Nigerian man indicted in plot to blow up plane

Abdulmutallab has told investigators he received training and instructions from al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen. His father warned the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria that his son had drifted into extremism in Yemen, but that threat was never fully digested by the U.S. security apparatus.

A Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day was indicted on Wednesday on charges including attempted murder and trying to use a weapon of mass destruction to kill nearly 300 people.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, was travelling from Amsterdam when he tried to destroy the plane by injecting chemicals into a package of pentrite explosive concealed in his underwear, authorities say.

The failed attack caused popping sounds and flames that passengers and crew rushed to extinguish.

The bomb was designed to detonate “at a time of his choosing,” the grand jury’s indictment said.

There is no specific mention of terrorism in the seven-page indictment. But trying to use a weapon of mass destruction is a terrorism charge, U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade said.

President Barack Obama considers the incident an attempted strike against the United States by an affiliate of al-Qaeda.

Abdulmutallab has told U.S. investigators he received training and instructions from al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen. His father warned the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria that his son had drifted into extremism in Yemen, but that threat was never fully digested by the U.S. security apparatus.

Since the failed attack, airlines and the Transportation Security Administration have boosted security in airports in the U.S. and around the world. Obama has said the government had information that could have stopped Abdulmutallab, but intelligence agencies failed to connect the dots.

Abdulmutallab faces up to life in prison if convicted of attempting to use a bomb on the plane. He is being held at a federal prison in Michigan and a message seeking comment was left Wednesday with his lawyers, Miriam Siefer and Leroy Soles.

“This investigation is fast-paced, global and ongoing, and it has already yielded valuable intelligence that we will follow wherever it leads,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement. “Anyone we find responsible for this alleged attack will be brought to justice using every tool {mdash} military or judicial {mdash} available to our government.”

Abdulmutallab will make his first appearance in federal court on Friday for an arraignment and a hearing to determine if he stays in custody.

“Short of actual murder, these are some of the most serious charges in the criminal code,” said Lloyd Meyer, a former terrorism prosecutor at U.S. war crimes tribunals at the Guantanamo Bay prison. “These charges are tailored to the facts of what happened over the sky in Detroit.”

Source:http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article76885.ece

46 p.c. drop in Indian students application: Australia

It was also due to stricter and tougher scrutiny of applications and the immigration department has been rejecting a higher number of applications from India, Department’s spokesman Sandy Logan said

Hit by international student attack crisis, Australia has experienced a huge decline by 46 per cent of Indians applying for student visas in the country last year, country’s Immigration Department has said.

The total number of student visa applications around the world also dropped by over 20 per cent.

Department’s spokesman Sandy Logan said racism and violence issue against foreign students were not mainly to be blamed for the slide in visa applications.

It was also due to stricter and tougher scrutiny of applications and the immigration department has been rejecting a higher number of applications from India, he said.

“It is correct to say that there has been a decline in the number of student visa applications coming from India,” he said.

There’s also been a decline though in the number of student visas applications that have been withdrawn by those applicants. In August last year the government announced strengthened checking for high—risk segments of the student visa programme.

“It was a targeted series of checks as a result of analysis which suggested the risk was most significant in India, Mauritius, Nepal, Brazil, Zimbabwe and Pakistan.

Once integrity checking is taken into account a student visa application has been refused,” he said.

Logan further said, “We are aware that there has been an effect across the board as a result of the global financial crisis,” he said.

“But we were also expecting that with greater and more stringent integrity checks, the student visa application cohort from a number of these countries will drop.”

Meanwhile, founder and director of International Education Consultants Australia, Kathryn Richardson, said adverse publicity of violent incidents involving foreign students in Australia cannot be ruled out as a factor.

“Of course you would expect there would be some sort of response to that. I don’t fear, at this stage, that it is something that will be in the long run a dramatic and constant change,”

“But if the numbers fall off this year due partly to publicity or bad publicity, it probably wouldn’t be surprising,” Logan said.

Source:http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article76919.ece

Suicide blast kills 6 Russian policemen in Dagestan

A suicide bomber blew up an explosives-packed car at a police station in Russia’s troubled North Caucasus on Wednesday, killing six officers and wounding at least 16 people, officials said.

The officers who died took action to prevent far greater devastation at the traffic police station on the outskirts of Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, where 150 officers were lined up outside for roll call at the time of the attack, city police chief Col. Shamil Guseinov said.

The bomber detonated the explosives at the station gate after police stopped him from driving through, Col. Guseinov said. Those killed were at the gate, including three officers in a police jeep that blocked the attacker’s path, he said.

A similar bombing in a neighbouring republic of Ingushetia in August killed 24 people and injured more than 200. In that attack, a man succeeded in crashing a bomb-laden van through the gates of the police station in Nazran. The explosion left a bus-sized crater in what was left of the station.

