Police Discover Car Bomb in Times Square and Clear Area
By AL BAKER and KARIN HENRY
Published: May 1, 2010
The police discovered a car bomb in a smoking Nissan Pathfinder in the heart of Times Square, prompting the evacuation of thousands of tourists and theatergoers from the area on a warm and busy Saturday evening.There was no explosion.“It appears to be a car bomb left in a Pathfinder between Seventh and Eighth” Avenues on 45th Street, said Deputy Commissioner Paul J. Browne, the Police Department’s chief spokesman.
The device, he said, contained “explosive elements” that included “propane tanks, some kind of powder, gasoline and a timing device.”
David Simon: Katrina and all that jazz
David Simon won unprecedented praise for his TV series The Wire. Now he’s turned his attention to New Orleans for his new show, Treme, where politics, music and heartbreak collide in the aftermath of the hurricane. As it opens in the States, we get unique access to its filming, the writing process and its creator – America’s most brilliant TV auteur
Wyatt Mason
The Observer, Sunday 2 May 2010
It was a bright, warm, blue-skied December afternoon in Central City, New Orleans, and in this neighbourhood of humble shotgun houses and overgrown empty lots, a convoy of white trucks and trailers idled incongruously while unmarked police cars blocked intersections nearby. On any other morning, a police presence would have meant more bad news. In a city that has one of the highest homicide rates in the United States, this neighbourhood – roughly a mile from the French Quarter – has a murder rate that, in recent years, has hit quadruple that of the city as a whole.This morning, however, the 20 drivers, as well as 80 other crew members who hefted and humped a boggling array of gear at the tumbledown corner of Second Street and South Liberty, had anything but murder in mind: they were six hours into a day of filming the third episode of Treme, David Simon’s new HBO drama – co-created by the seasoned television writer and producer Eric Overmyer – which is set in post-Katrina New Orleans and made its debut last month.
USA
Oil spill threatens Gulf region’s ecosystem and fishing, tourism and shipping industries
By David A. Fahrenthold and Steven Mufson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, May 2, 2010
PASS CHRISTIAN, MISS. — In this Gulf Coast fishing town, they spent Saturday awaiting, and dreading, the oil.
The slick from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill was still too far offshore to see or even smell. At least, it didn’t smell worse than the harbor’s usual mix of boat fuel and bait. But there were rumors: It would come Sunday, first the sheen and then the thick stuff behind it. People here had heard that just to the west, fishermen were already pulling up shrimp that smelled like diesel fuel.
Changes to key Guantanamo evidence innocent, officer says
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba – An Army Special Forces officer testified Saturday that he altered a field report to directly implicate a Canadian detainee now being held at Guantanamo in a fatal grenade attack in Afghanistan years later because he realized that he got it wrong and wanted to fix the historical record.The officer denied suggestions from defense lawyers for Omar Khadr that he changed the report at prosecutors’ urging “to make it look like Omar was guilty.”
Europe
Greece erupts in violent protest as citizens face a future of harsh austerity
May Day clashes in Athens as belt-tightening policies are set to reverse rights won by workers over 30 years
Helena Smith in Athens
The Observer, Sunday 2 May 2010
Athens erupted into violence as traditional May Day festivities turned into a bitter protest against draconian austerity measures aimed at tackling Europe’s worst debt crisis in decades.For the tens of thousands of demonstrators who took to the streets in rallies that quickly descended into clashes with riot police, the show of force was just the beginning – a prelude of the storm that will rock Greece if its Socialist government “caves in” to the dictates of the IMF and enforces policies that have been likened to “the coming of Armageddon”.
The private trauma of Constable Lock, quiet hero of the Iranian embassy siege
Rescued by the SAS in May 1980, the ex-policeman – in his first interview for 10 years – reveals his struggle to Rachel Shields
Sunday, 2 May 2010
Thirty years ago, Trevor Lock wrestled a man to the floor and held a gun to his head as he begged for mercy. Today, it is hard to reconcile that Trevor Lock with the softly spoken man gazing out of the window at his well-tended garden. The deep hollows under his bright blue eyes are the only giveaway that he is something more than a contented pensioner; the only hint that he is plagued by memories of chaos, gunfire and bloodshed.PC Lock, as he was then, was, of course, one of the heroes of the Iranian embassy siege. It is not a mantle that sits easily with him. He has done no book deal; does not pitch up on TV news as a pundit for every hostage situation. This interview is his first for more than a decade.
Middle East
American drones deployed to target Yemeni terrorist
Armed US drones have been deployed to target one of the world’s most wanted Islamist terrorists following reports that he was involved in last week’s failed suicide bomb attack against Britain’s ambassador to Yemen.
