Somali President Says Terrorists Are Defeated

By Alex Crawford, Special Correspondent, in Mogadishu

Al Shabaab terrorists operating in Somalia have been "defeated as a fighting force" after decades of creating havoc, according to the country's president.

But President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has warned that the extremists are an international network with links to al Qaeda and they still have the ability to mount attacks both inside Somalia and abroad.

The president is travelling to England next week to jointly chair an international conference with the British Prime Minister on Somalia's future.

He will be trying to convince backers like Britain and America that, despite more than two decades of financial support, their help is not only still needed but as crucial as ever.

"Somalia is so close to coming out of the quagmire," he told Sky News in his only television interview ahead of the conference.

"I say, please bear with us and stretch your patience just a little bit and you will get the kind of Somalia you have been dreaming of for 22 years."

President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has asked for patience

The president is the first elected leader in more than two decades and is heading up the first permanent government in that time.

He has only been in his job for eight months but with United Nations support there finally seems to be some progress in a country known as being the world's most fragile state.

International money along with the 18,000 African Union peacekeepers in the country has meant tentative stability in a nation more used to war.

The extremists have mostly been driven out of the capital Mogadishu and the joint Somali and African Union troops continue to take territory once held by the Islamists.

Many Somalis who once fled to safety in exile are now returning from their bolt holes around the world to set up businesses and live once again in their homeland.

There are big efforts to train the newly bolstered national army and police force, and the first permanent government is widely seen as legitimate and progressive.

But the terrorists' capacity to wreak havoc was demonstrated just a few weeks ago when al Shabaab extremists stormed the capital's court buildings, firing guns and setting off explosions.

The attack triggered a gunfight between the terrorists and the Somali security forces and at least 20 people were killed.

And over the past few days the capital has been virtually locked down due to fears of another attack.

But there is still a definite feeling of confidence among the Somali forces and the African Union peacekeepers that progress is being made bit by bit.

A new British embassy has been opened in the terror-ravaged country

Colonel Kassim Roble is one of the returning diaspora, lured back to his motherland after becoming convinced Somalia has turned the corner.

He had spent the previous eight years in Leicester before deciding to return home last year.

"Security is getting better every day, every month, every hour," he told Sky from the newly renovated Ministry of Defence in the capital. "We are in charge of 85% to 90% of the city (of Mogadishu)."

He put much of the change down to a fresh focus by the country's new president who has insisted funds be used to improve conditions for the troops with better salaries, better food and better training.

"The morale is now very good," said the colonel.

His words were echoed by peacekeepers from the African Union who are involved in helping secure areas but also mentoring and training the Somali security forces.

"Peace is coming back to Somalia," one Nigerian commander said. "The people are out on the streets, doing business again. The danger is not so much now. There's is a lot of difference even since a few months ago."

But the insecurity is never far away and there are concerns that without international community help, the fragile stability will shatter and be reversed.

"Al Shabaab is an international operation. They are operating inside Somalia but they are part of an international terror network," the president told Sky News.

"Somalia is just a small country, ill-equipped and ill-trained. Shabaab is defeated as a fighting force. Soon there will be no front line or no place they are in control of.

"But when they are defeated militarily, the way they work is they go into the society - so the suicide bombers and roadside bombings and grenade-throwing will go on for some time.

"But they will be defeated. They are about to be defeated and they are on the run."

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North Korea Reactor 'Could Produce Plutonium'

New satellite images of North Korea suggest it is nearing completion of a reactor designed for generating electricity - but which will have the capability to produce plutonium.

US academics who visited the site at the Yongbyon nuclear complex in 2010 concluded the reactor was being built for electricity.

Kim Jong-Un shut down a reactor in 2007 during aid negotiations

But analysts say that once complete the reactor will have a residual capability to produce weapons-grade plutonium.

The pictures have been published on 38 North - the website of the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins' School of Advanced International Studies.

The images - the most recent taken last month - show what appear to be external finishing touches made to the complex.

North Korea revealed an industrial-scale uranium enrichment facility in 2010 designed to provide fuel for the light-water reactor.

This development caused international alarm because of the potential for the centrifuges to be reconfigured to produce highly-enriched uranium - another means of creating fissile material for weapons.

If North Korea has produced enough low-enriched uranium to run the new reactor, it could commence the lengthy process of starting it up in the coming weeks, and be fully operational during the first half of 2014.

