Some good news for road warriors. Everyone knows booking all your accommodation with the same hotel chain earns loyalty points, which can be traded for upgrades, free stays and the occasional bottle of wine. Now a new study shows there could be performance benefits too.....
The future is already arriving, it is just a question of knowing where to look. On Changshou Road in Shanghai, eagle eyes may spot an odd rectangular object on top of an office block: it is a collection of 128 miniature antennae....
SEXUAL assault has been acted out for centuries. When British women were first allowed to take to the stage—in 1660, upon the restoration of the English monarchy—rape in particular became peculiarly prevalent....
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The future of Laurent Blanc as Paris Saint-Germain coach was thrown into grave doubt on Friday after the chairman of the big-spending French champions said major changes were afoot.
Nasser Al-Khelaifi in April insisted that Blanc, who has been head coach at Qatari-owned PSG since 2013, would stay on despite failing once again to get past the quarter-final stages of the Champions League.
But just weeks on the ambitious Al-Khelaifi strongly suggested that could be set to change and dropped a major hint that he could be after Atletico Madrid’s in-demand coach Diego Simeone.
“The players, the coach, the management, we need turnover, a new cycle,” he told the Le Parisien newspaper.
“I’ve supported (Blanc) for three years. Now, I have to ask the right questions. Big changes could happen.
“I’ve been here for five years and this is the first time that we have this sense of failure. This isn’t simply the fact of having lost in the quarter-finals of the Champions League (to Manchester City), it’s the way it happened.
“This elimination is the worst moment since I came to Paris.”
Despite signing a new contract in February taking him through to June 2018, Blanc’s position with the club’s money-bags owners came under threat with the tame surrender to City.
Blanc led PSG to a runaway fourth straight win in the French league, and success in the domestic cups, but it appears not to have been enough for his Qatari bosses.
Al-Khelaifi did not list names of a possible replacement for Blanc, but said in the interview that he had “a lot of respect for Atletico”.
Barcelona’s football star Lionel Messi (L) leaves the courthouse on June 2, 2016 in Barcelona. The 28-year-old football star was cheered and jeered as he emerged from a van accompanied by his father Jorge Horacio Messi. The two are accused of using a chain of fake companies in Belize and Uruguay to avoid paying taxes on 4.16 million euros ($) of Messi’s income earned through the sale of his image rights from 2007-09. / AFP PHOTO / LLUIS GENE
Spanish prosecutors called on Friday for Lionel Messi to be absolved and his father found guilty on the final day of the pair’s high-profile tax fraud trial in Barcelona.
The Argentina star and his father Jorge Horacio Messi have been accused of using companies in Belize and Uruguay to avoid paying taxes on 4.16 million euros ($4.6 million) of Messi’s income earned from his image rights from 2007-09.
Barcelona forward Messi’s defence lawyers want both the five-time World Player of the Year and his father to be absolved.
But the state attorney — who in Spain intervenes in trials in parallel with prosecutors when the interests of a public organisation have been impacted, in this case the tax authorities — wants both sentenced.
“Lionel Andres Messi must be absolved,” Prosecutor Raquel Amado said in her closing argument, a day after the footballer took the stand and said he trusted his father with his finances and “knew nothing” about how his wealth was managed.
“There is no evidence that anyone explained anything to him.”
But she maintained her accusation against his father, for whom she asked for a jail sentence of one-and-a-half years.
Any such sentence would likely be suspended as is common in Spain for first offences carrying a sentence of less than two years.
“It’s because Jorge Messi accepted it that this happened,” she said.
The income related to Messi’s image rights that was allegedly hidden includes endorsement deals with Banco Sabadell, Danone, Adidas, Pepsi-Cola, Procter & Gamble and the Kuwait Food Company.
“These contracts are in English, most certainly bulky,” Amado argued.
“For a layperson, if they see so many lawyers signing it, they must believe that it’s fine.”
The companies in Uruguay — which much of the probe centres on — were created and managed by a Barcelona law firm with whom Messi’s dad communicated.
“Mr. Jorge Messi cannot dodge his responsibility by accusing his advisors,” she said.
“Fraud takes place because there is a decision in that direction.”
Messi and his father did not attend the fourth and final day of the trial, in which defence lawyers and the state attorney have yet to make their closing arguments.
