British man finds carrier pigeon skeleton in his fireplace with unbreakable secret code (Reuters)
Before military forces had secure cell phones and satellite communications, they used carrier pigeons. The highly trained birds delivered sensitive information from one location to another during World War II. Often, the birds found the intended recipient. But not always.
A dead pigeon was recently discovered inside a chimney in Surrey, England. There for roughly 70 years, the bird had a curious canister attached to its leg. Inside was a coded message that has stumped the experts.
The code features a series of 27 groups of five letters. According to Reuters, nobody from Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters has been able to decipher it. The message was sent by a Sgt. W. Scott to someone or something identified as “Xo2.”
A spokesperson remarked, “Although it is disappointing that we cannot yet read the message brought back by a brave carrier pigeon, it is a tribute to the skills of the wartime code-makers that, despite working under severe pressure, they devised a code that was indecipherable both then and now.”
The bird was discovered by a homeowner doing renovations earlier this month. In an interview with Reuters, David Martin remarked that bits of birds kept falling from the chimney. Eventually, Margin saw the red canister and speculated that it might contain a secret message. And it seems as if the message will always be secret.
Carrier pigeons played a vital role in wars due to their incredible homing skills. All told, U.K. forces used about 250,000 of the birds during World War II.
The Brussels summit has ended without agreement on the 27-strong union’s next seven-year budget.
A BBC correspondent says another meeting will have to be called to sort out the difficulties but it is unclear how differences will be resolved.
European Council chief Herman Van Rompuy said he was confident a deal would be reached early next year.
Hours of talks failed to bridge big gaps between richer countries and those which rely most on EU funding.
The UK said current EU spending levels must be frozen.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
Angela Merkel and I both agreed that it would be better to take some time out”
End QuoteFrancois HollandeFrench president
The EU’s divisions are very clear and have become even more stark at a time of economic crisis, says the BBC’s Chris Morris in Brussels.
Mr Van Rompuy had reshuffled the allocations in his original proposed budget during the summit, but he kept in place a spending ceiling of 973bn euros (£783bn; $ 1.2tn).
With the eurozone’s dominant states, Germany and France, unable to agree on the budget, UK Prime Minister David Cameron had warned against “unaffordable spending”.
The failure to decide on a budget came just days after the finance ministers of the 17 eurozone states failed to agree on conditions for releasing a new tranche of bailout money to Greece, raising questions about the union’s decision-making process.
‘No threats’
Mr Van Rompuy’s budget had been unacceptable to a number of other countries, not just Britain, Mr Cameron told reporters.
Continue reading the main story
Analysis
The summit laid bare clear divisions between richer northern countries in the EU, and the poorer south and east. It mirrored the divide that has emerged in the eurozone between northern creditors and southern debtors.
But the uneasy relationship between France and Germany also played a role – when they don’t agree, things tend to move slowly. Germany wanted further cuts in the budget proposal – not as many as Britain and others – but cuts all the same.
France on the other hand, supported by Italy and Spain, was keen to defend the EU’s biggest spending projects.
So striking a deal at a second summit in the New Year won’t be at all easy. But there are two reasons to think that it might succeed.
One is that failure to reach an agreement would mean the EU falling back on more expensive annual budgets.
The other is that many people are keen to avoid a prolonged budget stalemate, which could divert attention from other more important issues – notably the need to take more steps to resolve the crisis in the eurozone.
“Together, we had a very clear message: ‘We are not going to be tough on budgets at home just to come here and sign up to big increases in European spending’,” he said.
“We haven’t got the deal we wanted but we’ve stopped what would have been an unacceptable deal,” he added. “And in European terms I think that goes down as progress.”
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she was sympathetic towards Mr Cameron’s view – but no more than she was to all countries involved in the discussion.
“The discussions, both the bilateral discussions and the common discussion, have shown us that there is sufficient potential for an agreement,” she added.
French President Francois Hollande said the summit had made “progress”.
“There were no threats, no ultimatums,” he told reporters. “Angela Merkel and I both agreed that it would be better to take some time out because we want there to be an agreement.”