Containing the nuclear fuel and keeping the reactor cool pose major challenges - as would unforeseen events like natural disasters that caused a meltdown in Japan's Fukushima reactor in 2011, the analysis says.

"Pyongyang is probably planning to build additional power reactors to end its electricity shortage and help solve its economic problems," said Joel Wit, a former State Department official and editor of 38 North.

The latest image taken in March 2013 shows what could a water channel

"It may have some residual ability to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons, but the biggest concern about these reactors is whether they are safe or not," he added.

North Korea announced in April that it was restarting an older reactor at Yongbyon from which it is estimated to have derived enough plutonium for six bombs.

The reactor was closed in 2007 during aid-for-disarmament negotiations.

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Cannibalism Confirmed At Early US Settlements

Scientists say they have found definitive archaeological evidence that some of the earliest English settlers in America turned to cannibalism to survive.

Archaeologists say they have found bones of a 14-year-old girl at Jamestown, Virginia, that show evidence of being chopped clumsily as though to be butchered - what they call clear proof that she was eaten by humans.

The girl, whom researchers have given the name "Jane", is believed to already have been dead at the time, the Smithsonian National Museum of History announced on Wednesday.

Stories have persisted for years that the 6,000 starving English settlers resorted to eating dogs, mice, snakes and shoe leather at Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in America.

There were also written accounts of the settlers eating their own dead, but archaeologists had been sceptical of those stories until recently.

"Historians have questioned, well did it happen or not happen?" said Smithsonian forensic anthropologist Douglas Owsley. "And this is very convincing evidence that it did."

A stone cross marks a grave at the Jamestown colony

Mr Owsley said the human remains date back to a deadly winter of 1609-1610 known as the "starving time" in Jamestown. The colony was first settled in 1607.

The settlers were under siege from the indigenous Indian population and had insufficient food to last the brutal winter and severe drought.

They were relatively inexperienced at gathering food, and had few stockpiled supplies.

Early Jamestown colony leader George Percy wrote of a "world of miseries" that included digging up corpses from their graves to eat when there was nothing else.

"Nothing was spared to maintain life," he wrote.

There is also a record of a man killing his pregnant wife, salting her remains and eating them. He was later executed for the crime.

The remains of the 14-year-old girl discovered in the summer of 2012 marks the fourth burial of human remains uncovered at Jamestown.

The bones show a bizarre attempt to open the skull. Animal brains and facial tissue would be considered accepted and desirable meat in the 17th century, Mr Owsley said.

The 14-year-old's skull shows signs of primitive butchery

Her remains were found in a cellar at the site that had been filled with trash, including bones of animals that had been consumed, according to archaeologists.

John Smith was the leader of the Virginia Colony, which was based at Jamestown.

He made a famous threat to those settlers who were not working hard enough: "He that will not work shall not eat."

He also said that the efforts in Jamestown helped to preserve the entire colony: "She next under God, was still the instrument to preserve this colony from death, famine and utter confusion; which if in those times, had once been dissolved, Virginia might have lain as it was at our first arrival to this day."

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Cult Leader Who 'Burned Baby' Commits Suicide

A Chilean man accused of organising the ritual killing of a three-day-old boy has apparently committed suicide in an abandoned house in Peru, according to authorities.

Ramon Castillo, 36, was found hanged in the highlands city of Cuzco, General Javier Avalos, the regional police chief, told reporters.

The body was identified through fingerprints that Chile sent via Interpol. Astete said officials found two bus tickets for the Urubamba Valley in his pockets and were investigating whether he might have been travelling with someone else.

Police in neighbouring Chile had been seeking Castillo and other members of the sect that he led for their alleged participation in the baby's killing on a hill in the town of Colliguay near the Chilean port of Valparaiso on November 23.

Police remove Castillo's body

Castillo was understood to be the leader of a sect which reportedly believed that the end of the world was near and that the three-day-old child was the antichrist.

The baby was taken to a hill in the town of Colliguay near the port of Valparaiso on November 21, 2012, and was thrown into a bonfire.

The boy's mother, 25-year-old Natalia Guerra, had allegedly approved the sacrifice and is among four people to have been arrested.

Authorities said the 12-member sect was formed in 2005 and counted professionals with university degrees among its members.

Police said the group's rituals included using ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic plant that grows in Amazon forests.

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Nasa Wants Three-Line Poems For Mars Mission

Nasa is inviting the public to send in their name and a poem to be put on a DVD that will be carried aboard a Martian-bound spacecraft.

