he was again taken back to the forest.

Obajimi was able to escape because of some heavy rainfall that caused the camp to become flooded for a period of time.

During the flood, the terrorists left the camp for a while, and so he grabbed the opportunity to escape.
Sources say he wandered through the village for a long time, before he was finally able to locate a village.

After
narrating his ordeal to some soldiers in the area, they took him to Maiduguri. Speaking about the incident, one of his fellow pastors who works at Redeemed church in Maiduguri said:

“We were so amazed to see him because we have been praying earnestly for long time trusting Jesus that he would surely come back but lo and behold he was brought to our headquarters in Maiduguri by the  military.” Arrangements are being made to relocate Obajimi to the church’s Redemption Camp in Lagos.


Court frees church leader over armed robbery

A Lokoja Chief Magistrates’ Court has discharged a church leader, Mr.
Sam Keddy Balogun over charges of
conspiracy and robbery levelled against him. Balogun, who is also
the Commandant General of Mission for Africa Chaplain Corps
was last June paraded by the police
along with his orderly, Saliu Mohammed, by the police for alleged conspiracy, theft, robbery and for illegally being in possession
of firearms.

When the case came up for hearing
yesterday at the Chief Magistrates’
Court, the trial magistrate, Mrs. Joyce Abdulmalik said she received
a letter from the office of the Director of Public Prosecution
signed by one Emmanuel Ibinu, a
principal legal officer, who said
there was no case against Sam Keddy Balogun and therefore,
advised the court to set him (the
accused person) free.

The magistrate, while making her
ruling said she relied on the letter
and therefore discharged Sam
Keddy Balogun of the offences
levelled against him. As for his
orderly, she expunged the allegations of robbery, conspiracy
and illegally being in possession of
firearms against him and only
charged him for theft and therefore
advised the police prosecution to
modify his charge sheet in the next
appearance.


Thursday, 9 October 2014

Suicide car bomb kills 10 in Iraq's Baquba

BAQUBA: A suicide car bomb blast at a police checkpoint in the Iraqi city of Baquba Thursday killed at least 10 people and wounded 11, security and medical sources said.
"At least 10 people, including seven
policemen, were killed when a suicide attacker rammed his car bomb into a police checkpoint at an entrance of the Shifta neighbourhood," an army officer
said. Shifta is a central district of Baquba, a city which lies around 60 kilometres northeast of the capital Baghdad.

The army officer said the attack occurred at around 4:00 pm (1300 GMT) and also wounded 11 people, including seven policemen.

A senior local police official and a doctor at Baquba general hospital both confirmed the casualty figures.

Baquba is the capital of the restive and religiously mixed province of Diyala, where Kurdish peshmerga, federal forces and allied militia have been battling the Islamic State jihadist group.


