Pioneering rock writer Paul Williams dies

PAUL Williams, a pioneering rock music journalist whose Crawdaddy! magazine is considered the first US publication to write seriously about rock 'n roll, has died in California aged 64.

The Union-Tribune of San Diego says Williams died in an Encinitas care facility on Wednesday.

His wife, Cindy Lee Berryhill, tells the Los Angeles Times that Williams died of complications of dementia triggered by head injuries from a 1995 bicycle accident.

Williams was a teenager when he began publishing Crawdaddy! in 1966. It appeared 18 months before Rolling Stone.

Williams also wrote more than 30 books and helped introduce readers to the work of science fiction writer Philip K Dick. He was Dick's literary executor.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Man dies in hospital after crash in NSW

A MAN has died in hospital, four days after being critically injured in a collision in northern NSW.

The crash happened on the Pacific Highway at midday (AEDT) on Wednesday at Tabbimoble, about 60km south of Ballina, when a southbound VW Passat and a northbound truck collided.

The truck pushed the car almost 80m before stopping, a police statement said.

The car driver, a 62-year-old man from Frenchs Forest, suffered critical head injuries and was airlifted to Gold Coast Hospital where he died on Sunday morning.

The man's 61-year-old wife was taken to Lismore Base Hospital with spinal injuries.

The driver of the truck, a 41-year-old man from Punchbowl, breath-tested negative at the scene.

Investigations are continuing.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Prosecutors seek death in cinema shooting

PROSECUTORS in the US state of Colorado say they will seek the death penalty against the man accused of killing 12 people in a crowded cinema in July last year.

"For James Holmes in this case, justice is death," district attorney George Brauchler told a court in Centennial, where the 25-year-old Holmes is expected to go on trial in August.

Holmes is accused over the July 20 massacre at a midnight screening of the Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado, which revived America's long-running debate about gun control.

Witnesses said Holmes threw smoke bomb-type devices before opening fire randomly with weapons, including an AR-15 military-style rifle, a 12-gauge shotgun and a .40-calibre pistol.

Last week defence lawyers filed an unexpected motion offering that Holmes would plead guilty, in return for the prosecution not pressing for the death penalty, but agreeing to a sentence of life in prison without parole.

But prosecutors shot back within 24 hours, accusing the defence of trying to negotiate a plea deal in public, in violation of a gag order on the horrific case.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Driver disqualified until 2062 caught

A WOMAN who has been disqualified from driving for almost 50 years faces a NSW court on driving and other charges.

Police say highway patrol officers approached a 37-year-old woman near a random breath test site on Campbelltown Road at Woodbine, southwest of Sydney, shortly after midday (AEDT) on Monday, after she allegedly stopped her car about 300 metres from the site.

Officers questioned the driver about her licence and identity and allege she provided false details.

A field fingerprinting identification device was used and further inquiries revealed she was disqualified from driving until 2062, a police statement said.

The woman was arrested and charged at Campbelltown Police Station with driving while disqualified and giving false particulars and she was refused bail to appear in Campbelltown Local Court on Tuesday.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Two dead and two injured in Vic crash

TWO people have died and two others have been airlifted to hospital with life-threatening injuries following a single vehicle accident in central Victoria.

Police say a people mover was headed south on the Hume Freeway near Winton about 11pm (AEDT) on Monday when the driver lost control of the vehicle, which rolled several times.

Emergency services arrived at the scene and discovered the bodies of two men, believed to be aged in their 30s and believed to have been passengers in the vehicle.

Two other passengers have been airlifted to hospital with life-threatening injuries.

The driver of the vehicle and another passenger were taken to local hospitals for treatment and are assisting police with their investigation.

Police said the deaths bring this year's road toll to 66, 11 fewer than at the same time last year.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Missing Vic teenager returns home

VICTORIAN teenager Sherridyn Rutland has returned home safe and well after being reported missing for more than a week.

The Brookfield 16-year-old had not been seen since leaving her Burrawang Close home about 11am (AEDT) on Sunday, March 24.

The girl's mobile phone had been switched on and off and it was understood she had no money, but a police statement said Sherridyn returned home about 7pm on Monday.

Police have thanked the public and media for their assistance.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Korea leader vows to strike back at North

SOUTH Korea's new president has promised a strong military response to any North Korean provocation after Pyongyang announced the two countries are now in a state of war.

President Park Geun-Hye's warning came as North Korea's rubber-stamp parliament formalised the country's status as a nuclear weapons state and appointed a sacked economic reformer for a fresh term as prime minister.

It also coincided with a US announcement that it had deployed stealth fighters to South Korea as part of an ongoing joint military exercise.

At a meeting with senior military officials and Defence Minister Kim Kwan-Jin, Park said she took the nearly daily stream of bellicose threats emanating from the North over the past month "very seriously".

"I believe that we should make a strong and immediate retaliation without any other political considerations if (the North) stages any provocation against our people," she said.

Her defence minister made it clear that the South would carry out pre-emptive strikes against the North's nuclear and missile facilities in the event of hostilities breaking out.

"We will ... establish a so-called 'active deterrence' aimed at neutralising the North's nuclear and missile threats quickly," Kim said.

The US military said on Monday it had deployed F-22 Raptor stealth fighters to South Korea as part of the ongoing Foal Eagle military exercise.

