Turkey lifts ban on thousands of books






ISTANBUL: From communist works to a comic book, thousands of titles banned by Turkey over the decades were taken off the restricted list Saturday, thanks to a government reform.

In July, the parliament adopted a bill stipulating that any decision taken before 2012 to block the sale and distribution of published work would be voided if no court chose to confirm the ruling within six months.

The deadline came and went Saturday and no such judicial decisions were recorded, the head of Turkey's TYB publisher's union, Metin Celal Zeynioglu, told AFP.

"All bans ordered by (the courts in the capital) Ankara will be lifted on January 5," city prosecutor Kursat Kayral confirmed to AFP.

Kayral had announced last month that he would let lapse every ban in his jurisdiction, a decision that cleared 453 books and 645 periodicals in that area alone.

Among them were several communist works such as the "Communist Manifesto" written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, as well as writings by Soviet tyrant Joseph Stalin and Russia's revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin.

Others included a comic book, an atlas, a report on the state of human rights in Turkey and an essay on the Kurds.

But the books under Kayral's jurisdiction make up only a fraction of all the titles affected, a total of up to 23,000 works according to Zeynioglu, who said he learned the number from the justice ministry.

The ministry did not immediately confirm the total, a number that Zeynioglu added was hard to nail down.

"These bans weren't implemented in a centralised fashion: they were ordered by different institutions in different cities at different times," he said.

"Besides, most have been forgotten over the years and publishers have resumed printing the banned books."

As an example, the complete works of Turkish poet Nazim Hikmet, who died in exile in Moscow in 1963, had already been stocked in libraries for years despite the ban.

The reform is thus largely symbolic, and some are sceptical of whether it reflects any true change within the Turkish state.

"The mindset hasn't changed and people (in the administration) will continue to do whatever they think is right," said Omer Faruk, a former head of the Ayrinti publishing house.

He cited as an example the fate of one of his published books: the erotic "Philosophy in the Bedroom" by French writer Marquis de Sade.

Deemed licentious, the text was banned, but the Supreme Court overturned the decision. Yet "despite the ruling, the book continues to be seized", Faruk said.

This scepticism is reinforced by the ruling Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party's record in matters of freedom of speech.

The Committee to Protect Journalists said last month that Turkey had, at 49 people, the highest number of journalists behind bars, with most of them Kurds.

In late November, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan himself took the directors of a television series to task, saying their script was in conflict with history and Muslim morals.

"Those who toy with the people's values must be taught a lesson," Erdogan said.

But despite his reservations, Zeynioglu said there would be at least one concrete result of letting the bans lapse.

"Many of the students arrested in demonstrations are kept in prison because they're carrying banned books," he said.

"From now on, we won't be able to use that as an excuse."

- AFP/fa



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Minor girl raped repeatedly, pregnant

SHIMLA: A 13-year-old pregnant rape victim's life is at risk as doctors have ruled out abortion in Himachal Pradesh's Kullu district.

The orphaned girl was allegedly raped repeatedly by her maternal uncle and medical examination found she is 29-week pregnant.

The elder sister of the girl had approached the Manali police on December 25 after she found out her sister was raped. After the death of their parents, they had been living with their 85-year-old maternal grandfather where the incidents occurred.

Police had registered a case but failed to arrest the accused so far. The victim was shifted to Shimla on December 28 where her medical examination was done.

As poor health and delayed detection have wiped out the chances of abortion, medical experts now say that delivering the child too will not be an easy task as her body is not ready to deliver a baby putting her life at risk.

According to sources, victim has slipped into depression.

A gynecologist from a prominent Shimla hospital said the victim would face complications during pregnancy as her body is not developed. "She would face problems related to anemia, bone and calcium besides undergoing mental trauma." She said as the minor cannot go through normal delivery so she would have to undergo delivery by a cesarean operation which will also be risky.

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City Answers Gang-Rape Cover-Up Allegations












As Steubenville, Ohio, prepares for the high-profile rape trial of two high school football players, officials, battling allegations of a cover-up, announced the creation of a new website today to debunk rumors and create what they said would be a transparent resource for the community.


