The U.S. develops a lethal new virus through genetic engineering

A scientist funded by the US government has deliberately created an extremely deadly form of mousepox, a relative of the smallpox virus, through genetic engineering.

The new virus kills all mice even if they have been given antiviral drugs as well as a vaccine that would normally protect them.

The work has not stopped there. The cowpox virus, which infects a range of animals including humans, has been genetically altered in a similar way.

Gender discrimination in Air India and Indian Airlines

An epitome of beauty, she is full of grace, radiates warmth and keeps you comfortable in every way. She is indeed Air India's hostess - which distinguishes her from her counterparts in other jobs.

A typical Air-India hostess is warm with a pleasing personality. A keen interest in people and places along with being dedicated and conscientious is what makes her unique. She is intelligent, committed, enthusiastic and creative. Her traditional welcome is like no other's and for her it is a pleasure more than a duty to serve you as a special guest aboard Air-India.

The above is from www.airindia.com.The below is from the Civil Aviation Minister Rajiv Pratap Rudy.

Presentability and physical appearance of candidates aspiring to become air hostesses at Air-India (AI) and Indian Airlines (IA) is more important than written tests.A memorandum sent out by the Ministry of Civil Aviation directs future recruitment of air hostesses is primarily on the basis of looks and personality, rather than academics or intelligence.

The Supreme Court has ordered that air hostesses, once they cross 50, should only be assigned ground duties.

"This is blatant gender discrimination," said Maldeep Sidhu, a former Air-India air hostess and now a practising lawyer.

Air-India has 753 air hostesses and as many as 600 have put their signatures on a petition protesting the Supreme Court order. The signatories are from all age groups — between 29 and 50.

The apex court judgment has a string of negative implications for the 50-plus air hostesses.

Their earnings will be reduced by 75 per cent as they will not be paid flight allowances.

In principle, everyone agrees there should be gender equality. But, in practice, they continue to face the bias and are humiliated on every single flight.

• Air-India’s air-hostesses are considered junior to all male cabin crew, irrespective of the number of years they have served in the airline.
• Air-hostesses are not eligible for the top crew position of Flight Supervisors though they are trained in training schools.
• All air-hostesses, from age 35 on, are required to undergo a biennial medical examination while there is no such requirement for men. Recently, an internal gynaecological check-up has been included which women staff say has no bearing on ‘‘in-flight fitness.’’
• While men and women are required to have regular weight checks, only the women are grounded on account of excessive weight. There have been instances when men have been allowed to fly despite being as much as 40 kg overweight.
• Only men are eligible for the monthly bar loss allowance of 30 pounds a month. This allowance is a compensation for what the AI management assumes are losses arising out of non-payment by passengers buying liquor on flight. Assistant flight pursers and Supervisors who don’t handle the cash also get the allowance.

The normal duties of an air hostess in any airline include:

They serve refreshmentsLook after passengers
Take special care of those unwell
Keep an eye on possible breaches of securityAdminister first aid in an emergency
Ensure the safety of passengers in the event of a hijack or terrorist threat

These are tasks air hostesses of IA and AI have performed with courage and distinction. Exactly which part of their job description places a premium on physical appearance?Protecting passengers should be the primary concern of any airline in the event of increasing risks such as terrorist attacks or hijacks.Equally important are concerns such as air rage. These could affect other passengers and such situations need to be handled with tact and patience.

It would be wrong and unsafe if the Civil Aviation Ministry ignored such vital issues and confined itself to superficial and chauvinistic jargon — about market feedback showing air hostesses having to be young and pretty for IA and AI to compete effectively.

No doubt, in a service industry like air travel, presentability of the crew has to be ensured. But by no logic can this justify different criteria for men and women, allowing men to continue to fly till the age of 58 but grounding women at 50.

The truth is IA and AI are unable to compete effectively because they have an ageing fleet; their aircraft need to replaced.

They are unable to compete effectively because the Civil Aviation Ministry bears the burden of cross-subsidy of petrol and diesel, leading to a very high cost of aviation turbine fuel.

They are unable to compete effectively because rather than being managed professionally, they are run by a constantly changing stream of IAS officers. These officers learn about the aviation industry after being appointed and are transferred before they get a feel for its intricacies.

It was Rajiv Gandhi who first attempted to remove the degrading and discriminatory service conditions of air hostesses by issuing a directive restoring male-female parity. This directive was subsequently watered down by the ministry.

The Air-India Air Hostesses’ Union is going to seek a review of the Supreme Court judgment grounding air hostesses when they reach 50 years of age.