Without naming the UK, he also said it was time the system of budget rebates was reconsidered.
“It is a paradox, because some net contributors [EU countries that pay in more than they get back] get some of the money back even though they are in a situation where they are wealthy enough for them not to get this money back,” he said.
Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite remarked that the atmosphere at the summit had been “surprisingly good because the divergence in opinions was so large that there was nothing to argue about”.
European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso said the talks had failed owing to “important differences of opinion – especially in overall size of the budget”.
Revisions
The Commission, which drafts EU laws, had originally called for a budget of 1.025tn euros.
UK Prime Minister David Cameron: “We still believe a deal is do-able”
Its position was supported by the European Parliament and many countries which are net beneficiaries, including Poland, Hungary and Spain.
While most EU members supported some increase in the budget, several, mostly the big net contributors, argued it was unacceptable at a time of austerity.
Germany, the UK, France and Italy are the biggest net contributors to the budget, which amounts to about 1% of the EU’s overall GDP.
Mr Van Rompuy’s revised budget would have softened the blow to the two main areas of spending: development in the EU’s poorer regions, and agriculture.
Instead, there would have been greater cuts to energy, transport, broadband and the EU’s foreign service.
His proposal, put to leaders on Thursday evening, would have made no change to the level of administrative costs – something the UK might have found unacceptable.
Speaking after the summit, Mr Van Rompuy said: “My feeling is that we can go further… It has to be balanced and well prepared, not in the mood of improvisation, because we are touching upon jobs, we are touching upon sensitive issues.”
Failure to agree on the budget by the end of next year would mean rolling over the 2013 budget into 2014 on a month-by-month basis, putting some long-term projects at risk.
Analysts say that could leave the UK in a worse position, because the 2013 budget is bigger than the preceding years of the 2007-2013 multi-year budget.
GENEVA (Reuters) – Kris Kristofferson — Oxford scholar, athlete, U.S. Army helicopter pilot, country music composer, one-time roustabout, film actor, singer, lover of women, three times a husband and father of eight — seems ready to meet his maker.
At least, that was the clear impression he left with an audience of middle-aged-and-upwards fans at a concert in Geneva this week, a message underscored by his 28th and latest album, “Feeling Mortal” and its coffin-dark cover.
At a frail-looking 76, his ample beard more straggly than ever and his always gravel-laden voice gasping out the familiar lyrics of his great classics from “Bobby McGee” to “Rainbow Again”, the hereafter appears at the front of his mind.
“I’ve begun to soon descend, like the sun into the sea,” runs the title song of the new CD.
On the stage without backing group in Geneva, the first leg of a solo European tour to promote the disc from his own record company, “God” trips off his lips like a punctuation mark.
Even the old songs that made him — as well as other country artists like Willy Nelson, Johnny Cash, and his one-time girl-friend Janis Joplin — internationally famous, sound shaped by the fading voice to underscore a spiritual dimension.
“Sunday Morning Coming Down” emerges less as an ode to elderly loners facing old age without family and children and more as a call to prepare for the next life.
Religiosity was never that far from Kristofferson, son of a major-general in the U.S. Air Force, grandson of a Swedish army officer and in the 1ate 1950s a Rhodes Scholar in English Literature at England’s Oxford University.
CRUCIFIXION
In the 1971 “Jesus was a Capricorn” he predicts the Christian savior would be crucified again if he came back preaching peace and love among all races and creeds.
In the new album, “Ramblin’ Jack” is semi-autobiographical — a song about a wandering singer “with a face like a tumbled-down shack” of “wild and righteous, wicked ways” who “ain’t afraid of where he’s goin’.”
Kristofferson is adored by many believers, probably the vast majority of U.S. country fans and performers. But his fans among the unreligious and the atheists were also happy just to relish the poetry of his lyrics and the idiosyncrasy of his voice.
In Geneva, despite its Calvinist past as secular today as any major European city, the ageing 1,000-odd audience in a theatre seating twice that number, were certainly ready to enjoy anything he gave them.