"This site is not designed to be a forum for how the Juvenile Court ought to rule in this matter," the website, called Steubenville Facts, said.


A timeline of the case, beginning with the alleged gang rape of a 16-year-old girl at a party on Aug. 11-12, 2012, is posted on the site. Summaries of Ohio law relating to the case and facts about the local police force including statistics on how many graduated from Steubenville schools, is included.


The case gained national attention last week when hacking collective Anonymous leaked a video of Steubenville high school athletes mocking the 16-year-old female victim and making crude references to the alleged rape.






Steubenville Herald-Star, Michael D. McElwain/AP Photo







"It's disgusting, and I've had people calling, numerous people call here, upset, they have seen it, one woman, two women were crying, because of what they witnessed," Jefferson County Sheriff Fred Abdalla said. "It really is disgusting to watch that video."


Anonymous has called for more arrests, however Steubenville Police have said their hands are tied.


"Steubenville Police investigators are caring humans who recoil and are repulsed by many of the things they observe during an investigation," the website said, addressing the video. "Like detectives in every part of America and the world, they are often frustrated when they emotionally want to hold people accountable for certain detestable behavior but realize that there is no statute that allows a criminal charge to be made."


Occupy Steubenville, a grassroots group, estimated 1,300 people attended a rally today outside the Jefferson County Courthouse, where rape victims and their loved ones gathered to share their stories.


The father of a teenage rape victim was met with applause when he shared his outrage.


"I've tried to show my girl that not all men are like this, but only a despicable few," he said. "And their mothers that ignore the truth that they gave birth to a monster."


Authorities investigated the case and charged two Steubenville high school athletes on Aug. 22, 2012.


The teenagers face trial on Feb. 13, 2013 in juvenile court before a visiting judge.


Attorneys for the boys have denied charges in court.



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Al Gore stands to gain about $70 million after selling Current TV to al-Jazeera



Al-Jazeera will pay about $500 million for Current TV, including the stake held by Gore, 64, according to two people with knowledge of the deal. The network is one of dozens of investments made by the former vice president since he lost the 2000 presidential race by a slim margin.


“It’s reeking with irony,” said Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, senior associate dean at the Yale School of Management, who studies corporate governance. “It seems to be at least a paradox in terms of his positions on sustainability and geopolitics.”

The deal highlights Gore’s makeover from career politician to successful businessman. His take from the Current TV sale is many times the maximum net worth of $1.7 million he reported while running for president in 1999. Besides investing in start-ups, Gore is on the board of Apple, an adviser to Google and a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, according to his Web site biography.

“The green of money knows no political boundaries,” said Charles Elson, director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware. “When you are running investments, your priority needs to be maximizing return.”

Gore’s holdings also include investments in Amazon.com, eBay and Procter & Gamble through his Generation Investment Management.

Gore holds a 20 percent stake in Current TV, according to those with knowledge of the deal, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the sale terms are not public. His proceeds are difficult to pin down because the company had $41.4 million in debt, as well as preferred stock entitled to $99.5 million in the event of a sale or liquidation, according to a 2008 regulatory filing.

The Current TV price represents a sevenfold increase from the $71 million that Gore and his partners paid for the predecessor company in 2004, according to the filing. Gore, chairman, and Joel Hyatt, a co-founder and chief executive officer, announced the sale on Wednesday, without providing financial terms.

Kalee Kreider, a spokeswoman for Gore, didn’t respond to a phone call or e-mail request for comment.

The network’s investors included funds controlled by Los Angeles billionaire Ron Burkle and San Francisco money manager Richard Blum, according to the 2008 filing, when the company unsuccessfully sought to sell stock to the public. Blum is married to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.).

The Raine Group advised Current TV on the sale. The owners introduced Current TV in 2005 after purchasing the network from Vivendi.