"The F-22s are advanced fighter aircraft and they're an important display of our commitment to the South Korean alliance," Pentagon spokesman George Little told reporters in Washington.

North Korea has already threatened to strike the US mainland and US bases in the Pacific in response to the participation of nuclear-capable US B-52 and B-2 stealth bombers in the exercise.

Monday's gathering of the North's Supreme People's Assembly, or parliament, was notable for the promotion of a former prime minister who was sacked in a reported backlash against his pursuit of economic reforms.

Pak Pong-Ju, 74, was unanimously returned to the post of prime minister, which he had previously held from 2003-2007, when he spearheaded modest economic reforms of state enterprises.

An apparent backlash from the party and the military saw him suspended from duty in June 2006 and sacked the following year.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Sarkozy slams 'unfair' corruption charge

FORMER French president Nicolas Sarkozy has denounced charges against him in connection with a probe into illegal party funding as "unfair and unfounded".

In his first personal reaction to the charge laid on Thursday, Sarkozy used his Facebook page to insist he had not taken advantage of France's richest woman, Liliane Bettencourt, when she was weakened by ill health.

"I want to insist that, at no moment in my public life, did I betray the duties of my office," Sarkozy wrote.

"I will put all my energy into proving my integrity and honesty. The truth will triumph in the end. I have no doubt about that."

Sarkozy's lawyers are attempting to overturn a decision by three examining magistrates to charge him in a case threatening to destroy his hopes of a political comeback.

The former president was charged on Thursday after being summoned for face-to-face encounters with former members of Bettencourt's staff, including her butler.

The confrontation was the latest chapter in an investigation into allegations Sarkozy accepted envelopes stuffed with cash from ailing L'Oreal heiress Bettencourt to fund his 2007 election campaign.

Investigators suspect up to four million euros ($A5 million) of Bettencourt's cash made its way into the coffers of Sarkozy's UMP party. Bettencourt is now 90 and has been incapacitated since 2006, according to doctors.

Sarkozy could face up to three years in jail, a fine of 375,000 euros, and a five-year ban from public office if convicted.

He recently dropped several hints that he is considering a return to the frontline of French politics, suggesting recently he could be forced to out of a sense of duty to his country.

Against that backdrop, his lawyers have branded the decision to charge him as politically motivated.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Jolie visits Rwanda war rape victims

ANGELINA Jolie has joined British Foreign Secretary William Hague to visit Rwanda in a bid to encourage world powers to do more on tackling rape and sexual assault in war zones.

Britain's Foreign Office released a picture of the US film star and Hague getting off a British-flagged jet in the central African country.

They are also to visit the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo this week in a trip aimed at forcing the Group of Eight world powers to address the issue more seriously.

Hague said he would be making it his priority when he hosts the annual meeting of G8 foreign ministers next month in London.

"This visit is about hearing first hand from people who have endured rape and sexual violence during the conflict in the eastern DRC," Jolie said.

"We want to learn the lessons that their experience holds for how the world can protect thousands of women, men and children at risk of rape in many other conflict zones.

"And we want to persuade governments around the world to give this issue the attention it deserves.

"Unless the world acts, we will always be reacting to atrocities, treating survivors rather than preventing rape in the first place."

Jolie and Hague are calling on the G8 to agree that rape and sexual violence constitute breaches of the Geneva Conventions governing warfare.

They also want a new international protocol on the documentation and investigation of the issue.

Hague said: "More often than not the international community looks away, the perpetrators of these brutal crimes walk free and the cycle of injustice and conflict is repeated. We have to shatter this culture of impunity.

"It is time for real, meaningful action by the governments of the world to say that the use of rape as a weapon of war is unacceptable, to bring perpetrators to justice and to lift the stigma from survivors."

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More

Kenya court orders presidential recount

KENYA'S Supreme Court has ordered a recount of votes cast at 22 polling centres, after presidential elections in which a second-round run off was only avoided by the narrowest of margins.

"Retallying is to be done in 22 polling stations," said Supreme Court Judge Smokin Wanjala.

The counting of the March 4 ballots - a fraction of the total votes cast in some 32,000 centres nationwide - is scheduled to take place on Tuesday.

Official election results showed president-elect Uhuru Kenyatta won 50.07 per cent of the vote, only just breaking the first-round threshold by some 8000 ballots.

He was, however, around 800,000 votes ahead of his closest rival, outgoing Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

Odinga's party and civil society groups have filed separate legal challenges in Kenya's highest court alleging widespread irregularities in the polls.

The panel of six judges have until Saturday to decide whether Kenyatta should be confirmed as Kenya's new president or whether new elections should take place - a high-stakes test for a country still traumatised by deadly violence after the last polls five years ago.

The court also ordered the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to provide the voter registration list it used in the tally of the presidential vote after an electronic system failed.

The elections in 2007 were marred by similar complaints of fraud and descended into tribal bloodshed that killed more than 1100 people and caused hundreds of thousands to flee their homes.

Odinga claims the poll was marred by irregularities, including changes to the voter register, inflated numbers of registered voters and technical incompetence by the electoral commission.

He has urged supporters to stay calm while he challenges the outcome, and has promised to abide by the court's decision - which is expected this week.

23.48 | 0 komentar | Read More