Former Union law minister Ram Jethmalani, who had argued the case on behalf of the air hostesses in the apex court last week, met civil aviation minister Rajiv Pratap Rudi to urge the government to intervene in the matter.

Sainthood to the Saint of the Gutter for "Miracle Healing" after death!

Nobody would disagree that Mother Teresa, who spent her life caring for the destitute, was a noble soul. For the "Saint of the Gutter", who never in her life assumed holiness by herself, sainthood was conferred upon her not by any religious institution, but the gratitude, appreciation and affection of the millions whom she served. Unfortunately, religious institutions make use of such social acceptance to propagate superstitions and in the process damages the integrity of the person involved on a whole.

At least one proven after-death-miracle is a must for any saint. Teresa’s managers have offered the "Healing of Monica Besra" for this purpose and the Vatican has officially accepted it as a suitable ticket to sainthood.

But unexpectedly the miracle has met with a tough challenge.

The medical records prove that it was sheer conventional medical treatment that rescued her life. "In the 21st century how can you talk about miracle healing?" says West Bengal health minister Suyrya Kanta Nishra. The miracle documentation claims that several doctors have certified that the healing was "scientifically inexplicable", but not a single of these anonymous witnesses could so far be traced. The former health minister of West Bengal, Partho De, revealed that he had been approached by the Vatican agents and asked to name a doctor, who would certify that Monica Besra’s healing was a miracle. He declined support. After ordering the medical records of the case in February 2000 for scrutiny to the Kolkata (Calcutta) health department, he was convinced that there was nothing unusual about the disappearance of the tumor after prolonged medical treatment.

Dr. Manju Murshed, superintendent of the government hospital in Balurghat, informed that Monica Besra was admitted in the hospital with severe pain. She suffered from tubercular meningitis and from an ovarian tumor, which was discovered during an ultra-sound investigation. She was subsequently treated by Dr.Tarun Kumar Biwas and the gynecologist Dr. Ranjan Mustafi. After she left the hospital, the treatment was continued in the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital and ended successfully in March 1999. A final ultra-sound investigation showed that the tumor had disappeared.

Vatican’s "proof" is a statement of crown witness Monica Besra. It leaked, despite utmost secrecy, to the press. In this statement, Besra describes that she was suffering from terrible pain from a giant tumor in her stomach and nearly lost all hope. She left her family to seek help with the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata. On 5 October, 1998, Mother Teresa’s first death anniversary, she prayed to her ardently. Two nuns, sister Bartholomea and sister Ann Sevika, took a silver medallion with Mother’s picture from the wall and tied it on Monica’s body with a black thread, right on the tumor. The pain vanished the same night and never came back. Her stomach became smaller and smaller and in the morning she felt that the tumor had vanished. She was miraculously healed!

Monica Besra is a 30-year-old tribal woman from Dulidnapur village. She is illiterate and speaks her tribal mother tongue only, laced with a few words of broken Bengali. Until recently she has not been a Christian. The statement is written in fluent English and shows familiarity with details of Catholic belief. It is obvious that the text has not been written or dictated by her. But Monica Besra was not available to bring light into the murky story: she had vanished. She must have been “under the protection of the church”, suspected those close to her. She was not seen, since her name, despite all efforts of secrecy, became public.

And the nuns involved in the miracle kept their lips sealed. "An objective miracle has happened", explains archbishop D’Souza of Kolkata. "The sisters don’t want to give different versions as that would spoil things."

Some of the doctors who treated Monica Besra, for example, say that there is no evidence of a miracle. They say that her tumour was not fully grown and that her condition responded to medical treatment.

"This miracle claim is absolute nonsense and should be condemned by everyone," Dr Ranjan Kumar Mustafi, of Balurghat Hospital in West Bengal, said. "She had a medium-sized tumour in her lower abdomen caused by tuberculosis. The drugs she was given eventually reduced the cystic mass and it disappeared after a year's treatment."

Her husband initially shared this scepticism. "This miracle is a hoax," he told an interviewer last year. "It is much ado about nothing. My wife was cured by the doctors."

Their children are being educated with the help of the nuns and he has been able to buy a small piece of land. "Everything has changed for the better", says Selku Murmu.

Now, he is full of praise for Mother Teresa and her order. "It was her miracle healing that cured my wife," says Selku Murmu, whose family has converted to Christianity. "Our situation was terrible and we didn't know what to do."

