Blancer.com Tutorials and projects
Freelance Projects, Design and Programming Tutorials
world news,online new,us news,uk news
Unemployment in Scotland rose by 25,000 to 239,000 between May and July, according to official statistics.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
+
Japan has intervened in the currency markets to weaken the yen after it hit a 15-year high against the US dollar, Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda says.
It was the first intervention in six years, and Mr Noda refused to rule out further similar action.
The yen’s strength has been hurting exports, and speculation has been rife that the government would starting selling yen and buying dollars.
The dollar slid to 83.09 yen on Tuesday before recovering to 83.40 yen.
The yen had spiked after news filtered through that Prime Minister Naoto Kan had survived a leadership challenge from rival Ichiro Ozawa on Tuesday.
Traders had reckoned Mr Kan would be less likely than Mr Ozawa to take measures to weaken the yen.
But in a brief news conference, Mr Noda said: “We have conducted an intervention in order to suppress excessive fluctuations in the currency market.
“We will closely monitor currency developments, and take firm action including intervention.”
The record low for the dollar is 79.75 yen, reached in April 1995.
Analysts fear the rising yen is undermining Japan’s recovery, making exports less competitive overseas.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Twelve people die when missiles are fired by a suspected US drone targeting militants in north-west Pakistan, security officials say.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Mike Castle faces a challenge from Tea Party pick Christine O’Donnell in the Delaware senate primary People in seven states and Washington are voting in the last major block of primary polls to pick party candidates ahead of the US mid-term elections.
Races where anti-government Tea Party candidates are taking on established Republican figures are closely watched.
Democrats hope Republicans in Delaware and New Hampshire will be saddled with unelectable, right-wing candidates.
Republicans hope to benefit from anger over the US economy to win both houses of the US Congress in November.
So far this year, seven incumbent members of Congress, four Republicans and three Democrats, have been beaten in primary contests, while a number of Republican Party-backed candidates have suffered reverses across the US.
In one keenly-watched race on Tuesday, Delaware Republican Congressman Mike Castle is fending off a surge by Tea Party favourite Christine O’Donnell for the Republican nomination for the US Senate seat once belonging to Vice-President Joe Biden.
Polls indicate Mr Castle would be well positioned to beat his Democratic opponent in November, while analysts view Ms O’Donnell as the weaker candidate for the congressional poll.
In New Hampshire, former state Attorney General Kelly Ayotte faces Tea Party-backed Ovide Lamontagne in the race for the Republican US Senate nomination.
The US capital, Washington DC, will effectively choose its mayor on Tuesday, with incumbent Adrian Fenty expected to be beaten by council chairman Vincent Gray in the Democratic primary.
Mr Fenty’s candidacy has been hindered by perceptions among African-American voters that he is more attuned to the needs of the city’s affluent whites.
Meanwhile, in New York, veteran congressman Charles Rangel faces New York City voters for the first time since a congressional panel accused him of a series of ethical lapses. Five challengers are vying for his job, though he has a roughly 10 to one advantage in campaign cash.
Hawaii’s primary on 18 September is the last of the current election season in the US.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Fire services disrupted by strike action or a flu pandemic would struggle to cope with a major emergency, a spending watchdog warns.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Tony Hayward will step down from his position in the wake of the disaster BP’s departing boss Tony Hayward will face questions from MPs later about the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
The Commons energy committee will consider whether UK offshore oil safety rules need to be changed as a result.
When the BP chief executive last spoke about the disaster, he was pilloried by a US Congressional committee for failing to answer its questions.
An explosion on a rig off Louisiana in April killed 11 workers and triggered the worst oil spill in US history.
BBC business correspondent Nils Blythe says the savage criticism heaped on Mr Hayward at the US hearing in June made his position hard to maintain.
Since then the leaking oil well has been capped, Mr Hayward’s departure has been announced and BP has published its own detailed account of what went wrong.
The committee will probe Mr Hayward and other senior BP executives on the causes of the disaster to see if there are lessons for the UK.
Our correspondent says some new safety measures may be introduced but it is unlikely the UK will follow the US and impose a temporary ban on new deep-water drilling.
Tim Yeo, chairman of the energy and climate change committee, has warned his colleagues against using Mr Hayward’s appearance for “point scoring” rather than serious inquiry.
The chief executive will be joined at the hearing by BP’s group head of safety and operations, Mark Bly.
Mr Hayward will step down next month to be replaced by the man in charge of the Gulf clean-up operation, BP managing director Bob Dudley.
