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Britain Will Need More Troops In Afghanistan

August 5, 2009 By

Britain will need more troops in Afghanistan_Britain may need to send more troops to Afghanistan despite the success of Operation Panther’s Claw, military chiefs admit. Brigadier Tim Radford, commander of Task Force Helmand, said that the existing troops could not be expected to mount further significant operations without reinforcements.

The scale of the challenge was revealed yesterday as it emerged that British soldiers have faced nearly 1,000 roadside bombs in the past three months. Although 3,000 troops managed to drive out about 500 Taleban during the five-week offensive, they will be fully deployed holding an area in Helmand province about the size of the Isle of Wight, their commanding officer admitted.

The warning came as the Ministry of Defence prepared today to launch a legal action against two former soldiers to reduce compensation payments for injuries.  Light Dragoon Anthony Duncan, who walks with crutches after being shot while on patrol in Iraq, was originally awarded £9,250, which was increased to £46,000 by an appeal tribunal. Royal Marine Matthew McWilliams fractured his thigh in a military exercise and was awarded £8,250, increased to £28,750 on appeal.

The High Court upheld the higher awards, ruling that the MoD’s argument that there should be a distinction between the original injury and later complications was absurd. Now, however, the MoD is taking the case to the Court of Appeal, where lawyers are expected to claim the pair should be compensated only for the initial injuries and not subsequent health problems.

Lieutenant Colonel Jerome Church, of the British Limbless Ex-Servicemen’s Association, described the court case as “very unfortunate” at a time when British soldiers were sustaining more deaths and injuries than at any time since the 2001 invasion. “This case is obviously appalling timing for the Ministry of Defence. This has been in the wings for some time,” Colonel Church said.

Simon Weston OBE, a former Welsh Guardsman who suffered serious burns during the Falklands War, branded the court bid “car-crash politics”. He said: “The system is incredibly flawed. If you get shot in the leg, and you get a subsequent infection which causes you to lose the leg, do you lose compensation for the loss of the leg or do you only get it for the gunshot which would probably be only a few thousand pounds?”

The MoD announced yesterday that two more soldiers had been killed in Afghanistan. Brigadier Radford said that although 23 soldiers had died since the operation began on June 19, only 10 were a direct result of the offensive in central Helmand.

The bodies of four of the dead will return to British soil today. Rifleman Aminiasi Toge, 26, Corporal Joseph Etchells, 22, Captain Daniel Shepherd, 28 and Guardsman Christopher King, 20, will be repatriated at RAF Lyneham, in Wiltshire, shortly after 11am.

As has become tradition, coffins carrying their bodies will pass through the nearby town of Wootton Bassett, pausing at the war memorial, before heading on to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford where post-mortem examinations will be carried out. Hundreds of British Legion veterans, shopkeepers and residents are expected to line the streets to pay their respects as the cortege passes through.

The four died in separate incidents in Helmand province, most involving roadside bombs. Details emerged yesterday of the “industrial” scale of the Taleban’s production of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Brigadier Radford, speaking by video link from his headquarters at Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand, said that troops had encountered 153 IEDs encountered during Panther’s Claw – and 994 since April. The release of details of Panther’s Claw gave Gordon Brown an opportunity to wrest back the political initiative over Afghanistan after the controversy over troop levels and helicopters.

Yesterday he hailed the offensive as an “heroic” military success, saying it had made Britain safer and pushed back the Taleban. David Miliband stole some of Mr Brown’s thunder, however, taking Downing Street by surprise with a call for renewed efforts to engage the Taleban politically. The Foreign Secretary used a speech to Nato leaders in Brussels to deliver an uncompromising message aimed at President Karzai of Afghanistan, calling for a programme of “reintegration and reconciliation” for moderate Taleban.

He rejected talks with insurgents who were fighting British troops in Helmand, telling Channel 4 News: “If they [the Taleban] carry on trying to kill British troops, then of course we can’t reconcile them into the system, because they will be making a choice of violence.”