They cheered and applauded his political declaration, an aside injected after a song line: “nobody wins.” “But somebody has just won. Obama won, so the whole world has won!” he rasped, waving his electric guitar in the air.
SELF-MOCKERY
They loved his self-mockery when, overcome briefly by a sniffle and pulling a blue bandana — cousin of the red one in “Bobby McGee”? — from his jeans pocket, he asked them if they minded having paid $ 100 “to watch an old fart blow his nose.”
And they laughed with him when — in the full flood of lyrics on the pleasure of being around “a lot of lovely girls in the best of all possible worlds — he confided: “I wrote this song a LONG time ago.”
His 22-year-old angel-faced daughter Kelly, a banjoist and vocalist, joined him on stage for a handful of numbers, while in the hall outside son Jesse manned a stall selling the new CD and the black “Feeling Mortal Tour” t-shirts.
Children — their dreams and the dreams of their parents for them — have also long been a central theme of his music.
“I wrote this for my little girl,” he says of a father’s song pledging he will be “forever there” for a daughter through life, and after. “Spread your wings,” he tells her.
More prosaically, he recalls a rebuke from Jesse at age five over his 1970s hit: “The Silver-Tongued Devil”: “That’s a bad song. You’re blaming all your troubles on someone else.”
After the concert, the Kristofferson family left for Zurich and Vienna to continue the tour. “This may be our last goodbye,” he sang in a final song. “We may not pass this way again.”
“We’ll miss you,” called a voice from the audience.
LONDON (Reuters) – A new virus from the same family as SARS which sparked a global alert in September has now killed two people in Saudi Arabia, and total cases there and in Qatar have reached six, the World Health Organisation said.
The U.N. health agency issued an international alert in late September saying a virus previously unknown in humans had infected a Qatari man who had recently been in Saudi Arabia, where another man with the same virus had died.
On Friday it said in an outbreak update that it had registered four more cases and one of the new patients had died.
“The additional cases have been identified as part of the enhanced surveillance in Saudi Arabia (3 cases, including 1 death) and Qatar (1 case),” the WHO said.
The new virus is known as a coronavirus and shares some of the symptoms of SARS, or Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which emerged in China in 2002 and killed around a 10th of the 8,000 people it infected worldwide.
Among the symptoms in the confirmed cases are fever, coughing and breathing difficulties.
Of the six laboratory-confirmed cases reported to WHO, four cases, including the two deaths, are from Saudi Arabia and two cases are from Qatar.
Britain’s Health Protection Agency, which helped to identify the new virus in September, said the newly reported case from Qatar was initially treated in October in Qatar but then transferred to Germany, and has now been discharged.
Coronaviruses are typically spread like other respiratory infections, such as flu, travelling in airborne droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
The WHO said investigations were being conducted into the likely source of the infection, the method of exposure, and the possibility of human-to-human transmission of the virus.
“Close contacts of the recently confirmed cases are being identified and followed-up,” it said.
It added that so far, only the two most recently confirmed cases in Saudi Arabia were epidemiologically linked – they were from the same family, living in the same household.
“Preliminary investigations indicate that these two cases presented with similar symptoms of illness. One died and the other recovered,” the WHO’s statement said.
Two other members of the same family also suffered similar symptoms of illness, and one died and the other is recovering. But the WHO said laboratory test results on the fatality were still pending, and the person who is recovering had tested negative for the new coronavirus.
The virus has no formal name, but scientists at the British and Dutch laboratories where it was identified refer to it as “London1_novel CoV 2012″.
The WHO urged all its member states to continue surveillance for severe acute respiratory infections.
“Until more information is available, it is prudent to consider that the virus is likely more widely distributed than just the two countries which have identified cases,” it said.
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (AP) — Singer Marc Anthony is coming to the aid of an orphanage in the Dominican Republic.
A foundation run by Anthony with music and sports producer Henry Cardenas plans to build a new residence hall, classrooms and a baseball field for the Children of Christ orphanage in the eastern city of La Romana. Anthony attended the groundbreaking ceremony Friday with his model girlfriend Shannon de Lima.