Wednesday’s questioning comes amid newspaper reports of safety lapses by BP in the North Sea.
The Financial Times says offshore inspection records show BP did not comply with rules about regular training for offshore operators on how to respond to an oil spill.
Inspectors from the Department of Energy and Climate Change also cited BP for failing to conduct oil spill exercises adequately, the paper adds.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Baroness Morris says libraries could play a more integrated part in school life Schools libraries are too often a “wasted resource” which should be brought into the mainstream of teaching, says a report.
The report from the School Library Commission says their importance has been neglected.
The commission says almost a third of staff responsible for school libraries have “no specialist knowledge of children’s literature”.
The report says good libraries are vital to successful schools.
The commission, chaired by former education secretary Baroness Estelle Morris, has published its findings after examining the current state of school facilities.
It calls for schools to make more use of their potential.
It says that there is a clear link between successful schools, high-achieving pupils and well-run libraries, with eight out of 10 good readers using school libraries.
The commission is calling for the government to recognise the role that such facilities can play in improving literacy – and for schools to designate a governor who will be responsible for the library.
The report says library staff should have access to training and that they should work more closely with teachers and other school staff.
It calls upon authors to get more involved in promoting the use of school libraries.
But it warns that too many schools are failing to make enough use of their facilities.
“They have to be more than just places with books,” says Baroness Morris. “They need to be integrated with the rest of the school, librarians working with teachers, rather than remaining separate domains.”
Baroness Morris said that adults might have lost their own habit of using the “great municipal resource” of a public library – and so do not see realise how much benefit can be gained from a successful school one.
The value of school libraries, as a way of opening the minds of the young, was emphasised by the former poet laureate, Sir Andrew Motion.
“School libraries form an absolutely vital part of every child’s education, and it is essential that they are protected, expanded, diversified, and enriched… They are nothing less than the rooms young people enter in order to discover the world,” said Sir Andrew, who is now chair of the Museums Libraries and Archives Council.
The School Library Commission was launched by the Museums Libraries and Archives Council and the National Literacy Trust.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Badgers are protected under European and UK law The government is to set out plans later for a badger cull in England, which it believes is necessary to curb tuberculosis in cattle.
The plan is likely to involve licensing farmers to shoot badgers, and tens of thousands of animals may be targeted.
Cattle TB cost the UK more than £100m last year.
But campaigners who successfully mounted a legal challenge against plans for a cull in Wales say the scientific evidence for culling does not stack up.
The government is also likely to endorse use of vaccines, even though evidence on whether they work has yet to become public.
The European badger (Meles meles) is a protected species under European and British law, but ministers can sanction killing in certain circumstances, including to tackle diseases.
It is believed the government will change the instructions it gives to Natural England, the statutory agency that issues licences, in order that farmers can gain permission to kill badgers on the basis that they carry the bovine TB bacterium.
The previous Labour government concluded culling did not make scientific or economic sense, and instructed the agency not to issue licences for TB control.
Ministers in the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition, however, believe the latest scientific evidence changes the picture.
Agriculture Minister Jim Paice said before the election that the Conservatives favoured culling. Since coming into office he has several times pledged to make it happen, although his boss, Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman, has been more nuanced, promising only a strategy based on science.
Whether science does back a cull or not is a hotly-disputed question.
Some of the scientists who performed the biggest ever investigation into culling – the UK’s Randomised Badger Culling Trial (RBCT), also known as the “Krebs Trial” – maintain that it does not.
The Krebs Trial found that the incidence of TB fell in cattle herds inside the culling zone, but rose outside, probably because killing badgers disrupted the animals’ social structures, making them range further and along less ordered trails in search of food and territory, bringing them into contact with more cattle.
The team concluded at that time that culling could not be an ingredient of an effective bovine TB control programme; and some of them, at least, say that is still the case.
However, other observers point out that in the four years since the Krebs trial concluded, the “perturbation effect” has fallen away while some benefit appears to persist inside the culled zone.
Two months ago, the Court of Appeal upheld an appeal by the Badger Trust against the Welsh Assembly Government’s plans for a trial cull in Pembrokeshire.
One of the reasons for the judgement was that proponents expected the measure to produce only a 9% decline in TB in cattle, which the court ruled was not a “substantial reduction”, as required by the Animal Health Act.
Defra is using different legislation, the Protection of Badgers Act. Even so, campaigners are expected to explore legal options if they do not think the law is being properly applied.