The player had been due to jet off to the United States after his Thursday court appearance for the Copa America where Argentina take on defending champions Chile on Monday.
No date has been set for when the court will issue its ruling.
Swiss investigators have searched FIFA’s Zurich headquarters and seized documents, the country’s prosecution authority said on Friday, while FIFA said the search targeted sacked deputy general secretary Markus Kattner.
“As part of the ongoing criminal investigations in the FIFA affair, the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland (OAG) carried out a search of FIFA’s headquarters on 2 June 2016 with the aim of confirming existing findings and obtaining further information,” it said in a statement.
“Documents and electronic data were seized and will now be examined to determine their relevance to the ongoing proceedings.”
The OAG provided no further details, but FIFA spokeswoman Delia Fischer told AFP that Kattner’s offices had been searched.
FIFA dismissed Kattner, a 45-year-old German-Swiss national, last month on charges that he paid himself secret bonuses worth millions of dollars under a contract whose terms were kept secret from FIFA’s audit committees.
That investigation covered the period from 2008 to 2014, when disgraced former president Sepp Blatter was in charge.
Searches of FIFA’s headquarters had become almost commonplace since a giant corruption scandal exploded over a year ago.
The world football governing body’s new president Gianni Infantino has vowed to cut out the rot that spread during the Blatter era, but has increasingly faced criticism himself.
On Friday, FIFA was slapping back allegations in German media that Infantino was under investigation for a possible ethics violation.
Die Welt newspaper reported that Infantino had improperly ordered the destruction of the minutes of a FIFA executive committee meeting held at last month’s congress in Mexico city.
According to the paper, FIFA’s independent ethics committee was looking at the issue and could impose a 90-day ban on the new president if the allegation was confirmed.
But Fischer said the allegations were baseless, and a spokesman for the ethics committee’s investigatory arm, Roman Geiser, told AFP that “there are no formal proceedings going on against Mr. Infantino”.
Microsoft announced on May 5, 2016 that its latest Windows operating system designed to work on laptops, desktops, smartphones, Xbox One consoles and more is powering 300 million devices around the world (AFP Photo/Joe Raedle)
By AFP
Microsoft is out to use Windows software to do for altered reality what it did for personal computers: make them commonplace.
The US technology giant on Wednesday announced that Windows software already powering a wide range of devices including HoloLens augmented reality headgear is being opened to partners interested in building devices for “mixed reality” experiences.
Devices built on the Windows platform will be interoperable, meaning that someone wearing HTC Vive virtual reality gear would be able to virtually visit and collaborate with someone using HoloLens virtual reality goggles, Microsoft executives told AFP.
The list of partners already working with Microsoft included HTC, Lenovo, Asus, and HP.
Microsoft said it built HoloLens to showcase the potential for the technology, which is based on the same Windows operating system that powers computers, smartphones, Xbox consoles and more.
Sharing the Windows platform will mean that augmented or virtual reality gear from various manufacturers will be able to work with one another, the same way Windows computers do.
“We are bringing the software that lights up HoloLens to the entire ecosystem of mixed reality devices –- and inviting partners to join us in this platform,” Microsoft spokesman Greg Sullivan told AFP.
– Walk on Mars – While virtual reality devices such as those from Facebook-owned Oculus and Sony’s PlayStation unit immerse users in fantasy worlds, HoloLens “augments” reality by overlaying holograms on the real world in view.
HoloLens lets users interact with virtual objects using hand gestures.
Microsoft would not disclose details regarding how it will make money from the move. But it is expected to pursue the kinds of licensing deals it negotiates with companies that make Windows-powered computers.
Creating a common platform for a wide range of companies to create and market mixed reality gear promises to bring down prices for altered reality gear while enriching variety in the marketplace.
Microsoft in March began its first shipments of its HoloLens to application developers, staking its place in what is expected to be an emerging computing platform.
At a recent Microsoft Build developers’ conference, the company showed some of the possibilities for HoloLens — such as giving users a view of Mars that up to now could only be seen by space vehicles, and an inside view of the brain by medical specialists aiming to deal with a cerebral tumor.
Aiming to encourage new applications for the device, Microsoft noted that developers can create “new mixed reality” with holograms to enable users to see and experience things in new ways.