Al-Jazeera is closely held and receives some funding from the government of Qatar, a small country on the eastern side of the Arabian Peninsula that gets almost half of its gross domestic product from oil and gas, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

“Under Qatari law, Al Jazeera Media Network is incorporated as a private, non-profit company,” Charlotte Fouch, a spokeswoman, said in an e-mail. “Al Jazeera receives funding from the State of Qatar, much like other publicly funded broadcast networks.”

Last February, Gore said investors in oil and gas companies that ignore the cost of carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases are making a mistake similar to those who invested in subprime mortgages.

Most of Gore’s investments are made through Generation Investment Management, which he co-founded with former Goldman Sachs Group executive David Blood. The most recent regulatory filing lists about $3.6 billion under management in 29 publicly traded companies.

In addition, Generation Investment Management also has stakes in private ventures such as Nest Labs, a company formed by Apple alumni to create a thermostat that adapts to user behavior and saves money. The fund also backed Elon Musk’s SolarCity, a developer of rooftop solar power systems that went public last month.

In April, Gore’s fund was part of $110 million in venture capital invested in Harvest Power, a closely held company that produces renewable energy from waste such as food scraps.

He is also the author of the climate change-focused best-sellers “Earth in the Balance,” “An Inconvenient Truth,” “The Assault on Reason” and “Our Choice: A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis.” Gore was the co-recipient, with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for “informing the world of the dangers posed by climate change,” according to his official biography.

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Singapore, Turkey reaffirm excellent bilateral ties






ANKARA: The foreign ministers of Singapore and Turkey reaffirmed the excellent state of relations between their countries during talks in the Turkish capital, Ankara on January 4.

Singapore's Foreign Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam and his Turkish counterpart, Professor Ahmet Davutoglu, also discussed ways to further broaden and deepen bilateral cooperation.

In particular, they looked forward to enhancing trade and investment flows, as well as more high-level exchanges, between their countries.

Mr Shanmugam welcomed Turkey's interest to step up its engagement of ASEAN.

Mr Shanmugam, who is on an official visit to Turkey from January 3 to 5, also welcomed the opening of Singapore's embassy in Ankara.

- CNA/fa



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Himachal: 2 brothers of murder-accused MLA booked for harbouring him


PANCHKULA: Himachal police on Friday booked two brothers of HP Congress MLA, Ram Kumar Chaudhary, a suspect in the murder case of 24-year-old Jyoti, for allegedly harboring him with the motive of avoiding his arrest.

Panchkula police have failed to arrest Chaudhary and 3 others during the 14-day validity of arrest warrant against them. The warrants were issued on December 20.

The case was registered under section 216 (harbouring offender who has escaped or whose apprehension has been ordered) of IPC in Baddi police station.

Baddi SP Arul Kumar said, "Madan Chaudhary and Harbhjan Chaudhary were harbouring MLA Chaudhary for a long time. Whenever police questioned them, they negatively replied, despite having full knowledge about the suspect's whereabouts."

Meanwhile, Baddi police have also informed Kangra police about the absconding status of Chaudhary and requested them to inform if he appears during the oath-taking ceremony of new MLAs to be held in Dharamshala on January 8.

Doon MLA Chaudhary is absconding ever since 24-year old Jyoti Devi of Hoshiarpur was found murdered in Sector 21, Panchkula, on November 22. Arrest warrants were issued against him along with three others by a local court here on December 20.

Haryana police have failed to arrest Chaudhary and his four accomplices even as a Panchkula court had rejected the anticipatory bail application of Chaudhary last month.

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Pilot Suspected of Being Drunk Stopped From Flying













An American Eagle pilot who was preparing to fly from Minneapolis to New York City was arrested today after failing a breathalyzer test.


Kolbjorn Jarle Kristiansen, 48, of Hollow Lane, N.C., was taken into custody by police at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, according to an arrest report.


Officers and a TSA agent smelled alcohol on Kristiansen as they passed him waiting to enter an elevator, the report said.


Airport police were notified and started an investigation. In the mean time, the pilot went to the plane and started his pre-flight checks before his scheduled flight from Minneapolis to New York's La Guardia airport.