The disc will be in the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft, scheduled to launch in November.

Every name submitted will go on the disc but the space agency also wants people to write a short haiku poem.

A haiku is a form of writing that originated in Japan and is usually made up of three lines and around 17 syllables.

The three best poems, as voted for online by the public, will end up heading to the Red Planet.

"This new campaign is a great opportunity to reach the next generation of explorers and excite them about science, technology, engineering and maths," said Bruce Jakosky, MAVEN principal investigator.

"I look forward to sharing our science with the worldwide community as MAVEN begins to piece together what happened to the Red Planet's atmosphere."

The project, coordinated by the University of Colorado at Boulder, is the first devoted to exploring and understanding the Martian upper atmosphere.

The spacecraft will investigate how the loss of Mars' atmosphere determined the history of water on the surface and explore its interactions with the sun and solar wind.

People who send in their names for the DVD will be able to print off a 'certificate of appreciation' to record their involvement and the deadline for entries is July 1.

The voting for the three best messages begins on July 15, with the winners announced on August 8. The MAVEN mission itself is expected to blast off in late 2013.

Nasa's Mars Curiosity rover is still on the surface of the planet as part of a two-year mission surveying the landscape and collecting samples.

 

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Man Jailed For Selling Fake Bomb Detectors

A businessman who made £50m selling fake bomb detectors that allegedly caused the deaths of innocent Iraqis has been jailed for 10 years.

James McCormick was sentenced at the Old Bailey, after he was found guilty of three counts of fraud last month.

Judge Richard Hone said the 57-year-old, of Langport, Somerset, was responsible for a "callous confidence trick".

He added: "Your fraudulent conduct in selling so many useless devices for simply enormous profit promoted a false sense of security and in all probability materially contributed to causing death and injury to innocent individuals."

The kits also came with fake sensor cards to detect drugs and people

During his trial, the court heard the devices, which were sold for up to £27,000 each, had no scientific basis and were based on novelty golf ball finders.

They were marketed to the military, police forces and government departments around the world using glossy brochures, and were said to be capable of finding bombs hidden underground or under water.

McCormick boasted: "It's a phenomenon. It's been known for a number of years."

McCormick showed salesmen how to use the fake devices

However, Richard Whittam QC, prosecuting, said: "The devices did not work and he knew they did not work."

Mr Whittam told the judge that former senior British officers in Iraq believed the detectors had cost lives - although McCormick's defence said there is no evidence to support such a claim.

In a statement read in court, Brigadier Simon Marriner said: "The inescapable conclusion is that devices have been detonated after passing through checkpoints. Iraqi civilians have died as a result."

African soldiers were among those who trialled the useless detectors

As well as Iraq, McCormick sold detectors to police in Kenya, the prison service in Hong Kong and the army in Egypt.

He said one of them had been used to check a hotel in Romania before the visit of an American president in the 1990s.

Det Supt Nigel Rock, of Avon and Somerset Police, said the profits made by McCormick "fed his greedy and extravagant lifestyle".

"He has shown no shame or remorse and carried on with a complete disregard for the consequences of his con trick," he added.

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Death Row Prisoner Dies After Cell Attack

By Neville Lazarus, Asia Producer

An Indian prisoner on death row in Pakistan has died in hospital after being attacked by fellow inmates in a high-security jail.

Sarabjit Singh died of a cardiac arrest in the early hours following the attack in a prison in Lahore, doctors said.

Singh was convicted of being a spy and of involvement in a string of deadly bomb attacks in Pakistan's Punjab province in 1990.

He had spent about 22 years in Pakistani prisons.

Singh's family campaigning in 2009

His mercy petitions were rejected by the courts and then by former President Pervez Musharraf. 

The Zardari government put off Singh's execution for an indefinite period in 2008.

His family has always insisted he was innocent and had inadvertently strayed across the border when drunk. 

Police have charged two death row prisoners over the attack.

They reportedly told investigators that they had attacked the prisoner because he had allegedly carried out bomb attacks in Lahore.

Singh had earlier told his lawyer about threats against him and the matter was brought up with the authorities but no action was taken. 

Threats to his life had increased after the execution of Ajmal Kasab, the lone Pakistani terrorist captured in the 2008 Mumbai attacks and also of Kashmiri-born Afzal Guru, who was hanged over the 2001 attacks on the Indian parliament.

Singh's sister Dalbir Kaur speaking to the press after his death

Singh's family visited him in hospital on Tuesday and raised questions about the quality of medical care at the hospital.

