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Murdoch not fit to run a company: UK lawmakers
Le Pen won’t endorse anyone in French poll
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‘Iranian plot to kill Saudi envoy in Cairo foiled’
7 held in UK for funding terror
Qaida hid attack plan in porn film
Indian-origin family of 4 found dead in Australia
There was a second shooter in Robert Kennedy killing: Witness
26 dead in Syria hours after new UN ceasefire call
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Murdoch not fit to run a company: UK lawmakers
London, May 1 The cross-party Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee concluded that 81-year-old Murdoch “turned a blind eye and exhibited wilful blindness to what was going on in his companies and publications” and that his company had misled the Parliament. This is the first report among the many inquiries into issues related to the phone-hacking controversy. Murdoch bought the News of the World in 1968, and has since expanded his empire in Britain across media platforms. Murdoch’s News Corporation said it was carefully examining the 125-page report titled ‘News International and Phone-Hacking’, but admitted that there was “significant wrongdoing” at the News of the World. The committee unanimously agreed that key individuals employed by Murdoch — Les Hinton, Tom Crone and Colin Myler — had misled parliament, but there was lack of unanimity on the conclusion that Murdoch was “not a fit person to exercise the stewardship of a major international company”. The committee’s findings will now be presented to Parliament, where a motion is likely to be moved and voted on the likely action to be taken against the three individuals who are accused of misleading Parliament. The panel said it was now for the House of Commons to decide “what punishment should be imposed” on those it thinks have treated the committee with contempt. The committee’s conclusion is expected to contribute to the ongoing inquiry by regulator Ofcom on the issue whether Murdoch’s BSkyB is a ‘fit and proper’ organisation to hold a broadcasting licence in Britain. The committee that investigated the issue at length and heard evidence from Rupert Murdoch and his son James Murdoch last year, came out with conclusions that have been described as “explosive” and “extremely damning”. The committee said: “On the basis of the facts and evidence before the Committee, we conclude that, if at all relevant times Rupert Murdoch did not take steps to become fully informed about phone-hacking, he turned a blind eye and exhibited wilful blindness to what was going on in his companies and publications”.
— PTI
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Le Pen won’t endorse anyone in French poll
Paris, May 1 Le Pen, who came in a strong third place in the first round of voting April 22, told her supporters to “vote according to your conscience.” In a big rally in Paris today, she assailed conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has borrowed some of Le Pen’s rhetoric about immigrants and Muslims in his campaign. Le Pen said: “I will cast a blank ballot” and said she could not endorse Sarkozy or Socialist challenger Francois Hollande. Sarkozy is hoping to win over Le Pen’s voters. Meanwhile, the presidential election race took over the streets of Paris today as three powerful political movements battled for attention with competing rallies five days before polling day. Marine Le Pen’s anti-immigrant far-right National Front kicked off the May Day events with several thousand supporters marching in memory of far-right icon Joan of Arc through central Paris. Waving a sea of blue, white and red French flags, Le Pen’s supporters chanted “France for the French!” and “This is our home!” as they marched to the Place de l’Opera, where Le Pen was to give a speech. Sarkozy’s right-wing supporters were to gather at the Place du Trocadero in Paris’s posh 16th arrondissement to hear their champion give his last major speech in the capital before the vote. And, on the left, trade unions were to carry out their traditional march to the historic Place de la Bastille. With the latest poll predicting a Hollande win on Sunday by 53 to 47 per cent, Sarkozy is anxious to gain some momentum from the rally and said he expected "tens of thousands of French" to take part. Under fire for rallying his supporters on a day traditionally dominated by unions and the left, Sarkozy has hit back with attacks on state benefit recipients and appeals to the middle class.
— AFP
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Residents for statue of peace at Lahore, May 1 Ahead of the first anniversary of the death of the Al-Qaida chief on May 2, security forces have been put on high alert across Pakistan to counter any possible terrorist attacks. “We have written to the Pakistan government to build either a statue of peace or a beautiful monument at the site where Laden lived illegally. “By doing so, we should give a message to the world that the man who was the symbol of terror is no more along with his philosophy. His elimination will bring peace to the world,” Zubair Ahmed, a resident of Bilal Town neighbourhood where bin Laden’s compound was located, told PTI on phone. Ahmed, a banker by profession, said he had heard that a playground would be built at the site of the compound, which was demolished in February. “These days, boys playing cricket there,” he said. Bin Laden lived at the compound in Bilal Town with his three wives and several children for about five years before he was killed in a unilateral US military raid early on May 2 last year. The operation embarrassed the Pakistani security establishment, which was dogged by questions about whether senior officials had been aware of bin Laden’s presence in a compound located a stone’s throw from the elite Pakistan Military Academy.
— PTI
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‘Iranian plot to kill Saudi envoy in Cairo foiled’
Riyadh, May 1 Egypt "arrested three Iranians planning to assassinate the ambassador, Ahmed Qattan," Al-Hayat quoted Sami Jamal as saying. "Egyptian authorities informed concerned parties at the Saudi foreign ministry of the details of the plot, but the Saudi side opted to keep silent on the matter," Jamal said. "Everybody was concerned that foreign parties would exploit demonstrations by some (Egyptians) outside the embassy (in Cairo) to attack members of the mission," Al-Sharq daily quoted him as saying. Riyadh on Saturday recalled its ambassador from Cairo after protests outside the Saudi embassy in Cairo over the arrest of an Egyptian human rights lawyer in the Gulf kingdom. Saudi state news agency SPA said the Cairo embassy as well as the kingdom's consulates in Alexandria and Suez were closed.