Children of Christ Foundation Director Sonia Hane said Anthony visited the orphanage previously and decided to help. His Maestro Cares Foundation raised $ 200,000 for the expansion on land donated by a sugar company. The orphanage was founded in 1996 for children who were abused or abandoned or whose parents were unable to care for them.
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Volatility is the name of this game.
With the S&P 500 above 1,400 following five days of gains, traders will be hard pressed not to cash in on the advance at the first sign of trouble during negotiations over tax hikes and spending cuts that resume next week in Washington.
President Barack Obama and U.S. congressional leaders are expected to discuss ways to reduce the budget deficit and avoid the “fiscal cliff” of automatic tax increases and spending cuts in 2013 that could tip the economy into recession.
As politicians make their case, markets could react with wild swings.
The CBOE Volatility Index <.VIX>, known as the VIX, Wall Street‘s favorite barometer of market anxiety that usually moves in an inverse relationship with the S&P 500, is in a long-term decline with its 200-day moving average at its lowest in five years. The VIX could spike if dealings in Washington begin to stall.
“If the fiscal cliff happens, a lot of major assets will be down on a short-term basis because of the fear factor and the chaos factor,” said Yu-Dee Chang, chief trader and sole principal of ACE Investments in Virginia.
“So whatever you are in, you’re going to lose some money unless you go long the VIX and short the market. The ‘upside risk’ there is some kind of grand bargain, and then the market goes crazy.”
He set the chances of the economy going over the cliff at only about 5 percent.
Many in the market agree there will be some sort of agreement that will fuel a rally, but the road there will be full of political landmines as Democrats and Republicans dig in on positions defended during the recent election.
Liberals want tax increases on the wealthiest Americans while protecting progressive advances in healthcare, while conservatives make a case for deep cuts in programs for the poor and a widening of the tax base to raise revenues without lifting tax rates.
“Both parties will raise the stakes and the pressure on the opposing side, so the market is going to feel much more concerned,” said Tim Leach, chief investment officer of U.S. Bank Wealth Management in San Francisco.
“The administration feels really confident at this point, or a little more than the Republican side of Congress may feel,” he said. “But it’s still a balanced-power Congress so neither side can feel that they can act with impunity.”
THE MIDDLE EAST AND EUROPE
Tension in the Middle East and unresolved talks in Europe over aid for Greece could add to the uncertainty and volatility on Wall Street could surge, analysts say.
An Egypt-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hamas came into force late on Wednesday after a week of conflict, but it was broken with the shooting of a Palestinian man by Israeli soldiers, according to Palestine’s foreign minister.
Buoyed by accolades from around the world for mediating the truce, Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi assumed sweeping powers, angering his opponents and prompting violent clashes in central Cairo and other cities on Friday.
“Those kinds of potential large-scale conflicts can certainly overwhelm some of the fundamental data here at home,” said U.S. Bank’s Leach.
“We are trying to keep in mind the idea that there are a lot of factors that are probably going to contribute to higher volatility.”
On a brighter note for markets, Greece’s finance minister said the International Monetary Fund has relaxed its debt-cutting target for Greece and a gap of only $ 13 billion remains to be filled for a vital aid installment to be paid.
Still, a deal has not been struck, and Greece is increasingly frustrated at its lenders, still squabbling over a deal to unlock fresh aid even though Athens has pushed through unpopular austerity cuts.
HOUSING DATA COULD CONFIRM RECOVERY
Next week is heavy on economic data, especially on the housing front. Some of the numbers have been affected by Superstorm Sandy, which hit the U.S. East Coast more than three weeks ago, killing more than 100 people in the United States alone and leaving billions of dollars in damages.
The housing data, though, could continue to confirm a rebound in the sector that is seen as a necessary step to unlock spending and lower the stubbornly high unemployment rate.
Tuesday’s S&P/Case-Shiller home price index for September is expected to show the eighth straight month of increases, extending the longest continuous string of gains since prices were boosted by a homebuyer tax credit in 2009 and 2010.
New home sales for October, due on Wednesday, and October pending home sales data, due on Thursday, are also expected to show a stronger housing market.
