Pay $40,000 for Einstein’s letter to US soldier
Washington, March 10
A previously-unpublished letter written by physicist Albert Einstein in 1945 to a US soldier where he explains that "space should be looked at as a four-dimensional continuum" is up for sale for $40,000. The typed, one-page letter was Einstein's reply to Sergeant Frank K Pfleegor and his friends who were puzzled by a scientific article they read and sought to clear up their confusion with the help of the 20th Century genius.

Sevastopol, March 10
Unidentified armed men fired in the air as they moved into a Ukrainian naval post in Crimea on Monday in the latest confrontation since Russian military groups seized control of the Black Sea peninsula.

With diplomacy at a standstill, Russia said the United States had spurned an invitation to hold new talks on resolving the crisis, the worst East-West standoff since the Cold War. Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk, who said he would address the UN Security Council on Thursday, put the blame for the crisis on Russia and accused Moscow of undermining the global security system by taking control of Crimea.

Russian forces have in little more than a week taken over military installations across Crimea, home to the Russian Black Sea Fleet and Russian territory until Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gave it to Ukraine in 1954. Pro-Russian separatists have taken control of the regional Parliament, declared Crimea part of the Russian Federation and announced a referendum for Sunday to confirm this.

President Vladimir Putin says Moscow is acting to protect the rights of ethnic Russians, who make up a majority of Crimea's population, after Ukraine's president Viktor Yanukovich was ousted in what Russia says was an unconstitutional coup.

On Monday, a group of about 10 unidentified armed men fired in the air at a Ukrainian naval post in Crimea, a Ukrainian defence spokesman was quoted as saying. Ukraine's Channel 5 television quoted Vladislav Seleznyov as saying the shooting took place at a motor pool base near Bakhchisaray.

The men in two minibuses drove into the compound and demanded Ukrainian personnel there give them 10 trucks. Earlier, Interfax Ukraine news agency quoted an unnamed Ukrainian official describing the men as Russian troops and saying that none of the Ukrainians at the site was injured. Russian forces, who have been in control of Crimea for more than a week, have not so far exchanged fire in anger with Ukrainian troops. Shots were fired over the heads of a group of Ukrainians during a standoff at a military airfield last week.

In other armed action, Russian forces took over a military hospital and a missile unit. Reuters correspondents also saw a big Russian convoy on the move just outside the port city of Sevastopol near a Ukrainian air defence base. It comprised more than 100 vehicles, including around 20 armoured personnel carriers, plus mobile artillery.

Putin says Russia is not controlling events in Crimea but denials of Russian involvement are ridiculed by the United States as the two former Cold War enemies wage a geopolitical battle over the future of Crimea and Ukraine.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told Putin that Russia's position on Ukraine remained at odds with the West, but US Secretary of State John Kerry had declined an invitation to visit Russia on Monday for further talks. "It is all being formulated as if there was a conflict between Russia and Ukraine ... and our partners suggested using the situation created by a coup as a starting point," Lavrov told Putin during talks in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. He did not say why Kerry had postponed the talks.

In Kiev, Yatseniuk said he would address the UN Security Council during a debate on Ukraine. He is also due to hold talks with the US government which will show Washington's support of the new Ukrainian leadership. — Reuters

London, March 10
An India-born father serving a life sentence for killing his toddler sons in Scotland six years ago has launched an appeal against the decision over his undiagnosed mental disorder.

Ashok Kalyanjee was sentenced to at least 21 years in prison by the High Court in Glasgow back in 2009 after pleading guilty to murdering six-year-old Paul and his two-year-old brother Jay by slitting their throats with a knife.

He has now appealed against the sentence at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh, claiming a failure by psychiatrists to identify that he was suffering from a paranoid personality disorder at the time.

He specifically blames an incident when he was thrown out of a library two weeks before the murders that had been preying on his mind and his lawyers claim his guilty plea, instead of one of diminished responsibility, led to a miscarriage of justice.

Judge Lord Carloway, sitting with Lady Dorrian and Lady Paton, heard the four-day appeal last week. If it is upheld next month, Kalyanjee could stand trial for a second time.