The two deaths announced yesterday take the total losses to 191 since 2001. Neither was linked to Panther’s Claw. A soldier from The Light Dragoons was killed by an explosion while he was on a vehicle patrol in Lashkar Gah. A soldier from the 5th Regiment Royal Artillery was killed by an explosion during a foot patrol in Sangin, in northern Helmand.

Filed Under: News & Media Tagged With: ,

India’s Solar Energy Plan

August 4, 2009 By

india's solar energy plan_For centuries Hindus have revered the sun god, Surya, as a source of health and prosperity, building lavish temples and holding festivals in his honour across a country with more than 300 days of sunshine a year.

Now India is putting its faith in the sun in a more literal sense by revealing what experts describe as the world’s most ambitious plan to develop solar energy over the next three or four decades. Manmohan Singh, the Prime Minister, will chair a meeting today to decide whether to approve a National Solar Mission designed to curb India’s carbon emissions and ease its crippling power shortages. It proposes boosting India’s solar power generation capacity from almost zero to 20 gigawatts (20 billion watts) by 2020, 100GW by 2030 and 200GW by 2050, according to a draft seen by The Times. The entire world can generate about 14GW of solar power today.

India’s plan also proposes reducing the price of solar power to the same level as that from fossil fuels by 2020, according to the draft, dated April 29. Solar power in India currently costs about 15 rupees (37.4 cents) per kWh, compared with an average 3.5 rupees per kWh for electricity from the national grid, which is largely produced by coal-fired thermal power plants. Other targets include forcing all government buildings to have solar panels by 2012 and developing micro-financing to encourage 20 million households to install solar lighting by 2020.

The plan also outlines a system — similar to Germany’s — of paying households for any surplus power from solar panels fed back into the grid. To achieve these and other goals, the mission proposes that the Government invest 920 billion rupees ($23bn) in developing, manufacturing and installing solar technology over the next 30 years. The mission is primarily designed to improve India’s energy security as it has abundant supplies of coal — the dirtiest of the fossil fuels — but has to import 70 per cent of its crude oil and half its natural gas. It is also meant to ease a chronic power shortage that has left 400m Indians without electricity, causes daily blackouts in cities, and represents one of the biggest obstacles to economic growth.

India now has the capacity to produce 150GW — less than a fifth of China’s — and demand outstripped supply by 9.5 per cent between 2008-09, and by 13.8 per cent during peak hours, according to the Power Ministry. Indian officials also hope that the mission will help to ease the pressure from Western governments at international talks for a new UN climate pact in December. Environmental campaigners have welcomed the plan, saying that solar energy is India’s most realistic alternative power source, as it does not have the space for large wind plants.

Siddharth Pathak, chief climate change campaigner for Greenpeace in India, said: “India’s putting a very strong argument in front of developed countries that it has huge potential for renewable energy.” However, some government officials remain sceptical about risking so much money on new technology, rather than spending it on providing all Indians with electricity from conventional sources.

Filed Under: Environment, Technology Tagged With: ,

Troops ‘Too Fat’ To Fight In Afghanistan

August 3, 2009 By

troops too fat to fight_Tom Morgan – Britain’s war effort in Afghanistan is being hindered by a number of frontline troops too fat to fight, according to a leaked Army memo.

The Ministry of Defence confirmed today it had directed military chiefs to ensure units are following Army fitness policy after concerns were raised over a “worrying trend of obesity”.

The Army needs to “reinvigorate a warrior ethos and a culture of being fit”, according to the leaked memo apparently sent to all Army units and obtained by the Observer newspaper.

The memo from Major Brian Dupree, of the Army physical training corps in Wiltshire, said basic fitness policy “is not being carried out”.

Units were routinely failing to fulfil the Army’s basic fitness regime of two hours of physical exercise a week, he added.

The memo leaked to the paper said: “The numbers of personnel unable to deploy and concerns about obesity throughout the Army are clearly linked to current attitudes towards physical training.”

There are 3,860 Army personnel classified as PUD – personnel unable to deploy – with a further 8,190 regarded as being of “limited deployability” for medical reasons, it was reported.