North Korea Leader Kim Jong Un Is Still In Charge: Source

BEIJING/SEOUL, Oct 9 (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is in firm control of his government but has hurt his leg, a source with access to the secretive North's leadership said on Thursday, playing down speculation over the 31-year-old's health and grip on power.
North Korea's state media, which usually chronicles Kim's whereabouts in great detail, has not made any mention of his activities since he attended a concert with his wife on Sept. 3.
The source said that Kim hurt his leg while inspecting military exercises.
"He ordered all the generals to take part in drills and he took part too. They were crawling and running and rolling around, and he pulled a tendon," the source told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
"He injured his ankle and knee around late August or early September while drilling because he is overweight. He limped around in the beginning but the injury worsened," the source said.
Kim, who has rapidly gained weight since coming to power after his father died of a heart attack in 2011, had been seen walking with a limp since an event with key officials in July, which would imply he may have aggravated an earlier injury.
Kim needs about 100 days to recuperate, said the source, whose information could not be independently verified.
"Kim Jong Un is in total control," said the source, who has close ties to Pyongyang and Beijing.
Friday is the 69th anniversary of the founding of North Korea's Workers' Party, an event Kim has marked in the past two years with a post-midnight visit to the Pyongyang mausoleum where the bodies of his father and grandfather are interred.
If Kim does not turn up, it could fuel speculation over the state of his health and whether he may have been sidelined in a power struggle, experts said.
"The longer he remains out of the public eye, the more uncertainty about him, and the status of his regime, will grow," said Curtis Melvin, a researcher at the U.S.-Korea Institute at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington.
NOT KIM'S FIRST ABSENCE
North Korean officials have denied that Kim's public absence since early September is health-related and a U.S. official following North Korea said this week there were no indications he was seriously ill or in political trouble.
It remains unclear why a leg injury would keep Kim out of the public eye for so long, although this is not the first time he has been missing from public view.
In June 2012, six months after coming to power, state media failed to report on or photograph him for 23 days.
He re-surfaced the next month at a dolphinarium.
Speculation that Kim's unusually long absence from public view may be due to ill health was fueled by a North Korean TV report late last month that said he was suffering from "discomfort."
Some Pyongyang watchers also suggest that Kim may have been sidelined in a power struggle, a scenario they say was reinforced by the unexpected visit on Saturday of a high-level delegation to the closing ceremony of the Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea.
Another interpretation of that visit holds that it was meant to convey stability in Pyongyang.
The source with knowledge of Kim Jong Un's health said rumors of a coup were "rubbish."
"It would have to be a very subtle coup indeed not to disrupt international travel plans," said Andray Abrahamian of the Choson Exchange, a Singapore-based NGO running a program for North Koreans in Southeast Asia.
North Korea is a hereditary dictatorship centered on the ruling Kim family. Kim's sister, Kim Yo Jong, is known to have an official role within the ruling party. His brother, Kim Jong Chol, and his estranged half-brother are not in the public eye.
Kim was absent from a Sept. 25 meeting of the Supreme People's Assembly, or parliament, the first he has not attended since coming to power three years ago.
However, Kim's name has not disappeared from state propaganda.
Thursday's edition of the Workers' Party newspaper, the Rodong Sinmun, carried three letters to Kim from overseas allies on its front page, and has reported on returning athletes from the Asian Games who thanked "the Marshal" for his support during the competition.
Abrahamian said it was unlikely Kim had been usurped.
"Kim Jong Un has always shared power with other key figures and even if the internal balance of power has shifted, it is unlikely that they would want to remove him, given his unmatchable symbolic value. Again, though, everyone is guessing," he said. (Additional reporting by James Pearson; Editing by Mike Collett-White and Raju Gopalakrishnan)

White policeman kills black teen in St Louis, triggering fresh protests

(Reuters) - A white off-duty policeman shot and killed a black teenager in St Louis on Wednesday, officers said, triggering a night of protests just miles from the site of another police shooting of another black youth in the suburb of Ferguson.
Police said the 18-year-old was armed and fired three shots while he was being chased by the officer, and they had recovered a gun at the scene.
The youth was killed almost two months to the day since sometimes violent protests erupted in Ferguson after a white police officer shot dead unarmed black 18-year-old Michael Brown.
In Wednesday's shooting, the dead man was one of three people who fled after being approached by the officer, a six-year veteran of the department who was working for a private security company, St. Louis Metropolitan Police Chief Sam Dotson said.
The officer, who was wearing his city police uniform, fired 17 shots at the teenager, police added.
A crowd of around 200 gathered at the scene in the south St. Louis neighborhood of Shaw, 11 miles (18 km) south of Ferguson. Many of the protesters marched to a major thoroughfare, partially blocking traffic and chanting "Whose streets? Our streets?" as a police helicopter hovered overhead.
Teyonna Myers, 23, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper that she was the cousin of the suspect and that he was unarmed when he was killed.
"He had a sandwich in his hand, and they thought it was a gun. It's like Michael Brown all over again," she told the paper. Police have not named the teenager.
'MICHAEL BROWN ALL OVER AGAIN' At one point, about a dozen people punched and kicked two occupied police vehicles, one that was marked and another that was unmarked. Demonstrators then broke the back window of a marked police vehicle.
None of the protesters, some of whom were from Ferguson, had been arrested by the early hours of Thursday, police chief Dotson told a news conference.
"I think the department showed a tremendous amount of restraint," Dotson said.
The officer, who was not hurt, has been placed on administrative leave and an investigation was under way, police said.
St Louis' historic Shaw district has a relatively low crime rate - as of September, there had been no homicides this year and just five cases of aggravated assault, according to police crime statistics.
In Ferguson, a grand jury is expected to decide next month whether to bring criminal charges against police officer Darren Wilson, who shot dead Michael Brown on Aug. 9.
Brown's death triggered weeks of sometimes violent protests, prompting the governor at one point to summon the National Guard.
Missouri authorities are drawing up contingency plans and seeking intelligence from other police departments around the country, fearing that fresh riots could erupt if a grand jury does not indict Wilson.