The holographic capabilities in the Microsoft gear can open doors for developers to augment tasks from complex surgery to motorcycle design, according to the company.
Marketers predict virtual headsets will soon top wish lists for kids and young adults from Silicon Valley to Hong Kong. But some analysts say virtual reality will be eclipsed by augmented reality within a few years.
DEQA HUSSEN is the mother of Abdirizak Warsame (pictured above), one of ten Minnesota Somalis indicted in the trial of young men allegedly recruited by Islamic State (IS), and one of six who have already pleaded guilty to charges of conspiring to provide material support to IS. A mother of eight, she has urged members of the Somali community to stop denying the danger that IS poses to their children and to work with the FBI. This has made her enemies within the Somali community and led to tensions with her own children.
On May 25th Mr Warsame testified against his former friends, Guled Omar, Abdirahman Daud and Mohamed Farah, who didn’t agree to a plea deal and are on trial for attempting to join IS and commit murder abroad. They face a maximum sentence of life in prison. (The six who pleaded guilty face a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison; the tenth of the indicted Somalis is presumed to be in Syria.) Mr Warsame was about to resume his testimony when his sister, Sahra Warsame, was handcuffed and led away after a noisy row with her mother. Ms Warsame once dated Mr Daud and wanted to show solidarity by sitting with the defendants’ families rather than her own. On the day before Mrs Hussen reported to Michael Davis, the presiding judge, that she had been threatened during lunch by Farhiyo Mohamed, Mr Daud’s mother. This earned Mrs Mohamed a reprimand from Judge Davis who told both mothers that he could not have any kind of confrontation in the courtroom.
Mothers of IS recruits and other radicalised youth are often the people most directly affected by their children’s misguided choices—and the best hope of those trying to stop and reverse radicalisation of susceptible youngsters. Daniel Koehler, the founder of the German Institute on Radicalisation and De-radicalisation Studies says that mothers (and much more rarely fathers or siblings) call him for help when they think their child is at risk. He co-founded “Mothers for Life”, a group of women from 11 countries who lost their children to violent jihadists. The mothers sent two open letters to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the IS leader. After the first letter, sent in June 2015, the group received an official reply from IS in less than four hours. As masterful propagandists IS knows that mothers could deal the organisation a death blow, says Mr Koehler.
The mothers sent their second letter this year on May 8th, Mother’s Day. One passage of the letter is an urgent exhortation:
“Again we turn to those thinking of going to Syria and Iraq and those who are there. There is no glory in death and killing. We have seen the pictures of our children and they were not smiling, because they had realised that they would not die for a great cause but simply for hollow and shallow opportunism filled with hypocrisy and double standards. There was nothing glorious about their death. One of our sons was forced to blow himself up, because he was shot in the face and of no further use to his ‘brothers’. He died alone. While his ‘brothers’ stab into each other’s backs, he had to die for their corruption and not for any glorious cause. We hear from our sons and daughters who are still alive and in Syria or Iraq almost every day how miserable their lives have become. We see their misbelief and urge to come home, and while talking with some of you, we can see through the tough shell, and see you miss the everyday life with your friends and family. We know that you can feel your roots with us – your family. Do not fall prey to those who use you for their own gain. Listen to your heart and the ones who brought you into this world.”
On May 25th Mr Omar was the only one of the three defendants to take the stand in his defence. He recounted his family’s first experience with the lure of violent extremists. “It killed my mom every night”, said Mr Omar when his older brother, Ahmed Ali, left the family in 2007 to join al-Shabab, a jihadist group allied to al-Qaeda. “She prayed for him every night. She asked God to guide him every night,” he said, breaking down in tears. Mr Omar claimed that it was his mother and his sister that prevented him from joining IS in Syria, which is why he didn’t provide a passport photo or make a down payment to a man he believed would get him to Syria but was in fact an informant for the FBI. He claimed that on the two occasions prosecutors allege that he wanted to go to Syria he was planning to go on holiday (the first time) and intending to join a girl he met online (the second time).