Major Dupree added: “The current Army fitness policy states that to be fit to fight requires a minimum of two to three hours of physical activity per week. It is clear that even this most basic policy is not being implemented.

“To cope with the demands of hybrid operations in Afghanistan and future conflicts the Army needs personnel with that battle-winning edge that sustains them through adversity. It is clear this message has been diluted recently and this attitude must change. “The increasing PUD list and concerns over obesity in the services are clearly linked to this indifferent attitude.”

An MoD spokesman said: “Following a review of recent evidence, direction has been given to the chain of command to take action to ensure units are following the Army’s fitness policy.”

The revelations came on the day a hard-hitting report on British efforts in the war-torn country by a committee of MPs was published.

Since deploying to Afghanistan in 2001, the UK has suffered from “significant mission creep” with an ever-growing list of responsibilities, including drugs, human rights and state-building, which have made it more difficult for the Government to explain the purpose of Britain’s mission, said the report by the cross-party House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee.

Filed Under: Government Tagged With: ,

Start Building Your Defense Now

August 3, 2009 By

court proceedings_Most people has had that experience where you get up in the morning and realize you are still wearing the same clothes from the night before and don’t remember how you got home. As your head starts to throb profusely, hazy images of beer pitchers, shots of patron, and a charming bartender start to reveal as you panic at the severity of your unstable condition the night before. At the creepy thought that your freedom and existence could have been stripped away with one of two things; DUI or death, you rejoice that things just turned out differently. Well, so many deaths result from similar situations in some parts of the country every year. And in most times the offenders are driving home from a bar or club. Hence, though they were equivocal enough but it doesn’t mean that they’re all guilty of the offense being imputed against them.

Nevertheless, one doesn’t even need to be at a 0.08 blood alcohol level to be convicted of a DUI.  The DUI charge consists of two counts.  One count is the charge of driving while over a blood alcohol level of 0.08, and the other count is the charge of driving while under the influence.  Thus, people who are at a 0.03 or some other harmlessly low blood alcohol level could be pulled over for mistakes such as failing to put on a blinker, and be charged with a DUI. However, worry no more as massachusetts oui lawyer is here to help anyone who may have fallen into this kind of mess. So why not start building your defense now? All you have to do is just visit the above mentioned for further help and more information’s.

Filed Under: Education, Society & Culture Tagged With:

Fruits & Vegetable Nutrition

August 3, 2009 By

fruit & vegetable nutrition_Janet Ollman – The importance of whole food nutrition from fresh fruits and vegetables cannot be over-emphasized.  However, in today’s world  we are not assured of receiving all the nutrients our bodies need if we rely on the common food supply.  Depleted soils and the use of chemical pesticides and herbicides limit the nutrient content of the foods they grow. (www.ghchealth.com/nutrient-depleted-soil.html)

In addition, these toxins have a detrimental effect upon the cells of our bodies to limit absorption of nutrients. (nativevillage.org)  Even our busy lifestyles limit the time we feel we have to prepare food and eat properly.

And yet, it’s common knowledge that disease is rampant and on the rise.  How can we ward off serious illness, much less the common cold, if our immune systems are not nourished and functioning properly?

Isolated vitamins aren’t the answer.  We’ve tried that.  It doesn’t work.  The isolated vitamins are just that: they are isolated from the other compounds in the food that they were grown with.  There’s a reason Mother Nature put them all together in the combination in which they occur.  Whole foods contain a complete nutritional profile which is more absorbable in the body than one of the compounds isolated from the others.  See www.theholisticvet.com/nutrition.html  for a discussion on the mistaken idea that taking more of an isolated vitamin will make up for full-spectrum nutrition.

Perhaps this shotgun approach to vitamin and mineral supplementation explains the reason  we’re still becoming ill and staying that way–and dying. There’s got to be a better way.

What about juicing?  Do you have a juicer?  Not many people do.  However, if you do, and you’re willing to use it every day, do you keep a supply of fresh fruits and vegetables around?  Do you actually USE the juicer–then clean it up, only to do the whole thing over again the next day?  That’s not very practical, or appealing to most people.