— AFP
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7 held in UK for funding terror
London, May 1 The police said six men and a woman were arrested in London, Coventry and Cardiff in early morning raids by counter-terrorism officers. They are being held in custody at a police station in central London. In a statement, Scotland Yard said the arrests were part of an investigation into a network suspected of illegally exporting the stimulant khat to the US and Canada. The plant khat is used by some people from East Africa and is not banned in the UK, but it is a controlled substance in North America.
— PTI
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Qaida hid attack plan in porn film Washington, May 1 Terrorist training manuals in PDF format in German, English and Arabic were among the documents found, according to intelligence sources cited by CNN, which said it had obtained details of the documents. The German newspaper Die Zeit was the first to report on the discovery of the documents by German cryptologists inside the memory disk found on a suspected Al Qaida operative arrested in Berlin last year, it said. Interrogators questioning a 22-year-old Austrian named Maqsood Lodin, who had recently returned from Pakistan via Budapest, Hungary, and then travelled overland to Germany were surprised to find a digital storage device and memory cards hidden in his underpants. Buried inside them was a pornographic video called "Kick Ass" — and a file marked "Sexy Tanja". Several weeks later, German investigators discovered encoded inside the actual video a treasure trove of intelligence - more than 100 Al Qaida documents. One document called "Future Works" appears to have been the product of discussions to find new targets and methods of attack, CNN said. German investigators believe it was written in 2009 — and that it remains the template for Al Qaida's plans. A year after the document was written, European intelligence agencies were scrambling to investigate a Mumbai-style plot involving German and other European militants which sparked an unprecedented US State Department travel warning for Americans in Europe. In the Mumbai terror attack, 10 Pakistanis sneaked into India
and launched the Nov 26-29 mayhem that killed 166 people, including many foreigners. "I think it is plausible to think that the 'Future Works' document is part of that particular project," investigative journalist Yassin Musharbash, a reporter with the German newspaper Die Zeit, who was the first to report on the documents, was quoted as saying. "The document delivers very clearly the notion that Al Qaida knows it is being followed very closely," Musharbash told CNN. While "Future Works" does not include dates or places, nor specific plans, it appears to be a brainstorming exercise to seize the initiative-and reinstate Al Qaeda on front pages around the world, it said.
— IANS
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Indian-origin family of 4 found dead in Australia Melbourne, May 1 Bodies of Nilesh Sharma, 34, his wife Pritika, 32, five-year-old Divesh and three-year-old Divya were found at their Glen Waverley home in the city's eastern outskirts. Nilesh, an accountant, was found in a hallway, the others in their bedrooms. The Fijian-Indian family, which moved to Australia over a decade ago, had lived in Glen Waverley for at least two years and appeared a normal, happy couple, news agency AAP said. Police says the deaths are being treated as a murder-suicide, with officers stressing no suspects are being sought.
— PTI
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There was a second shooter in Los Angeles, May 1 The new account comes as the gunman convicted over the killing, Sirhan Sirhan, awaits an appeal ruling over his conviction, with lawyers seeking his release or a retrial. “Bobby” Kennedy, a younger brother of assassinated President John F Kennedy, was himself killed in 1968 while running for the US presidency. Sirhan is behind bars in California after being jailed for life in 1972. But Nina Rhodes-Hughes, who was only feet away when Kennedy was gunned down at a Los Angeles hotel, said the now 68-year-old Sirhan was not the only shooter that day. “What has to come out is there was another shooter to my right,” she told CNN in an exclusive interview, adding: “The truth has got to be told. No more cover-ups.” “There were more than eight shots,” she said, adding that she had told at least one broadcaster on the night of the shootings that there were 12, maybe 14 shots, but investigators had ignored the claim. “There were two shooters, that must come out and who they were. It must come out who the other shooter is, because there definitely was another shooter,” added Rhodes-Hughes, who was not called at the original trial. Sirhan, serving life behind bars at Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga, California, has applied to be released, retried or granted a hearing on new evidence, including Rhodes-Hughes’ account, CNN said.
— AFP
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26 dead in Syria hours after new UN ceasefire call
Damascus, May 1 UN chief Ban Ki-moon said it was vital that government and opposition alike cooperate fully with a hard-won UN observer force as it fans out in its mission to shore up the ceasefire agreement that took effect on April 12. But despite his appeal, human rights monitors reported no let-up in the violence, a day after a series of blasts condemned by Ban as "terrorist bomb attacks" killed more than 20 persons. Nine members of a single family were among the 10 killed in the regime bombardment of a village in northwestern Idlib province, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. A mortar round slammed into their home in Mashmashan village near the town of Jisr al-Shughur, the watchdog said, adding four women and two children were among the dead.
— AFP
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today said media baron Rupert Murdoch had shown “wilful blindness” over phone hacking and was “not a fit person” to run a major company, 44 years after he entered Britain’s newspaper market by acquiring the News of the World.