Closing arguments in the trial will start on May 31st. Mrs Hussen says her son is a brave man because he is cooperating with authorities. Mr Omar’s mother, Fadumo Hussein, a single mother of 13, insisted last year that her son should not plead guilty because he has not committed any crime. Both sons may spend years, possibly decades, in prison. But one of them recognises that her son has done wrong. Her advocacy of working with the authorities, however controversial within the community, could help other mothers, and sons.
Africa’s installed capacity of power is 90GW. That is about the equivalent to Germany’s installed capacity from wind and solar sources alone. This tells two major stories; Africa is actually more power poor than it is poor in other instances when compared with other countries – before you even begin to do a country by country comparison between an average African country and say a European country or even a South East Asian one. It helps to bring it back home quickly: according to mecometer.com, Nigeria’s installed capacity is 5.9GW (2013 numbers) while the same list places South Africa at 44GW. In fact, when you take away South Africa’s numbers from that of the other sub-Saharan African countries, what you have is an entirely dark reality. More than anything else, Africa has an energy challenge; in Nigeria, it appears we have now finally realised this and for once, the Nigerian masses are actually demanding power more than they have done in a long while.
This has spurred a lot of initiatives and commitments from the Nigerian government. The most bizarre of the lot has to be the now advanced plans for nuclear energy. Note that Nigeria is essentially looking to derive its future energy from a source that is actually being phased out by the likes of Japan, Austria, Belgium, Philippines, New Zealand (some 90 per cent of its energy mix is via renewables – and Germany. While many countries initially considered phasing out nuclear power generation, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster accelerated commitments. This actually further spurred investments into renewable energy. By 2022, Germany intends to have closed all its nuclear plants and does not intend to generate any more power via this source. The German Energiewende is essentially a commitment towards phasing out nuclear power by 2022 and a correlational development of renewable energies in the power sector.
We must weigh all the costs from the beginning. A lot of communities where coal mining has since stopped are still paying some of these costs. We must also commit to an energy plan that captures our energy mix on a decade-by-decade basis. On this one, it would help to plan backwards. For instance, what sort of energy mix do we want by 2050? That answer will determine the steps we intend to take towards that. It will inform our investment priorities in the different energy sources available to us. Renewables now have an increased energy efficiency and there has been a telling increase in the adoption of renewable energy in Nigeria – especially in off grid communities – but we need to do more. There is no gainsaying that the energy of the future is renewable energy. We are seeing the consequences of climate change even in our own country –there is a telling correlation between Lake Chad losing some 90 per cent of its water content and the increase in violence in that region. When resources like vegetation are lost to desertification, there is often a telling increase in violence. The herdsmen challenge is a telling consequence of climate change.A recent study trip to Germany showed why this commitment was not just about energy of itself but the source of the energy. The visit to Lusatia was the most telling. “God created Lusatia, the devil put the Lignite beneath its soil” is a Sorbian proverb. The proverb derives its essence from the unwholesome and unfortunate reality of lignite mining. Lignite mining is quite expensive. Beyond the cost of investment, there is the environmental cost, let alone the carbon footprint. For instance, the price of water in Berlin is apparently set to increase by 30 per cent because of new water treatments necessitated by coal mining. There is the cost of displaced people as the mining area is not habitable. Today, billions of dollars have already been invested in turning old mining sites into artificial lakes. It will take years before these artificial lakes themselves get to support life because of their understandably high acidic content. Coal is an essential source of energy globally – it provides about 40 per cent of the world’s total electricity, it is also responsible for some 39 per cent of the world’s total CO2 emissions. China’s deadly air pollution has more to do with coal mining than anything else. Coal mining has come at a great cost to the world. Nigeria is now vigorously pursuing coal as one of its sources of power. This is understandable because two factors make it a rational pursuit; Nigeria has a vast deposit of unexplored coal and the country is power poor. That Nigeria is in pursuit of coal mining to power its economy should not be an issue, at least not as much an issue as whether Nigeria knows exactly what it is getting into.
Recent international meetings have shown that governments around the world have now fully come to the acceptance that we must do better with the management of our environment. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know that power generation from nuclear plants and coalmines will be anachronistic by 2050, or 2080 at most. The signs are there. If Nigeria is not planning an energy mix of 2050 and beyond built on renewables, then we are planning to again be part of the chasing pack on that front when that future comes. And it will come soon enough.