Top U.S. general says Ebola outbreak coming through Central America is real threat

A top U.S. general admitted that a potential Ebola outbreak in Central America is a real threat to the United States and a scenario which could result in a mass migration across the U.S./Mexico border, as thousands would attempt to flee the deadly virus.
“The immediate thing that really keeps me up awake at night, I tell you, it’s the Ebola issue,” said Marine Corps Gen. John F. Kelly, the commander of U.S. Southern Command, to an audience at the National Defense University on Tuesday. “There’s no way you can keep Ebola in West Africa.”
It’s a startling statement from Kelly who, as the man responsible for all U.S. military activities in South and Central America and the Caribbean, oversees a slew of serious issues from human trafficking to drug trade. During the videotaped event, the general said that many countries in Western hemisphere have “no ability” to deal with an outbreak of this sort, and much like we are seeing in West Africa, the disease “would rage for some period of time.”
“If Ebola breaks into Haiti, and Central America, I think it is literally ‘Katie bar the door’ in terms of the mass migration of Central Americans into the United States,” Kelly said, of the thousands he foresees fleeing countries like Honduras, El Salvaldor and Guatemala if an Ebola outbreak there were to occur. “These populations will move to either run away from Ebola or, in the fear of having been infected, to get to the United States, where it would be taken care of.”
The general added, “If there is an outbreak in the Caribbean, particularly in Central America, it would make the 68,000 unaccompanied children, I think, look like a small problem.”
The U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) held a meeting on the issue Wednesday at its headquarters in D.C. When reached out by Fox News Latino, they directed all questions on Ebola to the Department of Homeland Security, which did not respond at the time of this article.
The U.S. State Department has not responded to Fox News Latino either regarding the general’s Ebola concerns.
The Centers for Disease Control estimates 1.4 million people will become infected with Ebola in West Africa by January of 2015, with a 52 percent fatality rate – a statistic Kelly called “horrific.”
For weeks now, the CDC and the U.S. government have concentrated on containing the Ebola outbreak in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone through airport screenings. Airline passengers traveling from the region are getting checked for fevers, a symptom of Ebola.
But airport screenings do little to stop the robust sex trade and human trafficking business operating through a decentralized but efficient criminal network that carries hundreds of tons of drugs, weapons, money, and people through Latin America into the U.S.
“We see a lot of West Africans moving on that network. Sex slaves,” said Kelly, who emphasized that of the people captured along the southwest border “a very large percentage of them are West Africans.”
While on a trip to Costa Rica a couple of weeks ago, Kelly said, one of his staffers at the embassy told him of a case he witnessed firsthand of West Africans traveling freely and illegally toward the United States. The embassy person said that in a recent visit to the northern border he walked over to five or six men who were waiting in line to cross to Nicaragua and, in a casual conversation, found out they were from Liberia and had been on the road for about a week, on their way to New York City.
“They had flown through Trinidad and then met up with traffickers,” Kelly explained. “They could have made it into New York City and still be within the incubation period of Ebola. I’ve highlighted this issue in Washington.”
A CBP report published online earlier this week on Breitbart.com broke down where undocumented immigrants are coming from and, between January and July of this year, at least 71 people reportedly arrived from the three West African nations hit with the current Ebola outbreak.
Ebola symptoms can take up to 21 days to appear in an infected person, at which time the person is contagious.
Still, Carl Meacham, the director of the Americas program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Fox News Latino that, while he doesn’t disagree with the general’s assessment, he believes an Ebola outbreak in Central America is unlikely because the region has no significant West African communities.
“The likelihood of it coming to Central America and Haiti at this point is very small,” Meacham said.
There is a West African population in Northeast Brazil, but Meacham says Brazil is in a better place to deal with a possible outbreak than countries nearer to the U.S. border.
Meanwhile, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) is urging countries of the Americas not to underestimate Ebola and to be vigilant, especially at points of entry and throughout the health system. PAHO serves as the Regional Office for the Americas of the World Health Organization.
In Argentina, the Ministry of Health has already marked “Ebola Only” specialty hospitals, Chile has established contingency plans, and Ecuador, Venezuela, Honduras and Panama reportedly have plans in place to stop a possible spread of Ebola.
"There is no sign yet that the epidemic has reached a plateau," said Marcos Espinal, director of Communicable Diseases at PAHO, on Sept. 26. "The next few weeks will be key.”