Other data highlights next week include durable goods orders for October and consumer confidence for November on Tuesday and the Chicago Purchasing Managers Index on Friday.
At Friday’s close, the S&P 500 wrapped up its second-best week of the year with a 3.6 percent gain. Encouraging economic data next week could confirm that regardless of the ups and downs that the fiscal cliff could bring, the market’s fundamentals are solid.
Jeff Morris, head of U.S. equities at Standard Life Investments in Boston, said that “it’s kind of noise here” in terms of whether the market has spent “a few days up or down. It has made some solid gains over the course of the year as the housing recovery has come into view, and that’s what’s underpinning the market at these levels.
“I would caution against reading too much into the next few days.”
(Wall St Week Ahead runs every Friday. Questions or comments on this column can be emailed to: rodrigo.campos(at)thomsonreuters.com)
(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Tim Dobbyn and Jan Paschal)
TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — China has enraged several neighbors with a few dashes on a map, printed in its newly revised passports that show it staking its claim on the entire South China Sea and even Taiwan.
Inside the passports, an outline of China printed in the upper left corner includes Taiwan and the sea, hemmed in by the dashes. The change highlights China’s longstanding claim on the South China Sea in its entirety, though parts of the waters also are claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei and Malaysia.
China’s official maps have long included Taiwan and the South China Sea as Chinese territory, but the act of including them in its passports could be seen as a provocation since it would require other nations to tacitly endorse those claims by affixing their official seals to the documents.
Ruling party and opposition lawmakers alike condemned the map in Taiwan, a self-governed island that split from China after a civil war in 1949. They said it could harm the warming ties the historic rivals have enjoyed since Ma Ying-jeou became president 4 1/2 years ago.
“This is total ignorance of reality and only provokes disputes,” said Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, the Cabinet-level body responsible for ties with Beijing. The council said the government cannot accept the map.
Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario told reporters in Manila that he sent a note to the Chinese Embassy that his country “strongly protests” the image. He said China’s claims include an area that is “clearly part of the Philippines’ territory and maritime domain.”
The Vietnamese government said it had also sent a diplomatic note to the Chinese Embassy in Hanoi, demanding that Beijing remove the “erroneous content” printed in the passport.
In Beijing, the Foreign Ministry said the new passport was issued based on international standards. China began issuing new versions of its passports to include electronic chips on May 15, though criticism cropped up only this week.
“The design of this type of passports is not directed against any particular country,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a daily media briefing Friday. “We hope the relevant countries can calmly treat it with rationality and restraint so that the normal visits by the Chinese and foreigners will not be unnecessarily interfered with.”
It’s unclear whether China’s South China Sea neighbors will respond in any way beyond protesting to Beijing. China, in a territorial dispute with India, once stapled visas into passports to avoid stamping them.
“Vietnam reserves the right to carry out necessary measures suitable to Vietnamese law, international law and practices toward such passports,” Vietnamese foreign ministry spokesman Luong Thanh Nghi said.
Taiwan does not recognize China’s passports in any case; Chinese visitors to the island have special travel documents.
China maintains it has ancient claims to all of the South China Sea, despite much of it being within the exclusive economic zones of Southeast Asian neighbors. The islands and waters are potentially rich in oil and gas.
There are concerns that the disputes could escalate into violence. China and the Philippines had a tense maritime standoff at a shoal west of the main Philippine island of Luzon early this year.
The United States, which has said it takes no sides in the territorial spats but that it considers ensuring safe maritime traffic in the waters to be in its national interest, has backed a call for a “code of conduct” to prevent clashes in the disputed territories. But it remains unclear if and when China will sit down with rival claimants to draft such a legally binding nonaggression pact.
The Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam are scheduled to meet Dec. 12 to discuss claims in the South China Sea and the role of China.
___
Associated Press writers Oliver Teves in Manila, Philippines, Chris Brummitt in Hanoi, Vietnam, and researcher Zhao Liang in Beijing contributed to this report.