Kristiansen completed his checks and was exiting the plane when officers took him into custody and administered a breathalyzer test, which authorities said the pilot failed.






Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport Police Dept.











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A blood draw was completed at a local hospital, said Patrick Hogan, spokesperson for Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. The pilot's BAC wasn't released by authorities.


In Minnesota, the legal BAC limit for pilots is .04 -- much lower than the limit for drivers of .08.


Hogan said he had not heard any reports of people witnessing Kristiansen drinking alcohol.


He was released to airline personnel on own recognizance at 10:29 a.m., the arrest report said. It was not yet known whether Kristiansen had a lawyer.


The flight was delayed by two and a half hours while a replacement pilot was located.


American Eagle said it has a "well-established substance abuse policy that is designed to put the safety of our customers and employees first."


"We are cooperating with authorities and conducting a full internal investigation. The pilot will be withheld from service pending the outcome of the investigation," the airline said in a statement.


ABC News' Candace Smith contributed to this report



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Federal agencies bracing for cuts after ‘fiscal cliff’ deal



The eleventh-hour agreement to avoid a “fiscal cliff” of higher taxes put off the major cuts known as a sequester until March 1, when another showdown is expected over the federal debt limit and how much to reduce the size of government.


Congress and the White House agreed to find $24 billion to pay for the delay, divided between spending cuts and a tax change that allows Americans holding traditional retirement plans to convert more of them to Roth IRAs, a process that requires tax payments up front.

The remaining $12 billion in cuts to domestic and defense agencies will not take effect until at least March 27, when the stopgap budget funding the government expires. The first $4 billion in cuts must come by Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year, and the remaining $8 billion in fiscal 2014, which will start Oct. 1.

The cuts will be rolled into budget deliberations on Capitol Hill, and no one knows what agencies and programs they will affect. Out of a discretionary spending budget of $1.04 trillion, $12 billion is relatively small. But it’s not a rounding error.

“There will be a few select cuts that will be painful,” said Patrick Lester, fiscal policy director at the Center for Effective Philanthropy (formerly OMB Watch). “We won’t know for months what those cuts are, which makes them easy to do.”

William R. Dougan, president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, said $12 billion “spread across the government doesn’t sound like a lot of money, but it depends on how it’s spread out.”

Even if each agency took a hit, some “will still be looking at furloughs and even [reductions in force] as a possible solution,” he said. Those are some of the near-certain actions many agencies have said they would take if they had to make the across-the-board cuts Congress imposed in 2011 to force itself to reckon with the federal deficit.

On Wednesday, government and union leaders said that threat, just two months away, is making them nervous.

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said Congress has “prevented the worst possible outcome by delaying sequestration for two months.”

But he warned that the “the specter of sequestration” threatens national security.

“We need to have stability in our future budgets,” Panetta said in a statement. “We need to have the resources to effectively execute our strategy, defend the nation, and meet our commitments to troops and their families after more than a decade of war.”

Several officials said they are still sorting out what the two-month delay means.

“We are working hard with [the Office of Management and Budget] to understand the impact, but we’re just not there yet,” said Army Lt. Col. Elizabeth Robbins, a Defense Department spokeswoman.

Defense consultant Jim McAleese said the deal to raise taxes on families with income above $450,000 and individuals earning more than $400,000 will bring in so much less revenue than the $250,000 threshold President Obama proposed that steep defense cuts are inevitable.

Instead of the $10 billion in cuts a year over 10 years that the Defense Department could have expected to see under Obama’s most recent deficit reduction plan, McAleese said the reductions could be more in the range of $15 billion to $20 billion a year over 10 years.

“People were talking before about defense cuts of $10 billion per year, but the sheer size of the disagreement is going to bring about an immediate, aggressive reaction that will impact the final outcome of the spending cuts,” he said.

Colleen M. Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, said of the $12 billion in cuts, “I would hope agencies could find these savings without impacts on front-line employees and without impacts on services to the public. We have more questions than answers right now.”

Steve Vogel contributed to this report.

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