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Sunday, December 13, 2009 LONDON: Slanket is the newest apparel that has become a craze this season.The dress, which seems to be a cross between a hospital gown and a blanket, can be worn like an apron.Lakeland, the kitchen and homewares store in America had come up with the item in September last year.Since then, the dress that covers the wearer from neck to feet, has sold nearly a quarter of a million.Even chat show hosts Jay Leno and Oprah Winfrey have worn it on their shows.Also, Bruce Willis donned it on the David Letterman show.“There is something very wrong about someone wearing a slanket. They are definitely not high fashion, but they’ve been an amazing phenomenon,” the Telegraph quoted Tom Dunmore of Stuff magazine, as saying.Lakeland is offering it for 29.99 pounds, while Firebox, an online gadget retailer, is selling them for 25 pounds.

Sunday, December 13, 2009 MANAMA: Pakistan needs to put pressure on the leadership of the Afghan Taliban operating inside its borders for long-term progress to be made in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus said on Sunday. "(To make) the really significant progress in Afghanistan that will be necessary over time... it would be very helpful if additional pressure could be put (by Pakistan) on the leadership of the elements that are causing problems in Afghanistan," the head of the US Central Command told reporters on the sidelines of the sixth Manama Dialogue security conference. He said, however, that Pakistani forces have carried out some "quite impressive" operations against Pakistani Taliban forces, fueled by the realisation that extremist groups operating in the country pose a threat. "There was a recognition by all the Pakistani leaders (earlier this year)... that the main threat to the very writ of Pakistani governance was the internal extremist threat,...

Sunday, December 13, 2009 HAVANA: Latin American allies Venezuela and Cuba have strengthened their relations by signing cooperation agreements worth of 3.2 billion dollars. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and his Cuban counterpart Raul Castro on Saturday signed some 285 cooperation agreements that will go into effect in 2010. Chavez, who arrived in Cuba on Friday, said that the nations began increasing cooperation in 2000 with 17 modest projects worth some $30 million. "This is a mechanism of cooperation, which has no other precedents in the world. It is unbelievable in the way it has been forged over the last 10 years," the president added. Meanwhile, President Castro said that Venezuela would remain the primary trade partner for Cuba. Trade between Caracas and Havana has reached $8.7 billion, mainly in the health, education, agriculture and energy sectors. The two presidents on Sunday will attend a summit of the ALBA, a leftist bloc Chavez founded in 2004 as a counterweig...

Sunday, December 13, 2009 BHUBANESWAR: India’s Wildlife officials have seized 96 live fresh water turtles from a town in Orissa and arrested one person on charges of smuggling them, police.Acting on a tip off, a police team caught the man with the reptiles at Pipili town, some 20 km away, here Friday evening, inspector in charge of the Pipili police station Amulya Kumar Champatiray said.‘They were live turtles of different shapes and sizes. They were kept in three bags,’ he said. ‘We caught the man when he was waiting for a bus.’The arrested man, Durgasankar Mana, is a resident of Midnapore area of West Bengal and wanted to take the turtles to his state, Champatiray said.

Sunday, December 13, 2009 CHANDIPUR: ‘Dhanush’, the naval version of India’s indigenously developed surface-to-surface Prithvi missile system was test fired from a naval ship about 40 nautical miles from here inside the Bay of Bengal today.A naval team and the scientists of the DRDO jointly conducted the mission, claimed an official from the Department of Defence.The missile was flight tested from a naval ship in the Bay of Bengal at about 11:30 A.M, according to Defence sources.Dhanush missile is capable of carrying both conventional and nuclear warheads. It is a single stage missile with liquid propellant and can hit both sea as well as shore based targets of 350 km range with 500kg payload.The missile in its initial test of development stage on April 11, 2000 had failed due to some technical snags developed during the blast-off phase. But, in it’s range and pay load capabilities the missile was a success.The last trial of Dhanush missile was successfully conducted on March 30,2007 f...

