W O R L D

Twin blasts at Afghan police HQ, 2 dead 
Kandahar September 7
Two suicide bombers detonated explosives inside the headquarters of the main police station in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar today, killing two policemen and wounding 29 people. The blasts occurred hours after a suicide bomber blew himself up in an attack on an Italian convoy in western Herat today, but there were no casualties.

Pachauri: Shun meat to fight climate change
London, September 7
Mooting an unconventional therapy to check global warming, leading environmentalist Rajendra Pachauri has advised to shun meat and non-vegetarian diet at least for a day in the week.

Immigrant’s murder sparks riots in Madrid
Madrid, September 7
Immigrants went on a rampage in a southern Spanish town overnight, throwing stones and bottles at police after a Senegalese man was stabbed to death.

Big Bang test on Wednesday
London, September 7
If critics are to be believed, the end of the universe will begin coming Wednesday when a Welsh miner's son launches the world's biggest scientific experiment to know how the universe was born. The well-known Welshman physicist, Lyn Evans, dubbed Evans the Atom, will switch on a giant particle accelerator designed to unlock the secrets of the Big Bang.

Twin blasts at Afghan police HQ, 2 dead 

Kandahar September 7
Two suicide bombers detonated explosives inside the headquarters of the main police station in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar today, killing two policemen and wounding 29 people. The blasts occurred hours after a suicide bomber blew himself up in an attack on an Italian convoy in western Herat today, but there were no casualties.

A senior border police commander, Abdul Razaaq, was among the 25 officers who were wounded in the Kandahar explosions, police chief Matiuallah told the media. The others wounded were civilians.

Police cordoned off the roads leading to the police headquarters.

The attack is the latest in worsening violence in the recent months in Afghanistan where the al Qaeda-backed Taliban have made a comeback. According to aid agencies, about 2,500 people, including 1,000 civilians, have been killed in fighting in the first six months this year.

Earlier, officials said the US-led soldiers, backed by air-support, and Afghan police killed more than 20 Taliban fighters in two separate clashes. A US military statement said its forces killed more than 10 insurgents during an operation in the southeast province of Khost yesterday, and did not mention any casualties on its side. In Helmand, a southern province also regarded as a Taliban stronghold, militants lost 10 men in an assault on a police post, provincial police chief Mohammad Hussein Andiwal said. Four police were wounded defending their post.

The Taliban could not be reached immediately for comment about any of the incidents. Ousted from power in 2001 after refusing to surrender its al Qaeda guests, the Taliban militia intensified a campaign in 2005 to drive out foreign forces and bring down President Hamid Karzai's government. And a string of suicide bomb attacks in the recent times is a part of their strategy. — Reuters

Pachauri: Shun meat to fight climate change

London, September 7
Mooting an unconventional therapy to check global warming, leading environmentalist Rajendra Pachauri has advised to shun meat and non-vegetarian diet at least for a day in the week.

One meat-free day a week will be an effective sacrifice that would help tackle climate change, said Dr Pachauri, chairperson of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

“In terms of immediacy of action and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it clearly is the most attractive opportunity,” he was quoted as saying by the Observer.“Give up meat for one day (a week) initially, and decrease it from there,” he advised.

Diet change was important because of the huge greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental problems, including habitat destruction, associated with rearing cattle and other animals, the 68-year-old Indian economist, who is a vegetarian said.

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation has estimated that meat production accounts for nearly a fifth of global greenhouse 
gas emissions.

These are generated during the production of animal feeds, for example, while ruminants, particularly cows, emit methane, which is 23 times more effective as a global warming agent than carbon dioxide.

Pachauri was re-elected IPCC Chairman for the second time last week for a six-year term. He has headed the organisation since 2002. — PTI 

Immigrant’s murder sparks riots in Madrid

Madrid, September 7
Immigrants went on a rampage in a southern Spanish town overnight, throwing stones and bottles at police after a Senegalese man was stabbed to death.

While the police said the killing of a man in the town of Roquetas de Mar, had sparked ''altercations throughout the night in which immigrants were involved'', the Spanish media said the African immigrants were enraged by the death of the Senegalese man, 28, who was stabbed in a fight. Around a quarter of the residents in Roquetas de Mar are immigrants.

A news website said the African immigrants threw stones and bottles at police, and burnt down two homes and two police cars. However, there were no injuries inflicted,'' policeman Carlos Manuel Ruiz said. The police arrested three immigrants in this regard. — Reuters

Big Bang test on Wednesday

London, September 7
If critics are to be believed, the end of the universe will begin coming Wednesday when a Welsh miner's son launches the world's biggest scientific experiment to know how the universe was born. The well-known Welshman physicist, Lyn Evans, dubbed Evans the Atom, will switch on a giant particle accelerator designed to unlock the secrets of the Big Bang.

On Wednesday, Evans will fire up the Large Hadron Collider, a 17-mile-long doughnut-shaped tunnel that will smash sub-atomic particles together at nearly the speed of light. The collider has been kept beneath the French-Swiss border in Geneva, at depths ranging from 170 feet to 600 feet. The aim of the 4.4 billion-pound experiment is to recreate the conditions that existed a fraction of a second after the Big Bang - the birth of the universe - and provide vital clues to the building blocks of life.

However, a handful of scientists believe that the experiment could create a shower of unstable black holes that could "eat" the planet from within, and they are launching last-ditch efforts to halt it in the courts. They also fear the experiment may create a devastating quasar - a mass of energy fuelled by black holes - inside the earth. Jets emanating from it would grow and catastrophes such as earthquakes and tsunamis would occur at the points they emerged from the earth. — IANS

BRIEFLY

Rescuers search for survivors after a mudslide hit Massara vllage, Compostela Valley province, in southern Phillippines on Sunday. Rescue workers pulled eight bodies buried under mud after days of monsoon rains loosened soil and burried about 20 makeshift houses near a mining town. — Reuters

Refuge for forced marriage victims
LONDON: An Indian origin woman, who left her home to avoid being forced to marry a man chosen by her family in India, has founded a charity organisation to help women in similar situations. Birmingham-based Kelly Kaur was 16 when she left her home in Walsall to avoid marrying a man chosen by her family. Both parents are now dead, and Kelly is a happily married mother of two. — PTI

Pirated Indian films seized
LONDON: British officials have seized nearly 3,000 fake DVDs of the latest Bollywood films, including those that have not yet been released, from a shop in Leicester as part of a swoop on counterfeit Indian films. The shop was also selling discs with homemade labels and compilation DVDs. Britain feeds a lucrative counterfeit market for DVDs in Asian-dominated areas such as Southall, Birmingham, Harrow, Leicester and Manchester. — PTI

Reprieve for NRI actor
SILICON VALLEY: A California judge has reduced by millions, the bail amount of the Indian origin US actor Shelley Malil, who is accused of stabbing his ex-girlfriend. The 43-year-old actor allegedly stabbed his ex-girlfriend Kendra Beebe more than 20 times at her home in San Diego, California, last month. Malil was being held on $ 10 million bail and on Friday, a superior court judge reduced it to $ 3 million. Malil faces life in prison if convicted of all charges. — PTI