One did a round of travelling within and outside Nigeria stating that if the country’s oil does not dry up, the price of oil will certainly plunge due mostly to the improved energy efficiency of machines, investments in shale oil and renewables. Four years on, that happened really quickly. There was even an “expert” who said at the time, “the price of oil will remain high for many years to come.” We cannot commit to power generation projects with this ever present “low hanging fruit” mentality, our plans must be holistic and we must have the future in mind. We are where we are today as a country because those who led us here hardly thought of the future; we continue to pay for the seeds of corruption and lack of discretion of years past. If we miss it today, our next generation and that after them will pay. The present reality of every country you see today was not determined today,it was determined in years past.
Every decision comes with a cost; even renewables have their own challenges – complaints against the use of farmlands as solar farms persist and the efficiency of renewable energy products are only two of those. The most important thing is to lay all the costs and benefits – including remote and immediate ones – on the table and then decide which we can afford, not only in terms of naira and kobo but also in terms of what we end up doing to the environment and the people affected. The Niger Delta will battle environmental issues long after the last drop of oil is taken off the ground. Did we for instance factor the cost of the clean-up in the contracts we signed with these oil companies several years ago? We must do better now!
I believe in creation. When God created the world, He started out by creating Light. This is very instructive. Light/Power is the foundation of development. No country has ever attained development without generating the necessary power needed to drive its industries and economy. Nigeria must commit to developing its power sector but whatever we do, we must do it with the future in mind. If we don’t, we will be paying more tomorrow for the gains we assume we will be making today, even if we pretend these gains are without dangerous and deadly costs. About time a robust conversation on Nigeria’s energy mix of the future got started. We don’t have to wait till we start doing 40GW before deciding the sort of distribution by source we want the power to come from. The business of power is everyone’s business.
Two graduates, Desmond Quadri and Richard Orji, have been arrested by the Lagos State Police Command for allegedly raping a woman in the Ajah area.
PUNCH Metro learnt that the suspects had attended a party together where they had some bottles of alcoholic drink.
The men, who had reportedly been friends for eight years, were said to have spotted the victim in her room alone and sneaked into the compound.After the party, 24-year-old Quadri was said to have gone into the bush to defecate and was accompanied by his friend, Orji, 25.
Orji was alleged to have stabbed the 32-year-old in the shoulder and thigh, before taking her phones, Ipad, perfumes and other personal effects.
Not done, the suspects allegedly took turns to rape her for about half an hour before leaving her for dead.
Residents were said to have taken her to the hospital and reported the matter at the Ajah Police Division.
Our correspondent gathered that the case was transferred to the Anti-Robbery Squad, State Department of Criminal Investigation, which began trailing the suspects.
The suspected rapists were said to have been caught after selling the victim’s phones.
A source said, “After they committed the crime, they fled and thought that was the end of the case. They sold one of the woman’s phone to someone. We were able to track the phone and get that person arrested. The buyer led us to them. They did not deny the crime.”
While Quadri claimed to be a graduate of Business Administration from a polytechnic in Ogun State, his accomplice, Orji, said he hailed from Delta State and studied Banking and Finance at a polytechnic in Delta State.
Quadri, an indigene of Abia State, said they were drunk on the night of the incident, adding that he had no criminal record and had never abused a woman in his life.
He said, “It was around 10pm on Sunday night at Ajah that the incident happened. We went for a festival and became drunk. We later felt we should go to a hotel to have another drink.
“On the way, I went to a nearby bush to defecate. After I was done, we saw that the house opposite the bush had no gate or any form of security. We decided to enter the building. We observed that there was a lady in her room alone.
“We saw that her kitchen did not have any burglar-proof bar, so we entered through the kitchen. I was outside watching to know if anybody would come, while Orji was inside.”
He said his mate, Orji, stabbed the victim with a knife and she screamed, adding that he immediately went inside to join him.
Orji said they took her phones, tablets, and other effects and took turns to rape her.
“We were drunk. I cannot say if it was the drink or something else. But I can tell you that we allowed the devil to take complete control of us,” he said.
The Commissioner of Police, Lagos State, Fatai Owoseni, said the victim was in the hospital, adding that she was responding to treatment.
“The woman was taken to the hospital after the incident and she is responding to treatments. The suspects will be taken to court latest tomorrow,” he said.
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