World News Thread & Breaking News!!

[solarz]

NATO claims that Pakistan fired first.

EVEN IF (and that's a big IF) this were true, it does not absolve NATO of its responsibility. Did they not have intelligence that there were Pakistan forces stationed in the area? Operating in an area where nominally allied forces are based, why would you call in air strikes without even ascertaining who your target is?

This just shows a callous disregard for the lives of Pakistani servicemen.

[Baibar of Jalat]

Afghans called in air support. However we prob wont know full facts only the ones presented to media.

BTW I dont think US pilots will be distraught at hearing of killing Pakistanis.

[Mr T]

Arab League approves sanctions against Syria

BBC News - Syria unrest: Arab League adopts sanctions in Cairo

[delft]

Afghanistan is a large country. There is no need for the US to occupy it up to the Pakistani or any other border. If they were to stay a hundred miles from the border they would need fewer troops and avoid killing people inside Pakistan.
Btw I wonder if, all considered, killing Osama bin Laden was a mistake.

[navyreco]

A explosion rocked the western Iranian city of Isfahan on Monday, the semi-official Fars news agency reported, adding that the blast was heard in several parts of the city.
The reported incident occurred about two weeks after Gen. Hasan Tehrani Moghaddam was killed together with 20 other Guard members Nov. 12 at a military site outside Bidganeh
village, 40 kilometers southwest of Tehran
Report: Explosion rocks Iran city of Isfahan, home to key nuclear facility - Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News

And so it begins?

[navyreco]

There was an article on Fars news that has already been deleted (thank you google cache)

and here's the result of the last explosion

[Scratch]

What the heck, a complete town in China threw out all non local government officials and authorities in anger over poor conduct and is now basicly under siege by the police. They already fended off a police effort to regain control over the town.
That is one heck of a stand off ...

Rebel Chinese village of Wukan 'has food for ten days' - Telegraph

Rebel Chinese village of Wukan 'has food for ten days'
The rebel Chinese village of Wukan, which has driven out the Communist party, has resorted to smuggling in food past a police ring of steel which has cut off its population of more than 20,000.

By Malcolm Moore, Wukan 5:23PM GMT 14 Dec 2011

Villagers say that they have enough supplies to hold out for only 10 more days.

Wukan has been encircled by the police cordon since Sunday, after a failed attempt by 1,000 armed police to capture the village. No food or water is allowed in, and no villagers allowed out.

But the villagers were unbowed yesterday, and their leaders said they had seen signs that the government would “blink first”.

“We have an old saying here,” said Chen Liangshu, one of the villagers, referring to the legendary aggression of the Wukanese and their neighbours. “In heaven there is the Thunder God, on earth there is Lufeng and Wukan.”

Trouble in Wukan has been brewing since September, after the fishing village revolted at an attempt to take one of its last parcels of farmland and give it to a major Chinese property developer, Country Garden. However it was the death of 43-year-old Xue Jinbo, one of the village’s 13 temporary representatives, in police custody that pushed Wukan into its current fury, and saw the last of the village’s dozen Communist party officials flee. His family believe he was murdered.

Thousands of villagers have held daily protest meetings outside the village hall since the news broke on Monday.

Almost all the village’s roadside restaurants are shut, but at the market around half the stalls are open. “We think we can last for 10 to 12 days,” said Zhang Xiaoping, a stall owner.

“We are using a corridor to the next village to smuggle in meat and vegetables on the back of motorbikes, but each trip takes an hour,” she added.

Wukan’s fleet of fishing boats has also been shut in. One fisherman, who asked to be named as “United Wukan”, said he had already cut down to two meals a day and was prepared, like everyone else, “to starve myself to death”.

Wukan used to make a tidy sum from fishing, and was originally happy to sell off its farmland. But in recent years, a combination of pollution and large trawlers has diminished the fishery.

The gap between the rich and poor in the village has also upset many, with at least a hundred families, including those of the former party secretary and village finance chief, living in palatial mansions, all built on farmland. By yesterday, almost all the rich families had also retreated out of the village, while the ones who remained refused to comment on the protests, shut in behind high walls and strong steel gates.

So far, the police have not made any further attempts to retake Wukan, and the village’s temporary leadership said negotiations with the government are now under way.

The local government sent a relative of Zhang Jiancheng, one of the four Wukan villagers still being held by local police, to offer a deal, according to Yang Semao, a village representative. It was refused.

“We turned down the offer,” said Mr Yang. “We want them to admit responsibility for the bloodshed when the riot police beat us in September, admit that we have a legal complaint, admit that the village representatives are a legal negotiating team, and to return all of our land to us, for us to split evenly among the villagers.”

[bd popeye]

^^ I posted another story about this incident yesterday in the

Chinese Daily Photos, Videos & News!!

scroll up once you get there.