Mother Teresa's elevation has also been criticised for its speed. After a Vatican commission recognised Monica Besra's healing as a miracle, the Pope personally intervened to "fast track" the nun's beatification, making it the swiftest in the Church's history.

Under normal Church rules, at least five years must pass after a person dies before the procedure for sainthood can begin, first with beatification and later with canonisation. The process started in 1999, less than two years after Mother Teresa's death, aged 87.

Her canonisation could follow within a year or two, bestowing upon her the Catholic Church's highest honour, though a second miracle would be needed for her sainthood.

If the idea of miraculous healings gets credence, it will have dangerous consequences for the uneducated and the poor. Confidence in modern medicine and science has to be developed and strengthened and people have to be encouraged to use available medical facilities for treatment instead of taking to superstition and miracle belief. The efforts should be to expand the outreach of the modern medicine to all strata of the society.

Month long peoples revolt ends as the President of Bolivia steps down

Bolivia's President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada resigned in a letter to Congress following a month long deadly popular revolt in South America's poorest nation in which more than 70 people were killed.

The decision came after tens of thousands of people had marched and blockaded the capital for weeks to reject Sanchez de Lozada's pro-U.S., free-market economic policies.

Hordes of miners, farmers and Indian women had marched to the center of the capital, shouting ''quit, quit'' and exploded dynamite sticks two blocks from a government palace guarded by troops and assault vehicles. Food is scarce in the capital.

The protestors were seen dancing and clapping in the streets and singing the national anthem. Lozada had to step down for having massacred the people, for lying and trying to hang on to power by all means necessary. Now, vigilant and festive in the streets, the Bolivian people are the live expression of a democracy constructed from below.

6 months after US and British forces ousted former President Saddam Hussein in the name of freedom and human rights the future of Iraqi women is bleak

The U.S. occupation of Iraq has caused over 20,000 pointless civilian injuries. In addition, more than 1,500 people have died in Baghdad alone. The Pentagon's own numbers admit massive death rates. Women are threatened with rape when they leave their homes. Suicide and car bombs, civil unrest, and riots rock the nation daily. The U.S. has admitted to holding upwards of 10,000 Iraqi prisoners.

Censorship resistance in India: Indian govt blocks Yahoo! groups on security grounds

Along with the notion of free speech, the right to online freedom of association and peaceful assembly needs much greater emphasis. You shouldn't eliminate the right of all to assemble online via YahooGroups because one group is thought to be using the service for non-peaceful assembly. (YahooGroups and Hotmail are probably the world's two most significant contributions to low cost democratic involvement around the world - why? they are free and people actually use them on a consistent basis to communicate and organize.)

Express your protest. Beat the ban. Write your views to

Mr Arun Shourie Minister of Communications & Information Technology & Disinvestment Ist Floor, Electronics Niketan, Lodhi Road, New Delhi Email : mailto:ashourie@nic.in?subject=
Mr. Ravi Shankar Prasad Minister of Information and Broadcasting E-Mail: mailto:ravis@sansad.nic.in?subject= Phone: +91-11-23384340, 23384782 Fax : +91-11-23782118
National Human Rights Commission (NHRC)

You can also read messages posted to the discussion forum at the Ministry of Information Technology’s Website and post your views there.

In the meantime, users in India wanting to urgently access the groups.yahoo.com domain-based sites despite this unofficial ban should attempt to beat the ban by browsing via: http://www.anonymizer.com/ or may want to visit http://www.proxy4free.com/. The second option may involve changing some of your PC settings.

Bolivian police clashed with protesters demanding the removal of President

More than 45 people have been killed in a month-long wave of protests by thousands of workers and peasant farmers against Sanchez de Lozada, a U.S. ally, for his free market economic policies and his failure to tackle endemic poverty.

Scientists prove that the pain of rejection is for real

The pain of rejection is more than mere metaphor. A team of scientists have found that to the brain, a social snub is just like stubbing a toe. More>>

Vatican says AIDS has grown so fast because of the availability of condoms

Contrary to scientific advise, the Vatican is urging people world over not to use condoms, claiming that they do not help protect against the deadly virus.

HIV hitting young at the rate of one every 14 seconds

A United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) report says that about 6,000 youngsters become infected with the HIV virus every day, the equivalent of one every 14 seconds. The majority of them are female.

The government of Qatar was forced by the United States to censor Al Jazeera.

Freedom of the press becomes difficult when a country is too powerful in the world.