Ruling Delayed on Detention in Islamic State Case

A federal magistrate judge has put off ruling on whether a 19-year-old from suburban Chicago accused of trying to join Islamic State militants in Syria should stay behind bars pending trial.
Mohammed Hamzah Khan's detention hearing Thursday in federal court in Chicago followed his arrest Saturday at O'Hare International Airport as he attempted to board a plane to Turkey.
Judge Susan Cox delayed her ruling to allow more time to consider prosecutors' motion to close part of the hearing to the public.
Investigators said Khan left a letter for his parents in his bedroom at the family's Bolingbrook home expressing disgust with Western society.
He's charged with attempting to provide material support to foreign terrorists.
In a court appearance Monday, Khan told a federal magistrate he understood the allegations.

Kim Jong Un's long absence from public view explained


North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is in firm control of his government but has hurt his leg, a source with access to the secretive North's leadership said on Thursday, playing down speculation over the 31-year-old's health and grip on power.
North Korea's state media, which usually chronicles Kim's whereabouts in great detail, has not made any mention of his activities since he attended a concert with his wife on Sept. 3.
The source said that Kim hurt his leg while inspecting military exercises.
"He ordered all the generals to take part in drills and he took part too. They were crawling and running and rolling around, and he pulled a tendon," the source told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
"He injured his ankle and knee around late August or early September while drilling because he is overweight. He limped around in the beginning but the injury worsened," the source said.

Kim, who has rapidly gained weight since coming to power after his father died of a heart attack in 2011, had been seen walking with a limp since an event with key officials in July, which would imply he may have aggravated an earlier injury.
Kim needs about 100 days to recuperate, said the source, whose information could not be independently verified.
"Kim Jong Un is in total control," said the source, who has close ties to Pyongyang and Beijing.
Friday is the 69th anniversary of the founding of North Korea's Workers' Party, an event Kim has marked in the past two years with a post-midnight visit to the Pyongyang mausoleum where the bodies of his father and grandfather are interred.
If Kim does not turn up, it could fuel speculation over the state of his health and whether he may have been sidelined in a power struggle, experts said.
"The longer he remains out of the public eye, the more uncertainty about him, and the status of his regime, will grow," said Curtis Melvin, a researcher at the U.S.-Korea Institute at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington.
Not Kim's first absence
North Korean officials have denied that Kim's public absence since early September is health-related and a U.S. official following North Korea said this week there were no indications he was seriously ill or in political trouble.
It remains unclear why a leg injury would keep Kim out of the public eye for so long, although this is not the first time he has been missing from public view.
In June 2012, six months after coming to power, state media failed to report on or photograph him for 23 days.
He re-surfaced the next month at a dolphinarium.