“Jersey Shore” star Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi was celebrating her 25th birthday on Black Friday, but it wasn’t the shops that provided her with her favorite present.
The reality star and new mom Tweeted that her baby boy — Lorenzo, who was born in August — was the most rewarding gift of all.
PLAY IT NOW: The Jersey Shore Cast Makes A Plea To Help ‘Restore The Shore’
“My favorite birthday gift,” she Tweeted, linking to a photo of the MTV star holding her little one. (Click HERE to see the full pic.)
But, Snooki didn’t leave out her love for her fiance, Lorenzo’s daddy — Jionni LaValle, thanking him for celebrating her big day with her.
VIEW THE PHOTOS: We Did It All For The ‘Snooki’! Hot Shots Of The ‘Jersey Shore’ Star!
“Best Birthday ever with my fiance @JLaValle and Lorenzo,” she wrote.
In typical Snooki fashion, though, she wasn’t the perfect birthday girl. She made sure to emphasize it was her big day.
“Lol I’m being that annoying birthday girl to @JLaValle saying ‘but it’s my birthday today you have to,’” she Tweeted.
VIEW THE PHOTOS: She’s Just Bein’ Miley!
Snooki wasn’t the only celeb celebrating their birthday on Black Friday. Miley Cyrus turned 20, and hit Twitter to thank her fans for their well wishes.
“So much BIRFFFDAY love!” she wrote. “i wish everyday was like this.”
VIEW THE PHOTOS: Miley Cyrus & Liam Hemsworth: Young Hollywood’s Hot Power Couple
Copyright 2012 by NBC Universal, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – With the help of a checklist, ambulance workers may be able to safely reroute drunk patients to detoxification centers instead of emergency rooms, according to a new study.
Researchers in Colorado found no serious medical problems were reported after 138 people were sent to a detox center to sleep it off, instead of to an ER.
In 2004, according to the researchers, it’s estimated that 0.6 percent of all U.S. ER visits were made by people without any problems other than being drunk. Those visits ended up costing about $ 900 million.
“Part of the issue has been – as it is in many busy ER departments – there’s a lot of chronic alcoholics that are brought in by ambulance, police or just come in. Often they are brought in because they have not committed a crime or there is limited space in our detoxification center. So the majority were brought to the ER department,” said Dr. David Ross, the study’s lead author from Penrose-St. Francis Health Services in Colorado Springs.
Ross said the ambulance company where he serves as medical director created the checklist with the help of the local detox center, which provided limited medical care by a nurse, and the local hospitals to reduce the number of drunks without medical needs being sent to the local ERs.
They created a checklist with 29 yes-or-no questions, such as whether the patient is cooperating with the ambulance worker’s examination and if the patient is willing to go to the detox center.
The patient was sent to the ER if the ambulance worker checked “no” on any question.
The researchers then went back to look at the patients they transported between December 2003 and December 2005 to see whether or not any of them ended up having serious medical problems at the detox center.
During that two year period, the ambulance workers transported 718 drunks. The detox center received 138 and the local ERs got 580.
Overall, 11 of the patients who were taken to detox were turned away because there was no room, their blood alcohol level exceeded the limit, their family came to pick them up or they were combative.
Another four patients at the detox center were taken to the ER because of minor complications, including chest and knee pain. However, there were no serious complications reported.
“We really believe that we did not miss anybody with a serious illness and injury that didn’t go to the ER as they should have,” said Ross.
But the researchers write in the Annals of Emergency Medicine that their study did have some limitations.
Specifically, the researchers did not plan in advance to do a study when they were creating the checklist, which means their findings are limited to whatever information was collected at the detox center and ERs.
Also, the number of people who were sent to the detox center in their study is relatively small, so it’s hard to tell how many serious complications they’d see among a larger group of people.
“We tried to estimate how likely we would have been to encounter a serious event… We estimated at most we’d encounter three serious adverse events (in 748 patients),” Ross told Reuters Health.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/QgPCT5 Annals of Emergency Medicine, online November 9, 2012.
British man finds carrier pigeon skeleton in his fireplace with unbreakable secret code (Reuters)
