Excelsior... Nation

Clinton, Bayh step up exploratory efforts for White House

NEW YORK, Dec 4: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton met with New York’s Democratic Governor elect to solicit his support for her likely bid for the Presidency, the latest indication she is stepping up plans to join a growing field of potential contenders for 2008.

One rival, Indiana senator Evan Bayh, announced today he was establishing an exploratory committee to raise money for a possible Presidential run. He expects to decide over the christmas holidays whether to seek his party’s nomination.

A top aide to Clinton said he did not know when the former first lady would decide about pursuing the presidency or set up an exploratory committee. Clinton aides, however, have begun interviewing possible campaign staffers in recent weeks, Howard Wolfson said.(AGENCIES)

British Govt to publish proposals for new N-missile arsenal

LONDON, Dec 4: British Prime Minister Tony Blair is T Lay out plans today for a new multi-billion pound nuclear deterrent, a move expected to be among his last major acts as Prime Minister — and one likely to cause friction in his governing Labour Party.

Blair’s downing street office said he would publish a proposal paper and outline for lawmakers the Government’s preferred option for replacing Britain’s current nuclear submarine-based defense system.

Britain’s fleet of four nuclear-powered submarines, which are each capable of carrying up to 16 nuclear-armed trident missiles are expected to end their operational life by 2024.(AGENCIES)

Nepal Govt asks maoist splinter group to join peace process

KATHMANDU, Dec 4: Pledging to hold constituent Assembly elections, Nepal Government today asked a splinter group of the maoists to shun violence and join the political mainstream.

Home Minister Krishna Sitoula, the Government coordinator for peace talks with maoists, urged the Janatantrik Terai Liberation Front (JTLF), active in the Terai region, to halt violence and participate in talks with the Government.

"Restoration of peace and holding election to the constituent Assembly are the two prime agendas of the Government," he said.

"There is no problem that cannot be solved through peaceful means of dialogue, so I call upon the JTLF to present itself positively in the present changed political context," Sitoula said.

The Government would solve problems relating to citizenship of all Nepalese, including those belonging to the terai region, before going to the polls, he said.

"The seven party alliance Government is willing to solve all problems through talks in a peaceful manner," he told reporters in Sunsari in eastern Nepal yesterday.(AGENCIES)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Gold Gains in Asia as higher oil stokes concern over inflation

SEATTLE, Dec 4: Gold prices rose in Asia as crude oil traded near a two-month high, stoking concern over rising raw material prices and prompting investors to buy the precious metal as a hedge against inflation.

Crude oil gained 7.1 percent last week on signs the organization of petroleum exporting countries may cut output a second time in two months just as cold weather boosts US demand. Some investors buy gold to preserve purchasing power in times of accelerating inflation.

Gold gained 2.63 dollar to 648.22 dollar an ounce. Gold futures for Feb. Delivery gained 2 dollar to 652.60 dollar an ounce on the new york mercantile exchange. A futures contract is an obligation to buy or sell a commodity at a set price for delivery by a specific date.

Gold and oil often move together. Gold futures reached a record 873 dollar an ounce in january 1980 after oil prices doubled in a year, sparking a surge in the inflation rate.

(AGENCIES)

China commodity exchange turnover risesin first 11-mts

SINGAPORE, Dec 4: Chinese commodity exchanges’ turnover rose by 58 per cent in the first 11 months of this year compared with a year earlier, the China futures association in Beijing said in a statement today.

Turnover, or the value of all contracts that changed hands, totaled 2.4 trillion dollar between Jan-Nov in the country’s three commodities exchanges. A total of 403 million futures contracts changed hands, up 41 per cent from a year earlier, the data showed.

The Shanghai futures exchange is the country’s biggest commodities exchange, accounting for 61 per cent of the total turnover in the first 11 months with its active trading of copper, aluminum, natural rubber and fuel oil.

The dalian commodity exchange, where corn, soybeans, soyoil and soymeal are traded, had a turnover was higher by 12 per cent in the first 11 months. The Zhengzhou commodity exchange had gained 47 per cent for its trading of sugar, cotton and wheat. China has no commodities options. (AGENCIES)

Report criticises US’ police training programme in Afganistan

NEW YORK, Dec 4: The American-trained police force in Afghanistan is largely incapable of carrying out routine law enforcement work, a US Government report has said pointing to glaring inadequecies in the USD1.1 billion programme.

The report by the Pentagon and State Department also said that managers of the training programme cannot say how many officers are actually on duty or where thousands of trucks and other equipment issued to police units have gone.

In fact, most police units had less than 50 per cent of their authorized equipment on hand as of June, the report said.

The report was issued two weeks ago but is only now circulating among members of relevant Congressional committees.

In its most significant finding, the report said that no effective field training program had been established in Afghanistan, at least in part because of a slow, ineffectual start and understaffing, the New York Times reported today. (AGENCIES)

Japan ranks first in number of mobile broadband users

GENEVA, Dec 4: Japan has ranked first in terms of broadband internet services users via mobile phone in 2005, a un telecom body said sunday.