By Con Coughlin and Philip Sherwell in Washington
Published: 8:00AM BST 02 May 2010
US President Barack Obama last month authorised the assassination of radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki after he was linked to last year’s Fort Hood massacre and the attempt in December to blow up a Detroit-bound jet by a man wearing explosives in his underpants.
Now senior US intelligence officials say they have stepped up their efforts to target al-Awlaki following new evidence that the American-born cleric is taking an increasingly operational role in the operation of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the terror group held responsible for the failed suicide bomb attack against Tim Torlot, 52, the UK envoy to Yemen.
Arab nations back Mideast peace talks
Move raises hopes U.S.-brokered negotiations can resume
By HADEEL AL-SHALCHI Associated Press
CAIRO – Arab nations on Saturday endorsed indirect peace talks between the Palestinians and Israelis, a move that likely paves the way for the start of long-stalled U.S.-brokered negotiations.The United States has proposed the talks to end the impasse between Israelis and Palestinians over the conditions for resuming negotiations, which broke down more than a year ago amid Israel’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip.
The green light from Arab foreign ministers co in March when Israel announced a new Jewish housing project in east Jerusalem.
Asia
mes after a first attempt to get indirect talks going collapsed
Hot on the heels of Imelda Marcos
As the Philippines’ former first lady attempts a comeback, Imelda Marcos tells Nick Meo why she and her son Ferdinand Jr are shoe-ins for office.
By Nick Meo, in Leyte, the Philippines
Published: 7:00AM BST 02 May 2010
‘I am the famous Imelda Marcos. Or perhaps that should be the notorious Imelda Marcos…”
The beauty is faded now, and needs a lot of rouge. The eyes are rheumy although they still sparkle with mischief, especially when she cracks one of her own little jokes.
Yet there is no mistaking the striking woman in bright orange, adorned with heart-shaped jewels on her lapel and on her fingers, followed by a harassed retinue through the VIP entrance of Manila airport at 4am.
At the age of 80, the disgraced former First Lady of the Philippines is staging an extraordinary political comeback. She invited The Sunday Telegraph on her flight south to the electoral battlefield to witness it.
PM warns Thai reds face ‘losses’
SUNDAY, MAY 02, 2010
Thailand’s prime minister has warned of “clashes and losses” if anti-government protesters do not end their demonstrations that have paralysed large areas of the capital, Bangkok.“From now on, what the government will do may risk clashes and losses, but the government knows what it’s doing. What needs to be done must be done,” Abhisit Vejjajiva in a regular weekly television address on Sunday.It was not immediately clear what he meant by “losses” and he did not elaborate on what plans he had for any action to end the protests, saying only that the government had a “clear approach”.
Africa
Singer Youssou N’Dour challenges Senegal’s ‘autocratic’ leader
Youssou N’Dour has fallen out with his old friend Abdoulaye Wade, prompting speculation that he will run for office
Alex Duval Smith, Africa correspondent
The Observer, Sunday 2 May 2010
Youssou N’Dour, the Senegalese musician once described by Rolling Stone magazine as the most famous living African singer, has taken his first steps into politics, prompting speculation that he may run for president in his homeland.An outspoken anti-poverty campaigner, N’Dour is best known internationally for 7 Seconds, his duet with Neneh Cherry. His move last week to launch a political platform with Senegal’s leading opposition figure marks a head-on challenge to President Abdoulaye Wade, 83, who is accused of grooming his son to succeed him.
Top UN man investigates massacre claims in DR Congo
The UN is investigating reports of a massacre by Ugandan rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Thomas Fessy
BBC News, in DR Congo Sunday, 2 May 2010
A senior UN official says as many as 100 people were killed in the alleged attack, which is believed to have taken place in February.
John Holmes, the UN humanitarian chief, said on a visit to the country that an investigation was under way.
If the claims are true it would bring the number of people killed between December and March to more than 500.
Mr Holmes said rebels from the Lord’s Resistance Army had carried out the massacre in the village of Kpanga in the north-east of the country, near the border with southern Sudan and the Central African Republic.
Latin America
Bolivia nationalises energy firms
SUNDAY, MAY 02, 2010
Bolivia has nationalised at least four power companies, expanding state control over the Latin American nation’s key industries.Evo Morales, the Bolivian president, signed a decree authorising the nationalisation at the offices of one of the companies in the city of Cochabamba on Saturday, hours after police had moved in to secure them.
“We are here to nationalise all the hydroelectric plants that were owned by the state before, to comply with the new constitution of the Bolivian state,” Morales said.