OK, juicing was a great idea, but impractical.  Still, it’s a step in the right direction.  We know that vitamins and minerals work better in the combinations they come in as they grow in nature.  What if we could get them daily, on a guaranteed basis, assured of their purity, and convenient?  Wouldn’t that be wonderful?  It is wonderful, and it is happening.

In my next article, I’ll discuss some of the current health statistics in the United States today.  You will be amazed, surprised, and shocked to find out the obesity rate, the cancer rate, and other important markers for our health.   But there are answers, and some of them are easier and closer than you think..  Stay tuned!

Filed Under: Health & Fitness Tagged With:

All Vehicles Are Not Created Equal

August 3, 2009 By

auto car insurance_Different kinds and types of insurance system are now out in the offing to possibly lure out prospective customers. Well, whatever you own or are thinking of owning, you have to insure it. You know, if your car is seven or eight years old or worth less than $2,500, think about taking the risk and dropping the comprehensive and collision from your auto car insurance quote. Chances are your deductible is closing in on the value of your car anyway, and a major collision will send the car to the junk dealer and you to the dealership.

Nonetheless, many things are being bundled these days – from cell phones to Internet and cable TV – you would think that having your home and auto insurance with the same company would save money, but it might actually be costing you money.  Do your car insurance comparison research.  You could discover that having separate policies will be cheaper. You may think you can only afford the minimum coverage required by law. But, there’s a good chance those minimums won’t come close to covering the costs of a serious accident, which could mean you could be paying a lot more than you bargained for if it’s your fault and you don’t live in a no-fault state.

Even if two owners drive similar models from the same car maker, that doesn’t necessarily mean that they will pay equal auto insurance premium rates. Look for affordable car insurance quotes from companies that offer “green” discounts for driving a hybrid, choosing paperless statements or electronic payment plans. Even signing your policy with an e-signature can help cut your premium costs. Just remember that all vehicles are not created equal. Small or large, old or new, the type of car you drive affects your auto insurance rate. So it is still much better to have an insurance company which you can always rely and depend on. Hurry, visit the above mentioned now and enjoy.

Filed Under: Business & Economy, Recreation & Sports Tagged With: ,

Six Christians Burned Alive In Pakistan

August 2, 2009 By

burned alive in Pakistan_Ben Quinn – Six Christians were burned alive in Pakistan yesterday when hundreds of Muslims attacked and looted their homes, sparked by rumours that pages from the Qur’an had been desecrated.

The dead, including four women and a child, were killed when Christian homes were torched by hundreds of supporters of a banned Muslim organisation in the Punjabi village of Gojra, in eastern Pakistan.

Tensions have been running high between the two communities over allegations that Christians had defiled pages from the Muslim holy book, despite authorities insisting that the rumours were unfounded.

Television footage from the area showed houses burning and streets strewn with debris and blackened furniture as mobs ran at each other. There were reports in the local media of exchanges of gunfire between Christian and Muslim communities and that rioters had blocked a railway line.

Pakistani authorities named the Muslim group involved in the violence as Sipah-e-Sahaba, which has been accused of launching attacks against security forces and carrying out bomb attacks in public places in recent years.

Rana Sanaullah, Punjab’s law minister, said that an investigation had been carried out into allegations made during the week that a copy of the Qur’an had been defaced but that no such incident was found to have taken place.

Although the situation had calmed down by Friday, he said yesterday that “some miscreants and extremists entered the city [on Saturday] and pushed people toward armed clashes”.

Pakistan’s federal minister for minorities, Shahbaz Bhatti, said he had visited Gojra on Friday and asked police to provide protection for Christians who were facing threats, but accused them of ignoring his efforts.

Pakistan is a predominantly Muslim nation although religious minorities, including Christians, account for about 4% of its population of 170 million. The communities generally live peacefully alongside one another, but Muslim militants have periodically targeted Christians and churches in recent years.

Filed Under: Education, Society & Culture Tagged With: