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China Seen Deploying New Ballistic Missile Unit Close to Taiwan
Here is another article of interest published in April.
Taiwan’s intelligence head on Thursday asserted China had fielded an additional ballistic missile unit not far from the self-governing island, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, April 6).
“The unit, carrying the code number 96166 and based in Guangdong province [in southern China], is indeed a new unit, probably a new ballistic missile brigade,” National Security Bureau chief Tsai Teh-sheng said, without offering further specifics.
“Over the past few years, the People’s Liberation Army has kept increasing its deployment of ballistic missile units in both quantity and quality opposite Taiwan,” Tsai said in remarks passed along by lawmaker Lin Yu-fang.
Taiwanese analysts project that Beijing at present has in excess of 1,600 missiles targeting the island that it claims as Chinese territory. The majority of those weapons are thought to be fielded in Jiangxi and Fuijan provinces in the southeastern part of the country. Experts predict that as many as 1,800 missiles could be aimed at Taiwan in 2012, AFP reported.
China’s robust rail system has allowed it to rapidly transport missiles to coastal regions when required. Some missiles can even be fired from railway trains, according to Lin, who is also a military affairs professor.
China’s top military official last week seemingly denied that any missiles were aimed at Taiwan. Beijing, though, has said it could take military action should Taipei seek full autonomy (see GSN, May 19; Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, May 26).
California releases 450 ‘violent and dangerous’ criminals after computer glitch sets them free
Hundreds of violent and dangerous prisoners have been released on unsupervised parole in California because of a computer glitch, according to the state’s inspector general.
Software errors led prison officials to mistakenly release some 450 inmates deemed to have a ‘high risk for violence’, as part of a programme meant to ease overcrowding in the state’s jails.
And more than 1,000 additional convicts said to present a high risk of committing drugs crimes, property crimes and other offences were also freed.
Overcrowded: Hundreds of violent criminals have been released from prison early on unsupervised parole after a computer error
The news comes after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that California’s prisons are dangerously overcrowded, and upheld a ruling giving the state two years to slash prisoner numbers.
No attempt has since been made to return any of the offenders to prison or to put them on supervised parole schemes, inspector general spokesman Renee Hansen told the LA Times.
All of the released prisoners have been placed on so-called ‘non-revocable parole’ – meaning that they do not have to report to parole officers and can only be sent back to prison if they are caught committing another crime.
Inmates who are gang members, sex criminals or violent criminals are determined to pose a risk of re-offending and are not thought to be suitable for the scheme.
But a report by the inspector general found that the computer programme that officials Read more…
Another woman dies of mysterious virus in s Korea
Seoul (ANTARA News/Xinhua-OANA) – A pregnant woman has died of pneumonia related to an unidentified virus, nearly 15 days after the same cause brought about the first fatality in South Korea, local media reported Thursday.
The 36-year-old woman died early Thursday morning, about one month after being admitted to the intensive care unit of a large hospital in Seoul, according to the Korea Center for Disaster Control and Prevention (KCDC), Seoul`s Yonhap news agency reported.
She initially showed cold-like symptoms but later was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis. The victim was among eight patients who checked into the intensive care unit of the hospital for infection with the unknown virus.
Seven of the eight patients have recently given birth or are expecting, prompting widespread fears among the country`s pregnant women.
The KCDC has been focusing on verifying the origin of the virus by studying the specimen taken from the patient and conducting genetic analysis on it.
Escalating violence may push Yemen towards civil war, warns UN human rights office
Yemenis protesting against the government in Sana’a
27 May 2011 – The United Nations human rights office today voiced alarm at the escalating violence in Yemen, which it said may push the country to the brink of civil war, and called on the Government to stop its deadly crackdown.
The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said it is trying to confirm reports it has received of dozens of civilian casualties, including women and children, in the fighting over the past few days, as well as reports of shelling by Government troops in residential areas.
The death toll has reportedly approached 100 since fighting began Monday after Yemen’s President, Ali Abdullah Saleh, refused for a third time to sign a deal to transfer power amid the pro-democracy protests that began earlier this year.
“The dangerous escalation of violence in Yemen over the past few days is very Read more…
House Passes Authority for Worldwide War
The House just passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), including a provision to authorize worldwide war, which has no expiration date and will allow this president — and any future president — to go to war anywhere in the world, at any time, without further congressional authorization. The new authorization wouldn’t even require the president to show any threat to the national security of the United States. The American military could become the world’s cop, and could be sent into harm’s way almost anywhere and everywhere around the globe.
Before the vote, the House debated an amendment that would have struck the worldwide war provision. That amendment was introduced by a bipartisan group of representatives: Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.), Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), and Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas). Given the enormity of the proposed law, you’d expect the House to debate the amendment to strike it extensively, but that’s not what happened. The amendment was debated for a total of 20 minutes. That’s right. Twenty minutes to debate whether Congress should hand the executive branch sweeping worldwide war authority.
The vote on the amendment took place earlier this afternoon, and it failed on the House floor by a vote of 187-in favor to 234-opposed. Check the vote here.
But not to worry, all of your efforts to bring the importance of the new law and the amendment to strike it to your representatives’ attention have Read more…
New leak seen at Japan quake-hit plant
Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the operator of the plant, said on Thursday that up to 57 tons of contaminated water has leaked from a storage facility, Reuters reported.
The environmental group, Greenpeace, has criticized the Japanese government’s assessment of the contamination level, saying, “Radioactive hazards are not decreasing through dilution or dispersion of materials, but the radioactivity is instead accumulating in marine life.”
“Our data show that significant amounts of contamination continue to spread over great distances from the Fukushima nuclear plant,” the group added.
Greenpeace has also accused TEPCO of covering up the actual severity of the disaster in the Asian Read more…
Super Typhoon Songda Projected To Pass Over Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant
So far the only good news to accompany the Fukushima catastrophe has been that for all the fallout, the radiation has been mostly contained due to Northwesterly winds which have been blowing any radioactivity mostly out and into the Pacific (coupled with relatively little rainfall), as well as the dispersion of irradiated cooling water which promptly enters the Pacific after which it is never heard of or seen again (there is at least a several year period before 3 eyed tuna fish feature prominently in restaurants across the country). This may be changing soon now that Super Typhoon Songda, which according to Weather Underground will form shortly as a Category 5 storm with 156+ mph winds, will take a northeasterly direction and 2 days later will pass right above Fukushima. The good news: by the time it passes over Fukushima, Songda will be merely a Tropical storm. The bad news: by the time it passes over Fukushima, Songda will be a Tropical storm. As the latest dispersion projection from ZAMG shows, over the next two days the I-131 plume will be covering all of the mainland. Although judging by how prominent this whole topic is in the MSM lately, it seems that conventional wisdom now agrees with Ann Coulter that radioactivity is actually quite good for you.
From wunderground.com:
And the latest plume projection: Read more…
UN Experts to Consider Proposal Condemning Syria
Photo: AFP An image taken from a video posted on YouTube, May 20, 2011, shows a Syrian soldier pointing his rifle and firing at anti-regime protesters during a demonstration in Hama, north of Damascus
U.N. Security Council experts are expected to discuss a draft resolution on Thursday that would condemn Syria for its crackdown on peaceful protesters.
The draft – put forth by Britain, France, Germany and Portugal – appeals for an immediate end to violence in Syria. It also condemns what the European sponsors call a “systematic violation of human rights” that includes killings, arbitrary detentions, disappearances and the torture of peaceful demonstrators.
Rights groups estimate that roughly 1,000 people have died since the government started a crackdown to stop protests against Read more…
Antibiotics In Animal Feed Encourage Emergence Of Superbugs – FDA Sued By Health And Consumer Organizations
medicalnewstoday
If the FDA concluded in 1977 that adding low-dose antibiotics used in human medicine to animal feed raised the risk of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, why has it still done nothing about it? A suit filed by some health and consumer organizations says the FDA has not met its legal responsibility to protect public health – the practice of routinely adding low-dose antibiotics to animal feed has to stop, and the FDA has the authority to make it so.
Peter Lehner, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) executive director, said:
“More than a generation has passed since FDA first recognized the potential human health consequences of feeding large quantities of antibiotics to healthy animals.
Accumulating evidence shows that antibiotics are becoming less effective, while our grocery store meat is increasingly laden with drug-resistant bacteria. The FDA needs to put the American people first by ensuring that antibiotics continue to serve their primary purpose – saving human lives by combating disease.”
70% of all US antibiotic consumption is used up in adding low-doses to animal feed to make up for unsanitary living conditions and promote faster growth, according to NRDC. This practice has been steadily growing over the last six decades, despite the every-growing threat to humans of superbugs.
The antibiotic doses used in feed or water for turkeys, cows, pigs and chickens are too low to treat diseases – however, they are low enough for a significant number of bacteria to survive and build Read more…
Sprint, MasterCard, Citibank Partner Up For ‘Google Wallet’
A Google Partner Event in New York kicks off in a couple hours with all signs pointing to an announcement about a mobile payments platform that’ll let you tap your phone against a card reader to pay for an item, using technologythat has been implemented in Japan for years. But if the groundswell of rumors is to be believed, there’s not much left to announce:
Late Wednesday night This Is My Next unearthed an internal announcement from The Container Store, believed to be a launch partner for Google’s mobile payment platform, dubbed “Google Wallet”:
It sounds like Google has chosen some major “innovative” retailers to kickstart a mobile payment platform that lets customers tap their phones against a contact-less card reader to pay for an item. And it sounds like The Container Store will start using the readers on September 1.
Bloomberg reported Tuesday that Google will use the event to unveil a mobile payment platform on Sprint phones embedded with NFC chips. Customers with these NFC-supported phones, currently limited to Google’s Nexus S 4G (Sprint) and Nexus S (T-Mobile) in the U.S., will be able to tap their devices against an NFC-enabled card reader to make an instant payment. The program will launch in Read more…
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