North Korea is a hereditary dictatorship centred on the ruling Kim family. Kim's sister, Kim Yo Jong, is known to have an official role within the ruling party. His brother, Kim Jong Chol, and his estranged half-brother are not in the public eye.
Kim was absent from a Sept. 25 meeting of the Supreme People's Assembly, or parliament, the first he has not attended since coming to power three years ago.
However, Kim's name has not disappeared from state propaganda.
Thursday's edition of the Workers' Party newspaper, the Rodong Sinmun, carried three letters to Kim from overseas allies on its front page, and has reported on returning athletes from the Asian Games who thanked "the Marshal" for his support during the competition.
Abrahamian said it was unlikely Kim had been usurped.
"Kim Jong Un has always shared power with other key figures and even if the internal balance of power has shifted, it is unlikely that they would want to remove him, given his unmatchable symbolic value. Again, though, everyone is guessing," he said.
New star emerges
The man in the olive drab uniform and oversized Soviet-style military cap who strode through South Korea's main airport last week has climbed from an obscure desk job in North Korea to the most powerful position outside the ruling Kim family.
Hwang Pyong So, now a top military aide to Kim, has had an unprecedented rise to the top rungs of North Korea's leadership in the space of a few years. With intense speculation on the whereabouts of Kim, Hwang is even more in focus.
Last week, Hwang was at the head of a delegation that visited South Korea for the closing ceremony of the Asian Games in the city of Incheon with little advance notice.
He is the most senior official from the North to have ever come to the South, and opinion is divided on whether this could be a sign of turmoil in Pyongyang.
Hwang, who is 64 or 65, was in the Organization and Guidance Department (OGD), a powerful and secretive body that finalizes appointments within North Korea's leadership, and rose to be its second-in-command, according to North Korea experts and South Korea's Unification Ministry.
At the time, the OGD was headed by Kim Jong Il, the father of the current leader.
Hwang was associated with Kim Jong Un in the late 2000s when the young man was first named in state media reports announcing his party and military credentials.
When Kim Jong Un took power after his father's death in 2011, Hwang was among his coterie of advisers. As others fell by the wayside, Hwang became chief of the General Political Bureau of the army, a powerful position that mobilizes the military for the leader, earlier this year.
Last month, he also became vice chairman of the National Defense Commission, considered one of the most important posts in North Korea. Kim Jong Un is chairman.
Jang Jin-sung, a North Korean defector who previously worked at a propaganda unit in the North's ruling party, said it was unusual for an OGD veteran to rise to such a prominent position.
"These are the people who come to the forefront only when there is a purge or an execution," said Jang.
Pyongyang's military leadership has been in a state of perpetual reshuffle since Kim Jong Un took power.
Kim's uncle Jang Song Thaek, who was once seen as the No.2 in Pyongyang, was purged and executed late last year.
lRelated North Korea leader Kim is still in charge, has injured leg: source NATION & WORLD North Korea leader Kim is still in charge, has injured leg: source SEE ALL RELATED 8
Jang's replacement, Choe Ryong Hae, has been demoted several times since then. Now head of the state sports commission, a role Jang also held before being executed, Choe accompanied Hwang on the visit to South Korea.
A source with ties to the leadership in Pyongyang and Beijing said Choe fell from grace for not preparing troops in his role as political head of the North Korean army.
North Korean state media in April said Kim noted "serious defects" with an artillery unit within the army that he said failed to carry out "party political work" - a task within Choe's remit.
Kim Jong Un further lost confidence in Choe when he learned the 65-year-old had stashed millions of dollars in a secret Chinese bank account, the respected Seoul-based Daily NK website reported in July.
New uniform
Despite little military experience, Hwang wears a rank equivalent to a four-star general - not unusual in a top-heavy military leadership where party cadres often rotate in and out of uniform.
"Hwang was promoted because Kim Jong Un was impressed with his division, the most combat-ready of the ones Kim inspected," the source with ties to the leadership said.
Known as a close confidant of the young dictator, Hwang had few official dealings with people outside the reclusive North before leading the delegation to South Korea on Saturday.
He arrived on a VIP plane bearing the emblem of the North Korean state, flanked by suited bodyguards wearing sunglasses and earpieces.
During his 12-hour trip, Hwang smiled often, watched fireworks and Korean pop music at the closing ceremony, and at times spoke in a way that made it impossible to ascertain what he was saying, official transcripts show.
Michael Madden, an expert on the North Korean leadership, said people who have met Hwang described him as lacking arrogance, favoring consensus and "very pleasant to interact with." He cuts a more formidable figure at home.
At a military rally in Pyongyang in July, Hwang told troops to prepare for nuclear Armageddon against America.
"If the U.S. undermines our sovereignty and right to exist with its nuclear weapons and aircraft carriers, our army will launch a nuclear-armed rocket at the White House and major U.S. bases in and around the Pacific," Hwang said.
Hwang first emerged in state media reports 10 years ago as greeting leader Kim Jong Il with "stormy cheers" at a concert.
South Korea's Ministry of Unification has published little on Hwang beyond his job, rank and year of birth - 1949, the same generation as many of the cadres around Kim Jong Un. Kim's father, by comparison, was often accompanied by octogenarians.
Experts are divided as to how much control the OGD, and Hwang, have over Kim Jong Un, but there is general agreement that there has long been mutual dependency between party cadres and the Kim family.
"Hwang is the guy who made the leap from the shadows to sunshine," said Jang, the defector.