They asked the Pakistani authorities to allow him to be transferred to India or a third country. 

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has expressed sadness over Singh's death, saying criminals responsible for the barbaric and murderous attack on the Indian national must be brought to justice.

An official tweet from his office stated: "Particularly regrettable that the government of Pakistan did not heed the pleas ... to take a humanitarian view of this case."

The Indian government is under intense pressure over the death amid accusations it did not do enough to help him. 

Pakistan has agreed to return Singh's body for cremation at his village in Punjab. 

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Stars Join Global Citizen Ticket Scheme

Stars like Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam, One Direction and Beyonce have signed up to a scheme to give out concert tickets in exchange for social activism.

The Global Citizen project issues points for its members for doing things like signing a petition, sharing a video via Facebook, or contacting politicians about issues affecting the world's poor.

Points can then be used to enter ticket lotteries, with the winners receiving guest list tickets in the areas usually reserved for the press and other competition winners.

The acts involved have promised two tickets for each of their shows for the next three years, according to Rolling Stone.

Rihanna, Neil Young, Black Sabbath and Tony Bennett are among some of the other musicians who have pledged their support.

The scheme was thought up by Pearl Jam's manager Kelly Curtis and the chief executive of the Global Poverty project, Hugh Evans, who also put on a fundraising festival in New York's Central Park last summer.

Dozens of record label music executives and managers have also given their support to the tickets initiative.

Global Citizen says it aims to fight poverty by tackling issues such as food and hunger, primary education, gender equality, child mortality and corruption.

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Bird Flu: Death Toll In China Reaches 27

The death toll from a new strain of the bird flu virus has risen to 27 after a man died in central China's Hunan Province.

The 55-year-old, whose surname was given as Jiao, died after receiving medical treatment, according to state news agency Xinhua.

At least 126 people have been diagnosed with the H7N9 virus since it was first reported in late March, with most cases so far confined to eastern China. One case has been reported in Taiwan.

The H7N9 virus

China confirmed 19 new cases of the virus in the week leading up to May 1, Xinhua said.

The World Health Organisation has called the outbreak "one of the most lethal" flu viruses ever seen, but there is no evidence yet of human-to-human transmission.

The virus is contracted after contact with poultry, but experts believe it is possible it could mutate, triggering a pandemic.

Public Health England (PHE) has taken the precaution of writing to GPs, warning them to be alert for symptoms in travellers returning from the Far East.

Most of the bird flu cases have not yet resulted in death, with some patients suffering lung problems but later being discharged from hospital after apparently recovering.

Meanwhile, a new Sars-like virus has sparked a health alert in Saudi Arabia after five deaths in the past few days.

The Saudi health ministry said all those cases were in the Ahsaa province, in the oil-rich eastern region of the kingdom.

Known as novel coronavirus or hCoV-EMC, the virus was first detected in mid-2012 and is related to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars), which triggered a scare 10 years ago when it erupted in east Asia.

The new strain is different in that it can cause rapid kidney failure.

Sixteen people have now died from 23 reported cases in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Germany and Britain.

However, the World Health Organisation does not yet know how it is transmitted or how widespread it is.

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Denmark: Biker Gangs Raided By Murder Police

Police in Denmark have arrested 32 bikers and members of gangs suspected of murder and assault in a massive crackdown on organised crime.

The capital Copenhagen has seen a spate of drive-by shootings and stabbings in recent months that have left several dead and injured - with warring biker gangs blamed for many of the most violent incidents.

Copenhagen police inspector Joergen Skov said: "We have arrested suspected perpetrators of a long slew of things, including murder, attempted murder, assault and other serious crimes."

Five weapons were also seized in the raids, police said.

In late March, police said a clampdown on gangs had led to around 80 arrests in three weeks.

Inter-gang turf wars, in particular between various immigrant gangs and biker groups, have been going on in Denmark since 2008.

Police estimate there have been more than 150 shooting incidents, usually linked to control over the drugs market.

Police would not disclose which gangs had been targeted in the latest swoop, when special task force officers descended on 51 addresses.

Previous stings have focused on the Hells Angels and Bandidos biker groups, and the Vaerebros Haarde Kerne (Vaerebro Hard Core), Black Cobra and Loyal to Familia gangs.

Mr Skov said police were "making it clear to the biker and gang members that we will under no circumstances accept violent conflicts, and that we will use every resource to arrest the guilty".

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