“The Badger Trust is monitoring things very closely and we hope [Defra] will take a considered view of the science that is overwhelmingly against culling,” said Gwendolen Morgan of Bindmans solicitors, the organisation’s legal advisor.
The government’s consultation is expected to last for three months.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Each of the prison hulks held up to 300 inmates in cramped conditions A picture of life on board Britain’s 19th Century prison ships has emerged with the publication online of details of some of the 200,000 inmates.
The records outline the disease-ridden conditions on the “prison hulks”, created to ease overcrowding elsewhere.
The prisoners included eight-year-old Francis Creed, who was jailed for seven years on HMS Bellerophon for stealing three shillings worth of copper.
The records, held by National Archives, are published online at Ancestry.co.uk.
The Prison Hulk Registers and Letter Books 1802-1849 include character reports written by the “gaoler”.
Creed served his term alongside murderers, thieves and bigamists after being convicted in Middlesex on 25 June, 1823.
“The records provide a fascinating insight into the personalities of many major, and minor, criminals of the Victorian age”
Dan Jones Ancestry.co.uk
Another inmate of the era was 84-year-old William Davies, who was sentenced to seven years for stealing sheep.
Samuel Phillips, a 16-year-old labourer jailed for life for burglary, and unable to read or write, was described as a “doubtful character” who had been to prison before.
Thomas Bones was said to be “a bold, daring fellow, not fit to be at large in this country”.
Another convict, George Boardman, was “neglected by his parents” and “connected with bad company”.
Each of the ships held between 200 and 300 inmates.
Mortality rates were high, with about one in three prisoners dying on board, as there was no way to separate the diseased from the healthy in the cramped conditions.
Dan Jones, international content director of Ancestry.co.uk, said: “The records provide a fascinating insight into the personalities of many major, and minor, criminals of the Victorian age, as well as documenting a rather unique solution to prison overcrowding.
“The records will be of use to family and social historians, and anyone with an interest in the UK penal system.
“They detail the rather bleak conditions that those who fell foul of the law would have found themselves in.”
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Sarah Shourd, speaking on Iran’s Press TV: “I feel humbled and grateful”
A US hiker, freed after spending more than a year in jail in Iran, has promised to lobby for the release of the two men she was arrested with.
Sarah Shourd, who was flown to Oman, urged Iran to free her fiance Shane Bauer and friend Josh Fattal.
All three were arrested near the Iran-Iraq border last year and accused of spying. The two men still face trial.
US President Barack Obama renewed his call for the pair’s release, saying they had done nothing wrong.
“We remain hopeful that Iran will demonstrate renewed compassion by ensuring the return of Shane, Josh and all the other missing or detained Americans in Iran,” Mr Obama said.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon also urged the release of the men, telling the Associated Press news agency he “appreciated the flexibility” of the Iranian government.
But Tehran’s chief prosecutor Jafari Dolatabadi was quoted as saying that the two men’s detention had been extended by two months.
“Therefore there is no talk of the release of the two,” Iran’s English language Press TV quoted him as saying.
The three Americans deny spying, saying they accidentally strayed into Iranian territory while on a hike in Iraq when they were arrested on 31 July 2009.
Their families say they have been kept in solitary confinement, and Ms Shourd’s mother Nora, who was reunited with her daughter in Oman, has said she was being denied treatment for potentially serious health issues.
The Americans’ cases may be entangled in a power struggle among Iran’s leaders Speaking before she left Iran, Ms Shourd described her release as a “huge relief” and thanked “every country, every official and individual” involved in the process.
“I feel myself I have a huge debt to repay the world for what it’s done for me,” she said.
“My first priority is to help my fiance Shane Bauer and my friend Josh Fattal to gain their freedom because they don’t deserve to be in prison any more.
“And even when that’s finished I feel like my work has just begun repaying the world for what it’s done for me.”
US officials said Ms Shourd, 32, would be spending at least a day in Oman, but gave no details of her future plans.
The Iranian authorities said a bail of $500,000 (£325,000) had been posted, but it is unclear who paid, with US officials denying they had handed over any money.
Analysts say the Americans appear to have been caught up in a power struggle among Iranian elites.
While Ms Shourd’s release was initially proposed by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the country’s powerful judges delayed the release and stamped their authority by demanding a huge bail payment.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
How people are trying to preserve endangered languages
Language experts are gathering at a university in the UK to discuss saving the world’s endangered languages. But is it worth keeping alive dialects that are sometimes only spoken by a handful of people, asks Tom de Castella?