You ought to check out that thread..lots of good stuff over there!

[delft]

Something entirely different: Breakthrough could double solar electricity ouput - latimes.com

Breakthrough could double solar energy output

By Dean Kuipers
December 16, 2011, 4:39 p.m.
A new discovery from a chemist at the University of Texas at Austin may allow photovoltaic solar cells to double their efficiency, thus providing loads more electrical power from regular sunlight.

Not only that, but it’s way cheap. Chemistry professor Xiaoyang Zhu and his team discovered that an organic plastic semiconductor could double the number of electrons harvested out of one photon of sunlight. Yep, plastic.

An issue with regular photovoltaic panels is that much of the energy delivered by sunlight comes in the form of “hot” electrons, which are too high-energy to be converted to electricity in silicon and are instead lost as heat. For that reason, the max insolation-to-electricity efficiency of a silicon solar cell used today is considered to be about 31%. Capturing those hot electrons could boost it to 66%.

Zhu’s process involves absorbing the photon of sunlight in a plastic – in his experiments, pentacene – to produce a dark quantum “shadow state” from which two electrons can be retrieved, instead of just one.

Right now, his experiments use ordinary sunlight, and not focused sunlight, and he’s getting 44% efficiency. That’s a big boost in electricity, and it means it could be done with ordinary rooftop panels.

Breakthroughs in the solar industry seem to be coming fast of late. Just two weeks ago we heard about researcher Douglas Keszlar at Oregon State University in Corvallis, who is studying the photovoltaic potential of fool’s gold– pyrite – and discovered instead that some more ordinary materials could make improved photovoltaics, especially iron silicon sulfide. Once again, the advantage would be that it’s hyperefficient and cheap.

All of this goes to reinforce a recent study by Joshua Pearce at Queen’s University in Toronto, who found that cost estimates for solar technology used by energy analysts are greatly inflated. The technology is changing so fast that many studies don’t reflect the newest realities. For instance, the cost of solar panels has dropped 70% since 2009, and their productivity only declines 0.1% to 0.2% per year, rather than the 1% per year that was the norm.

The bottom line? Commonly used studies have listed dollars-per-watt of electricity as high as $7.61. According to Dr. Pearce, the real cost in 2011 is under $1 per watt.

With a cheap way to store electrical energy (super-capacitors, or my favorite, and I'm pretty ignorant about these things, reversible fuel cells, or something entirely different ) you can supply electricity everywhere were the population density is not to high and without having to transport it or the fuel to generate it from afar. Every island, every village can have electricity without having to buy oil or gas.

[Schumacher]

3 months into the Occupy movements, the crackdown on peaceful protestors intensifies.

Dozens of Occupy protesters arrested in Manhattan — RT

Dozens of Occupy protesters arrested in Manhattan

Published: 18 December, 2011, 05:53
Edited: 18 December, 2011, 14:42

Some 50 anti-Wall Street protesters have been arrested after trying to break into a church-owned property in Manhattan as the Occupy movement marked the three-month anniversary of its fight against economic injustice.

The anti-corporate demonstrators have been in search of a new location since they were evicted from their encampment in Zuccotti Park last month.

Dozens tried to claim a fence into the empty lot on Duarte Square in New York’s Tribeca neighborhood on Saturday afternoon. The square is city-owned, but a fenced section belongs to the Trinity Wall Street Church.

Activists tore holes in the fence around the private grounds, and used ladders to climb inside shouting “We are unstoppable! Another world is possible!”

The first person to get into the park was retired Episcopal Church Bishop George Packard. He tumbled over the fence, climbed onto a wooden bench inside the park and called on the crowd to follow.

Police dispersed the protesters, claiming that the occupiers, who did not have permission to enter the park, were turning violent. The retired bishop was arrested along with everybody who did not flee the site. The crowd yelled “Shame!” as the arrests took place.

Earlier the protesters had asked the Episcopal Church officials to allow them to occupy the church-owned park on Duarte Square, but were refused. Their bid was backed by South Africa’s prominent anti-apartheid activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

On Friday, the top bishop of the Episcopal Church asked the protesters not to trespass on the property of the Trinity Church on Duarte Square and called the move “regrettable.”

In an official statement issued by Trinity Wall Street, Trinity Church rector Rev. Dr. James H. Cooper said that the church does not believe that allowing an encampment on Duarte Square would do any good.

“In all good conscience and faith, we strongly believe to do so would be wrong, unsafe, unhealthy and potentially injurious,” the statement read.

The rector pointed out that the Church “has probably done as much or more for the protesters than any other institution in the area.”