Dagestan, Ingushetia and Chechnya, all predominantly Muslim republics in the North Caucasus, have seen a sharp rise in violence last year, with many of the nearly daily attacks targeting police and other officials.

The violence sweeping the impoverished southern region is increasingly being described as a civil war between Kremlin-supported administrations and Islamic militants.

Source:http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article76832.ece

9/11 attackers still in Af-Pak region: US officials

White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said the Obama administration has re-oriented its focus on Pakistan and Afghanistan, the place were 9/11 attacks originated

Those behind the 9/11 terror strikes are still in the Af-Pak region and planning more attacks against the United States, country's top officials said on Sunday.

White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said the Obama administration has re-oriented its focus on Pakistan and Afghanistan, the place were 9/11 attacks originated.

"We are drawing down in Iraq and focusing on Pakistan and Afghanistan, the place where the attacks of 9/11 originated and where people sit in caves and in houses today planning more attacks on this country," Mr. Gibbs told the NBC channel.

He said the administration has renewed its approach towards addressing the threat coming from Al Qaeda and the Taliban and strengthened its partnerships with a number of countries.

"The President certainly has taken steps in his time in office to re-orient our priorities as it comes to fighting that war on terror," Mr. Gibbs said.
Source:http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article71627.ece?homepage=true

Hundreds rescued as heavy snow slams Britain

Unusually heavy snowfall stranded hundreds of motorists, disrupted trains and shut down schools and airports across Britain on Wednesday as the country suffered through its longest cold snap in nearly 30 years.

The British military was called in overnight to help rescue motorists when up to 1,000 vehicles were caught in a massive snow-related traffic jam in Hampshire, in southern England. Many people were evacuated to nearby rescue centres but some people slept in their vehicles overnight.

The demands on rescue workers in southern England were so overwhelming that coast guard workers turned their skills from sea to land to help out.

The runway at London’s Gatwick Airport, the second busiest in the country, was closed for snow clearance Wednesday morning while sections of the country’s most important highways -- such as the M1, which links London and Leeds -- were closed.

A dozen flights were canceled at London’s Heathrow airport, Europe’s busiest, with massive lines building at check-in desks. Similar delays and cancelations were reported at regional airports.

Train services were also affected, with lines in southern England reporting reduced services. However London’s transport system, which practically ground to a halt when snow hit the capital in February, only suffered minor disruptions. Most of the capital’s bus and subway lines were running.

Hundreds of schools also closed down.

British winters are typically mild, and cities and towns are generally ill-equipped to deal with heavy snowfall. With the worst-hit areas seeing up to 16 inches (40 cm) of snow, officials and road crews were struggling to keep up.

Several local governments were running out of sand and salt -- with some reportedly emptying department stores of supplies. The wintry weather has prompted some police forces to urge drivers to stay off the roads and some trash collectors to suspend their rounds.

The national weather office says Britain is experiencing its longest cold snap since 1981. The unusually cold weather is expected to continue for the next two weeks.

Source:http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article76608.ece

Rs 749 water filters: What Tata plans to do

Nearly 4 million people in India are affected by water-borne diseases every year. As many as 400,000 children die from diarrhea every year. According to a 2007 United Nations report, half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by patients who suffer from water-borne diseases.

In India, such diseases cause more than 1.5 times the deaths caused by AIDS and double the deaths caused by road accidents.

These are depressing numbers indeed. But they also suggest a need gap -- water purifiers. So far, water purifiers have been used in middle and upper class homes, though water-borne diseases affect all income classes.

The cost of water purifiers -- acquisition as well as maintenance -- has been too steep for poor households. But that could change now. The Tata Group has launched what could be the world's cheapest water purifier at price points of Rs 749 and Rs 999.

The genesis of Swach -- 'clean' in Hindi -- began nearly a decade ago as a corporate social responsibility initiative of Tata Consultancy Services , India's largest information technology company.

Between 2000 and 2003, the company launched a water filter called Sujal and distributed it among several NGOs (non-government organisations). When the tsunami ravaged parts of coastal south India in 2004, these water filters were distributed in the affected regions.

Source: http://business.rediff.com/special/2009/dec/22/spec-what-tata-plans-to-do-with-rs-749-water-filters.htm

Hero-passenger-on-flight-253-foiled-british-based-plane-bomber

Dec 27 2009 Charles Lavery, Sunday Mail

A HAVE-A-GO hero yesterday relived the moment when he foiled a millionaire terrorist trying to blow up a plane over the USA.

Jasper Schuringa raced to tackle London-based extremist Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab as he tried to ignite a bomb on board Northwest Airlines Flight 253 over Detroit.

Brave Jasper scrambled over rows of seats to subdue Mutallab as he tried to detonate a phial of powder strapped to his thigh.

The drama unfolded as Northwest Airlines Flight 253 from Amsterdam - carrying 278 passengers and 11 crew members - was descending to land at Detroit.