“Language is the dress of thought,” Samuel Johnson once said.
About 6,000 different languages are spoken around the world. But the Foundation for Endangered Languages estimates that between 500 and 1,000 of those are spoken by only a handful of people. And every year the world loses around 25 mother tongues. That equates to losing 250 languages over a decade – a sad prospect for some.
This week a conference in Carmarthen, Wales, organised by the foundation, is being attended by about 100 academics. They are discussing indigenous languages in Ireland, China, Australia and Spain.
“Different languages will have their quirks which tell us something about being human,” says Nicholas Ostler, the foundation’s chairman.
“And when languages are lost most of the knowledge that went with them gets lost. People do care about identity as they want to be different. Nowadays we want access to everything but we don’t want to be thought of as no more than people on the other side of the world.”
Apart from English, the United Kingdom has a number of other languages. Mr Ostler estimates that half a million people speak Welsh, a few thousand Scots are fluent in Gaelic, about 400 people speak Cornish, while the number of Manx speakers – the language of the Isle of Man – is perhaps as small as 100. But is there any point in learning the really minor languages?
“I do think it’s a good thing for a child on the Isle of Man to learn Manx. I value continuity in a community.”
Last speaker dies
In Europe, Mr Ostler’s view seems to command official support. There is a European Charter for Regional Languages, which every European Union member has signed, and the EU has a European Language Diversity For All programme, designed to protect the most threatened native tongues. At the end of last year the project received 2.7m euros to identify those languages most at risk.
Spoken by half a million, Welsh has enjoyed a resurgence in popularity But for some this is not just a waste of resources but a misunderstanding of how language works. The writer and broadcaster Kenan Malik says it is “irrational” to try to preserve all the world’s languages.
Earlier this year, the Bo language died out when an 85-year-old member of the Bo tribe in the India-owned Andaman islands died.
While it may seem sad that the language expired, says Mr Malik, cultural change is driving the process.
“In one sense you could call it a cultural loss. But that makes no sense because cultural forms are lost all the time. To say every cultural form should exist forever is ridiculous.” And when governments try to prop languages up, it shows a desire to cling to the past rather than move forwards, he says.
If people want to learn minority languages like Manx, that is up to them – it shouldn’t be backed by government subsidy, he argues.
“To have a public policy that a certain culture or language should be preserved shows a fundamental misunderstanding. I don’t see why it’s in the public good to preserve Manx or Cornish or any other language for that matter.” In the end, whether or not a language is viable is very simple. “If a language is one that people don’t participate in, it’s not a language anymore.”
“It’s very romantic to try and save a language but nonsense”
Philip Howard Times columnist
The veteran word-watcher and Times columnist Philip Howard agrees that languages are in the hands of people, not politicians. “Language is the only absolutely true democracy. It’s not what professors of linguistics or academics or journalists say, but what people do. If children in the playground start using “wicked” to mean terrific then that has a big effect.”
The former Spanish dictator Franco spent decades trying to stamp out the nation’s regional languages but today Catalan is stronger than ever and Basque is also popular.
And Mr Howard says politicians make a “category mistake” when they try to interfere with language, citing an experiment in Glasgow schools that he says is doomed to fail. “Offering Gaelic to children of people who don’t speak it seems like a conservation of lost glories. It’s very romantic to try and save a language but nonsense.”
But neither is he saying that everyone should speak English. “Some people take a destructivist view and argue that everyone will soon be speaking English. But Mandarin is the most populous language in the world and Spanish the fastest growing.”
There are competing forces at work that decide whether smaller languages survive, Howard argues. On the one hand globalisation will mean that many languages disappear. But some communities will always live apart, separated by sea, distance or other barriers and will therefore keep their own language. With modern communications and popular culture “you find that if enough people want to speak a language they can”.
In short, there is no need for handwringing.
“Language is not a plant that rises and falls, lives and decays. It’s a tool that’s perfectly adapted by the people using it. Get on with living and talking.”
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Children who have fled war and sought refuge in camps still face serious dangers, a UN investigator says.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Scientists at the UK’s Health Protection Agency say they have devised a new test which can detect the presence of the tuberculosis bacterium in one hour.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Dishcloths used in restaurants and takeaways harbour unsavoury and possibly dangerous bacteria, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) has said.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
An ice cream company banned from using an advert because it “mocked Roman Catholics’ beliefs” vows to target the Pope’s visit with new posters.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.