“We have provided OWS with meeting rooms and offices for them to assemble, plan and hold private discussions. We have provided pastoral services. We have provided a place of refuge and tranquillity at our neighborhood center during opening hours where they can rest, use computers, charge cell phones, and use bathrooms,” Cooper said.

Meanwhile, a half a dozen Occupy Des Moines activists have set up a camp outside President Barack Obama’s campaign headquarters in Iowa, according to the Associated Press. The occupiers, who are protesting against military spending, vow to stay there around the clock.

The protesters say they want Obama to cut the US military budget by half and “dismantle our US military empire” to create jobs. No comments followed from Obama’s campaign.

In North Carolina, at least six Occupy protesters have been arrested and face charges. Police detained the activists in Raleigh as a group of about 20 to 30 demonstrators blocked the city’s downtown Hillsborough Street and refused to move.

The events come as a part of a call to “reoccupy” public spaces following the wave of police crackdowns and evictions of Occupy activists across the United States.

[Mr T]

Live: Kim Jong-il, North Korean leader, dies aged 69 - Telegraph

Go straight to Hell. Do not pass Go, do not collect £200.

[bd popeye]

Finns stop 'Patriot missile' ship bound for China - China.org.cn

Patriot missiles found on ship in Finland

The Finnish authorites said they have found around 160 tons of explosives and 69 surface-to-air missiles on a cargo ship bearing a British flag and ultimately destined for China on Wednesday. An official later told CBS News he doesn't believe they're connected to terrorism.

The MS Thor Liberty had docked in the Finnish port of Kotka after leaving German port of Emden on Dec. 13 to pick up a cargo of anchor chains. Its final destination was Shanghai, but it wasn't clear whether that's where the arms shipment was going, officials said.

Police are questioning the crew of the MS Thor Liberty. Interior Minister Paivi Rasanen said the missiles were marked "fireworks".

"Actually in our investigation at the moment, we have got the information that we found 69 Patriot missiles on the ship and around 160 tonnes of explosives," said Detective Superintendent Timo Virtanen from the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation.

Virtanen told CBS News that the ship didn't have permission to transport the explosives and missiles via Finland and that the explosives were improperly packed, both of which are illegal.

"As far as we can make out the shipment was legal," he said. "They were not trying to smuggle the missiles ... they are destined for South Korea."

Patriot missiles, designed by the US company Raytheon, are supplied to "US and allied forces", according to the company's website. South Korea is among states which deploy them.

[bd popeye]

Cruise ship sinks news: Three die and at least 70 missing | The Sun |News

A cruise ship that ran aground is seen off the west coast of Italy at Giglio island January 14, 2012. A large Italian cruise ship carrying more than 4,000 people ran aground on a sandbar off the west coast of Italy overnight, and rescue workers were quoted on Saturday as saying at least six people had been killed in the incident.

A cruise ship that ran aground is seen off the west coast of Italy at Giglio island January 14, 2012. At least three people were killed and rescuers were looking for other victims on Saturday after a large Italian cruise ship carrying more than 4,000 people ran aground overnight, took on water and tipped over.

THREE people have been confirmed dead and at least 70 are missing after a packed cruise ship began sinking off the Italian coast last night — with 24 British holidaymakers on board.

Three bodies have been pulled from the sea, Italian coastguards said. At least three more people who jumped overboard are also thought to have perished as panic spread through the Costa Concordia.

One victim was a man in his 70s who jumped into the icy waters and died of a heart attack caused by the shock to his system.

Over thirty people were injured in the horror, several with serious wounds. Divers were working to establish whether anyone was trapped in the submerged part of the ship after an obstacle tore a 160ft gash in the hull.

A huge rock was embedded in the side of the ship towards the stern.

Most the 3,200 passengers and 1,000 crew were thought to have been rescued from the 950ft liner early this morning.

They were first taken to the nearby island off Giglio — off the Tuscan coast — before being transferred to the mainland.

Coastguards originally said the £450million six-year-old ship was listing at an angle of 20 degrees after running aground on a sandbar.

Passengers arrive at Porto Santo Stefano after a cruise ship ran aground off the west coast of Italy at Giglio island January 14, 2012. A large Italian cruise ship carrying more than 4,000 people ran aground on a sandbar off the west coast of Italy overnight, and rescue workers were quoted on Saturday as saying at least six people had been killed in the incident.

[montyp165]

That ship is basically a total loss, given the damage to the hull particularly near the keel.

[delft]

Salvaging and repairing the ship will be cheaper than building a new one. But it depends on what the owner, Carnival, which also owns several other cruise ship owning companies, will think of the future of the cruising market. I expect they will have the ship repaired.
A more immediate question: Is this the result of an incredible blunder of the Italian hydrographic service or a very serious mistake on board of the ship? And what kind of mistake and how do you prevent a repetition.