NBA tells Cavs and Heat not to do '3 goggles' in Brazil, where it's offensive

NBA players have a number of go-to celebrations — chest bumps, giving daps, running around and beating one's chest in the most confrontational manner possible, etc. One of thJames Harden inadvertently starts World War III.
most popular in recent years has been "three goggles," the practice of putting fingers up to one's eyes in the shape of, well, goggles. It's now common enough that most American fans think nothing of it.
Yet that is definitely not the case in Brazil, where the gesture is very offensive. Enough so that the NBA has asked the Cleveland Cavaliers and Miami Heat not to use it in advance of Saturday's exhibition game in Rio de Janeiro. From Chris Haynes of the Northeast Ohio Media Group:
Holding up the "three-sign" or the "three-goggles" in Brazil means "f--- you" or "f--- off," I was informed.
The NBA sent the Cavs and Heat a memo with a list of questionable gestures that shouldn't be used in Brazil, we're told. The last thing anybody wants is for the stands to clear immediately after a player nails a 3-pointer.
Can you imagine a player floating and waving the three-sign from one end of the court to the other? That wouldn't be good.
James Jones, the Cavaliers' 3-point marksman, says he was not made aware of the memo and knew nothing about the gesture being an insult in Brazil.
"Hey, that's why I just salute after I hit one," James said. "That's not offending anyone, right?" Jones should be fine, but the three-goggle issue speaks to the broader problems of bringing a league with its own culture into countries that may have developed similar customs with very different meanings. Tell someone that things are "a-ok" with your fingers and you're likely to get in a fight. However, the NBA has also played innocent host to offensive gestures from other cultures in the past. In the early '00s, Sacramento Kings and fellow Serbs Vlade Divac and Peja Stojakovic celebrate three-pointers with a three-fingered salute that had been used by their countrymen as a display of pride — unless, of course, you were a Muslim Croatian, in which case you saw it as a sign of oppression. The act earned some negative attention after its alternate meanings were revealed, but for the most part it continued along with few American fans thinking much of it.
Regardless, it's nice to see that the NBA is on top of the issue and doing its best to ensure that these teams don't start any international incidents. Although it does cause some consternation as to what Brazilian players like Nene and Leandro Barbosa must think every time they see a teammate throw up the goggles. That's no way to make a friend feel comfortable.

Now the protesters are being accused of intimidation in Clare Hall

Demonstrators protesting the installation of domestic meters by Irish Water have been accused of engaging in intimidatory behaviour in Clare Hall this week.
It follows clashes between gardaí and protesters at the northside Dublin estate.
Over 20 gardaí from various parts of Dublin responded to the scene at Elmfield Drive in the estate yesterday after a group of some 150 people turned out to protest.
Scuffles broke out on several occasions, and protesters claimed afterwards that officers involved had used heavy-handed tactics.
Speaking to Joe Duffy’s Liveline programme on RTÉ this afternoon, one resident of the area said she and her neighbours felt ”intimidated by these people in our own homes”.
Giving only her first name, Louise, she said the demonstrators were “ringing doorbells, moving barricades, and intimidating us and our kids”.
However, one of the organisers of the protests who spoke to Duffy – and later, to this website – insisted no intimidation of residents took place in yesterday’s actions.
Jim*, who lives in the estate and is one of the organisers of the ‘Clare Hall Says No’ group insisted that there was broad support for the protests in the area, and that it was the gardaí and the contractors who had engaged in intimidatory tactics.
The group began a social media campaign against the planned installation of meters at the start of the week, Jim said.
He said that Irish Water had ‘blitzed’ the estate and that gardaí had acted aggressively as residents and other demonstrators formed a human chain to try to block contractors’ vehicles.
In a statement on the incident, the Gardaí said that the force had a role to play in “ensuring peaceful protest can take place, and also in preventing injury and protecting life”.
Our objective with any such operation is to ensure the safety of the public.
‘Clare Hall Says No’ organised a public meeting to discuss their actions on Tuesday night, which was attended by some 200 people, Jim said.
He described the clashes with gardaí as “pandemonium” and said one woman had been badly hurt in what he referred to as a “rugby scrum”.
Elsewhere, a member of Clare Hall Residents Association said opinion on the protests was split in the estate, but that there had been a groundswell of opposition to the metering process in recent months. Another member of the association posted a statement on Facebook saying that many of the anti-charges protesters had “behaved impeccably in the face of some very serious intimidation”.
“We are however aware that not all residents are opposed to the installation of water meters or water charges, and that is their right.”
*Jim gave us his full name, but asked that it not be published.
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