Sunday, December 13, 2009 NEW DELHI: Classrooms at the Adivasi Academy in western India echo to the speech patterns of languages that may soon become no more than a meaningless jumble of noises.Kukna, Panchmahali and Rathvi are just three of dozens of tribal Indian tongues taught at the academy, which was set up in 1996 in an attempt to preserve the country's indigenous cultures.India's 1.16-billion people speak more than 6,500 languages and dialects, according to the 2001 census.But almost 200 of them are seriously endangered, says the United Nations cultural agency UNESCO, as Hindi and English strengthen their grip in an increasingly mobile and interconnected world."If younger generations don't learn these languages, they will be forgotten," said academy teacher Jeetendra Vasava, 29. "Without education in the next 30 years the current speakers will get old and these languages will die."Vasava, who believes India's rich diversity will be wrecked if ...

Sunday, December 13, 2009 HAVANA: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez signed 3.2 billion dollars' worth of cooperation agreements with Cuba and said former Cuban leader Fidel Castro was in great health, after visiting him at his home.Chavez arrived Friday in Havana for a meeting Sunday of the regional ALBA group, and met shortly after landing with President Raul Castro, who took over from his now 83-year-old brother Fidel after the longtime Cuban leader underwent surgery in 2006."Fidel is better than all of us... I told Raul that Fidel will bury us all," Chavez said after his meeting with the Cuban president. Recently there were rumors Fidel Castro was close to dying.Chavez and Raul Castro, 77, on Saturday signed some 285 cooperation agreements worth 3.2 billion dollars, which will go into effect in 2010.Close political partners Cuba and Venezuela have expanded their economic ties since 2000, reaching a cumulative exchange of 8.7 billion dollars, said Chavez' Oil and Ene...

Sunday, December 13, 2009 NEW YORK: Academy Award winners Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman once again team up in a feature film, “Invictus,” the latest by the talented director Eastwood. Right there we should be expecting good things. I am happy to say that this movie does not fail to deliver.“Invictus” is a true story, based upon the events surrounding the political and cultural tribulations faced by South Africa around the time of Nelson Mandela’s election as its president. It was part of Mandela’s vision to ease fears and unify a splintered nation, in part, by focusing on the country’s rugby team in the World Cup Competition.Freeman was born to play this role. He is impeccable as the gentle, low-key Mandela whose warm and confident demeanor combines the wisdom of Abraham Lincoln with the visionary idealism of Mahatma Gandhi. The message here is one of forgiveness, of moving past old prejudices and patterns of oppression into the light of a loving and promising future.The film itsel...

Sunday, December 13, 2009 ORISSA: Orissa police seized 96 turtles, which were being smuggled out of the country, and arrested one in this regard in the late hours on Friday.The illegal consignment was being taken in a vehicle to West Bengal’s Midnapore East district. Police officials said that they intercepted the vehicle on a tip-off.“Total 96 tortoises were kept in the bag. We seized the turtles and arrest one person in this connection. We informed the forest officials regarding this. Later forest officials came and seized the turtles and the detained person named Durgashankar Maan for further legal action,” said Amulya Kumar Champatiray, Inspector-in-charge of Pipili Police Station.Besides slaughtering for meat, the species, protected under India’s wildlife act, are also used in the formulation of certain traditional medicines.India has banned their trade under the 1972 Wildlife Protection Act, but the huge profit margin and lax laws increasingly lure poachers to the trade.

Sunday, December 13, 2009 BEIJING: Police in central China encircled Sunday a remote hilltop where a gunman suspected of killing 12 people, including his father, was believed to be hiding, state media said. Special police and paramilitary troops have cornered suspect Liu Aibing, 34, on the hilltop in Hunan province and are closing in on him, the Hunan government news website reported.Liu is suspected of shooting 12 people to death with a hunting rifle and seriously wounding two others on Saturday in Yinshanpai village, the report said. Six wooden homes were also torched in the rampage, it said. Earlier, the news agency said 11 people were killed and five homes were destroyed by fire. The killings occurred early Saturday evening, news agency said. Liu, a migrant worker, had recently returned from southern China's Guangdong province where he had sought employment, the website report said. He has a history of mental illness, it added. Among the dead were Liu's father and several c...