A young female lawyer chose to become the next human bomb; kills 19 in Haifa

A Palestinian woman wrapped in explosives blew herself up yesterday inside a seaside restaurant popular with both Arabs and Jews, killing 19 bystanders, including four children.
The lunchtime attack ended nearly a month of relative calm. One of the deadliest in three years of renewed violence, the bombing came on the Jewish Sabbath and a day before the start of Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. The blast inside the Maxim restaurant went off shortly after 2 p.m., shattering windows and leaving the white walls cracked and charred. Most of the ceiling collapsed, with lights and wires dangling. Broken plates, glass, chairs and human remains covered the floor of the one-story building. Outside, the body of the restaurant's security guard lay broken and bloody on the steps.

Police said the bomber and 19 bystanders were killed, including four Arabs. The four dead children included a 1-year-old and two others ages 5 and 6, emergency officials said.

The group Islamic Jihad said it organized the bombing. It identified the bomber as Hanadi Jaradat, 27, a law school graduate from the West Bank town of Jenin. Her brother and a cousin, an Islamic Jihad member, were killed in an Israeli military raid in June, the group said.

The explosion brought to 103 the number of Palestinian suicide bombings in the past three years of fighting. At least 432 persons have been killed in the attacks. The suicide bomber whose attack in Haifa left 19 people dead did not fit the usual profile of an unemployed young man throwing in his lot with the terror groups. Hanadi Jaradat, was a professional woman who was due to qualify as a lawyer in a few weeks, with every chance of a successful career. She left her home in the West Bank city of lenin at 7.30 a.m. local time on Saturday without breathing a word about her intentions.

Instead of going to the law firm where she was a trainee, she went to Haifa, where she set off her bomb in a crowded restaurant. Among the dead were four Israeli children and three Arabs. Jaradat carried out the attack for Islamic Jihad, the Palestinian terrorist group. Her family said her prime motive was revenge.

In June Israeli forces killed her cousin, Salih, and her brother, Fadi (23), in Jenin. Both were accused of being Islamic Jihad operatives. "Do not expect her not to be influenced by those killings," said her sister, Bisan (21). "She saw her brother slaughtered like a sheep." Jaradat had done well enough at school to win a place at Yarmuk University in neighbouring Jordan. She had always been a devout Muslim, but after her brother’s death she completed the task of memorising every verse of the Koran.

Madhumita case: CBI grills Anuj

A day after Madhumita Shukla's mother and sister were brought face-to-face with murder suspect Amarmani Tripathi, the Central Bureau of Investigation has interrogated a student in the case.According to the CBI, Amaramani Tripathi tried to frame Anuj Mishra, an IIT student, in the murder case. Madhumita's ex-servant planted the story of her marriage with Anuj and a priest claimed he had performed the rituals. Since she was pregnant, it was alleged that Anuj had killed her. The police had a lead that the suspect had initials 'A.M.' and Anuj Mishra came under the needle of suspicion. His friends in IIT were questioned and his house was raided. His family too went through a traumatic period. Anuj has denied any relation with Madhumita and said he had only met her at her house on October 27 last year in connection with a poetry competition in IIT Kanpur. Now with Amarmani in CBI custody and most of the puzzle falling into place, Anuj confronted the former minister and tried to debunk the marriage theory. However, Mishra's testimony does not have a direct bearing on the murder investigation. Though Madhumita's family is helping the agency in collecting more information and important evidence, the CBI is still to get its hands on the man who actually committed the murder.

Family swaps toddler for colour TV

A poverty stricken Albanian couple has admitted handing over one of their five children to a gang of human traffickers in return for a colour television, Italian media reports said on Tuesday.

The gang subsequently sold the three-year-old boy to an elderly Italian couple for 5000 euro ($8520), according to the Italian news agency ANSA citing judicial sources.
According to the report, the boy's father, knowing that the traffickers were dangerous, agreed to the deal.

The gang was broken up by Italian police several months ago and when the arrest of leader Besim Metani was announced, the boy's mother came forward, the report said.

Italian and Albanian investigators finally traced the boy to the town of Sersale in the south of the country, where he had been living since 1999 with Angelo Borelli, 69, and his wife Iole Rodio, 57, under the name of Michele.

The child, now aged 7, was put into the care of Italian social services until the legal authorities make a decision on whether to send him back to Albania.

The trafficking gang is alleged to have brought about 60 children into Italy by similar means.
Police spokesman Pierpaolo Maraffa said his officers were still trying to trace around 30 children in and around the town of Pescara on the Adriatic coast facing Albania.