According to court reports, the father had collected his sons from his former wife's home in Glasgow and driven down towards a lay-by in Lennoxtown area of Dunbartonshire.

He slashed Jay's throat then turned his knife on his brother as they sat in his Mercedes car in May 2008. He then burned their bodies.

"Kalyanjee is a spineless waster who never took responsibility for anything in his life," the Daily Mirror quoted his ex-wife, as saying. "He was devious and cunning and boasted he knew how to work the system. As far as I'm concerned the trigger was fear of his mother finding out about his drinking and gambling," she added.

The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission backed Kalyanjee's claim that despite pleading guilty and having sentence reduced by a quarter, he should have been able to plead to diminished responsibility because of a personality disorder. —PTI

Kabul, March 10
The Taliban today vowed to target Afghanistan's presidential election, urging their fighters to attack polling staff, voters and security forces before the April 5 vote to choose a successor to Hamid Karzai.

Previous Afghan elections have been badly marred by violence, with at least 31 civilians and 26 soldiers and police killed on polling day alone in 2009 as the Islamist militants displayed their opposition to the US-backed polls.

Another blood-stained election would damage claims by international donors that the expensive military and civilian intervention in Afghanistan since 2001 has made progress in establishing a functioning state system.

NATO combat troops are withdrawing from the country after 13 years of fighting a fierce Islamist insurgency that erupted when the Taliban were ousted from power after the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

"We have given orders to all our mujahideen to use all force at their disposal to disrupt these upcoming sham elections-to target all workers, activists, callers, security apparatus and offices," the Taliban said in an emailed statement.

"It is the religious obligation of every Afghan to fulfil their duty by foiling the latest plot of the invaders that is guised in the garb of elections." Billions of dollars have been spent on military operations and development in Afghanistan, but the country remains wracked by poverty and violence with weak government structures and a fragile economy dependent on aid money.

The next president will face a testing new era as the Afghan army and police fight the Taliban without NATO assistance and as international funding declines.

Efforts to open peace talks with the Taliban have so far failed, but negotiations are likely to be given another push by the incoming government as it tries to bring stability to areas in the south and east where the militants hold sway.

The Taliban have targeted every election since the 2004 poll, but the statement today was the first explicit threat from the militants against this year's vote.

Among the front-runners are Abdullah Abdullah, who came second in 2009, former foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul and former World Bank economist Ashraf Ghani.

The campaign has been relatively peaceful so far, though gunmen shot dead two of Abdullah's aides in the western city of Herat. "We once again call on all of our countrymen to keep away from electoral offices, voting booths, rallies and campaigns so that may Allah forbid, their lives are not put into danger," the Taliban said. — AFP 

Koriyama, March 10
Some of the smallest children in Koriyama, a short drive from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, barely know what it's like to play outside. Fear of radiation has kept them indoors for much of their short lives. Though the strict safety limits for outdoor activity set after multiple meltdowns at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in 2011 have now been eased, parental worries and ingrained habit mean many children still stay inside.

And the impact, three years on, is now starting to show, with children experiencing falling strength, lack of coordination, some cannot even ride a bicycle, and emotional issues like shorter tempers, officials and educators say.

"There are children who are very fearful. They ask before they eat anything, 'does this have radiation in it?' and we have to tell them it's okay to eat," said Mitsuhiro Hiraguri, director of the Emporium Kindergarten in Koriyama, some 55 km west of the Fukushima nuclear plant.

"But some really, really want to play outside. They say they want to play in the sandbox and make mud pies. We have to tell them no, I'm sorry. Play in the sandbox inside instead."

Following the March 11, 2011, quake and tsunami, a series of explosions and meltdowns caused the world's worst nuclear accident for 25 years, spewing radiation over a swathe of Fukushima, an agricultural area long known for its rice, beef and peaches. A 30-km radius around the plant was declared a no-go zone, forcing 160,000 people from homes where some had lived for generations.

Other areas, where the radiation was not so critically high, took steps such as replacing the earth in parks and school playgrounds, decontaminating public spaces like sidewalks, and limiting children's outdoor play time. "There are children in the disaster-stricken areas who are going to turn three tomorrow," Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Monday.