The number of mobile broadband internet service subscribers totalled 17.79 million in Japan last year, followed by 12.53 million in south korea and 10.26 million in italy, the geneva-based international telecommunication union said in its annual report on internet services.

According to the report, the total number of subscribers around the world is 60.25 million while there are 215.48 million fixed broadband internet subscribers worldwide.(AGENCIES)

The perm turns 100, but is no longer making waves

BERLIN, Dec 4: It is a century since a German Hairdresser invented the perm, but the technique that long gave fashion victims and footballers an extra bit of bounce has finally gone out of style.

"I will not even allow that word to be mentioned in my salon," Berlin’s Foremost Society Hairdresser, Udo Walz, recently told the Sueddeutsche Zeitung daily.

The problem with the perm 100 years on is still the same as the day it was born in a salon on London’s Oxford street in late 1906, it will give you curls but at considerable cost to the health of your hair.

Nobody paid more dearly than the wife of Karl Nessler.

The Hairdresser from the town of Todtnau in the black forest twice scorched off his spouse’s hair and burned her scalp in a torturous process of trial and error.

Once Nessler had perfected and patented the perm, it still involved vast amounts of sodium hydroxide and metal rods heated to 100 degrees C, which were hooked up to a chandelier to supply an electric charge.

But it meant an end to going to bed in uncomfortable curlers and took the world by storm.

Nessler left London in 1915 and emigrated again, this time to the United States. He died in relative poverty in 1951, never having recovered from the stock market crash in 1929 that swallowed the fortune he made from his invention.

The perm, however, went from strength to strength, providing hope and relief for the straight-haired throughout the decades. (AGENCIES)

"Sewage in lard" prompts new China health scare

BEIJING, Dec 4: china has arrested the manager of a factory which used grease from swill, sewage and recycled industrial oil to make edible lard, a Chinese newspaper said today in the latest health scare to hit the country.

Health officials also detected "toxic pesticide" in lard produced by the fanchang grease factory in Taizhou, in the eastern coastal province of Zhejiang, the Shanghai daily said.

"They wholesaled the product to retailers across the country, and the retailers sold it to clients, including hotels and restaurants," the paper said.(AGENCIES)

Brazilians head for foreign climes in holiday season

SAO PAULO, BRAZIL, Dec 4: Brazilians are heading abroad in record numbers for the country’s peak vacation season, prompted by the combination of a strong local currency and a crisis in the air traffic control system.

Among the brazilians’ top destinations in the first eight months of the year were Argentina, Spain, Chile and United States, according to Brazil’s number one travel operator, CVC. Traditionally popular domestic locations such as Bahia in the northeast are suffering.

Diana Toledo Arruda, a 28-year-old lawyer, recently decided to spend a holiday in Buenos Aires after finding out that it would cost less than 500 dollars.(AGENCIES)

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Saudi students return to west after 9/11 setback

RIYADH, Dec 4: Saudi students are returning to the United States after tensions in the wake of the September 11 attacks but other western countries remain an easier alternative for many, Saudis and foreign diplomats said.

Saudi Arabia hopes to send 10,000 students to US universities this year as part of a scholarship scheme to return cultural links to their levels before 9/11, when 19 young arabs, including 15 Saudis, killed 3,000 people with hijacked planes.

"The number of Saudi students in the states is currently about 14,000. This is up significantly from early post-9/11 figures," a US embassy official said yesterday.

But visa procedures remain tough for Saudis hoping to study in the United States, and it can take 12 weeks just to get an interview. Saudi media have frequently reported alleged maltreatment, including from US Government bodies.

Britain, Canada and other English-speaking countries have taken advantage of the problems to attract Saudis their way.(AGENCIES)

1 pc of China’s GDP spent treating smoking related illnesses

BEIJING, Dec 4: The health costs associated with treating 23 smoking related illnesses in China account for almost one per cent of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), latest research has found.

Smokers in China cost the country at least 250 billion yuan (USD 31 billion) last year, according to research conducted by the China centre for economic research of Peking university.

Illnesses caused by second-hand smoking, fires, environmental pollution and lost work time led to losses of 86 to 121 billion yuan, accounting for between 0.47 and 0.66 per cent of GDP, the report said.

According to the statistics of the World Health Organisation (WHO), there are currently 350 million smokers in China and 700,000 people die from smoking every year.

Experts suggest cigarettes should be more heavily taxed making the habit more expensive encouraging people to quit smoking.

The WHO said China’s smokers consume 1.6 trillion cigarettes every year, accounting for one-third of the world’s total consumption.

The average age of Chinese smokers beginning to take up smoking is younger than a decade ago, Xinhua news agency quoted a survey report by the Ministry of Health as saying last week.(AGENCIES)