Gunmen attacked a riot police unit in Athens today, seriously wounding a 21-year-old policeman in an escalation of violence after the fatal police shooting of a teenager last month sparked Greece's worst riots in decades.

The pre-dawn attack was aimed at a riot police unit stationed outside the Culture Ministry in the centre of the capital, police spokesman Panagiotis Stathis said, adding that the policeman is in a serious condition in hospital.

The policeman was being treated for two gunshot wounds, one to the thigh and one near the shoulder, and was undergoing surgery in a central Athens hospital, Panos Efstathiou, head of the Health Ministry's operations centre, said on state television.

A police official, who asked not to be named because the information had not yet been officially released, said two men -- one of them armed with a Kalashnikov-type automatic rifle -- had sprayed the police unit with gunfire.

On April 11, 2002, at 9:35 a.m., just seven months after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, Nizar Naouar, a Tunisian man, rammed a truck filled with 5,000 liters of liquid gas into the Ghriba synagogue on the Tunisian vacation island of Djerba. Twenty-one people died, including 14 Germans, two French tourists and five Tunisians. Al-Qaida claimed responsibility for the attack.

Almost seven years later, a jury court in Paris began hearing the case against the men believed to be responsible for the attack in a trial that began on Monday. Prosecutors believe that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, also responsible for the 9/11 terror attacks and currently being held at Guantanamo, was the mastermind and planner behind the strike on Djerba. Also on trial is Walid Naouar, the brother of suicide bomber Nizar Naouar.

Much attention is also expected to be focused on the appearance of the third defendant -- Christian Ganczarski, a German national with ties to top al-Qaida terrorists. French investigators claim that the suspected terrorist, who had close ties to Osama bin Laden, gave final approval for the attack. All three defendants have been charged with aiding and abetting murder and with membership in a terrorist organization. If convicted, they could face life sentences in prison.

The twist:

If the suspicion is proven during the trial, it would represent a serious setback for German terror investigators who released Ganczarski for lack of evidence shortly after they had arrested him in the wake of the attack.

Ganczarski has vigorously denied all the charges against him. In a letter sent to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, he proclaimed his innocence, adding "I have a peaceful conscience" and had nothing to do with the "terrible attack or such planning."

"In addition to the Germans, Spanish, Tunisian, Saudi Arabian and Swiss investigators have confirmed that I am neither a terrorist nor a high-ranking member of Qaida and neither was I involved in the attack in Djerba," Ganczarski wrote from his prison cell. He also claims that the trial in Paris will be "politically motivated."

Russia says it will further cut gas to Ukraine by 65 million cubic meters per day, the amount it says Kiev is stealing from EU clients further downstream. Some EU countries reported decreased supplies for a second day.

The thing is, currently attorneys are emphatically not independent from political power, and Sarkozy has no ambitions to change that. He is using a couple "scandals" concerning failures of the inquisitorial judge - mostly Outreau - to achieve an even weaker justice system.


Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères

The collapse of historic crystal and china maker Waterford Wedgwood today put 2,700 jobs at risk in the UK and Ireland on another day of gloom for retailers across the high street.

The latest failure came as the axe fell on 850 staff at failed childrenswear chain Adams after administrators announced the closure of 111 stores.

Manchester-based perfume retailer Passion for Perfume also joined the list of high street casualties in administration after cutting 194 jobs.

And former high street giant Woolworths will shut its doors for the final time tomorrow with the closure of its remaining 200 stores in a collapse which is set to leave 27,000 staff out of work.

Conservative leader David Cameron called today for the abolition of income tax on savings by basic-rate taxpayers.

And he said that pensioners' tax allowances should be raised by £2,000.

It is not going to add up to the $50bn that, collectively, they may have lost, but the clients, staff and trading partners of self-confessed fraudster Bernard Madoff are at least trying to cash in what they do have to show for their business.

The online auction site eBay is filling up with Madoff memorabilia, the promotional trinkets, emblazoned with the Madoff Investment Securities logo, that he gave out to associates over his almost five decades on Wall Street.

Up for sale are backpacks, sweatshirts, t-shirts and a whole host of beach gear, reflecting Mr Madoff's oft-repeated personal history as a Long Island lifeguard in the Sixties who used his $5,000 earnings to start his own share trading firm. A beach chair was selling for $50 on eBay yesterday, a fleece picnic rug in a Madoff-logo canvas bag with drawstring pouch was available for $18. Someone whose family member used the services of Madoff Investment Securities is selling a beach towel that they were given with the company's logo on it.

Germany's ruling political parties have begun talks on a second economic stimulus package that could total up to €50 billion. But the negotiations may prove difficult because the Social Democrats oppose conservative plans for the program to include tax cuts.

(The problem is not the nsistence of certain quarters on tax cuts, the problem is opposition to it...

In talks on Sunday night, Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats had given in to their Bavarian conservative allies in the Christian Social Union who had demanded tax cuts.

The two parties agreed to raise the income tax base threshold to €8,000 from €7,664 and to start eliminating so-called "cold progression" under which tax payers are bumped into higher tax brackets even if inflation-adjusted incomes haven't grown.

However, the SPD, which shares power with the conservatives in Merkel's grand coalition, doesn't want tax cuts and has even said it wants to raise taxes for top earners. "It will be very difficult to reach an agreement on the tax issue," SPD deputy chairwoman Andrea Nahles said.

She said the conservative tax cut plans would mainly benefit medium and high-income groups and that it made more sense to cut welfare contributions because this would also help low-income households and thereby boost consumer spending.

('Welfare contribution' means emloyers' and employees' contribution for each employee to social security and retirement funds.)

*Traitor*, n.
A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.

French viewers have for the first time watched prime-time television without advert breaks, as President Nicolas Sarkozy's media reforms got under way.

Advertising is now banned on French public television between 2000 and 0600. It will be phased out by 2011.

It is part of Mr Sarkozy's move to shake up public broadcasting.

He says his plan will improve the quality of programming but critics say it is a power grab that will deprive state broadcasters of funds.

France Televisions' board of directors chose to back the ban - which affects four main state-funded channels - last month.

"The past eight years of imperial overstretch, hubris and domestic and international abuse of power on the part of the Bush administration has left the US materially weakened financially, economically, politically and morally," he said. "Even the most hard-nosed, Guantanamo Bay-indifferent potential foreign investor in the US must recognise that its financial system has collapsed."

Israeli tanks, planes and ground forces pounded Gaza today and the defence minister said the offensive against Hamas militants in the Palestinian enclave would go on until Israel was safe.

International efforts to secure a ceasefire moved ahead with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Middle East special envoy Tony Blair visiting the region, but they seemed able to offer little beyond words.

The death toll in besieged Gaza rose on Monday to at least 530 people. Victims included three Palestinian children and their mother when a tank shell hit their home in Gaza City and seven members of another family were killed in a refugee camp.

What is Israel afraid of? Using the old "enclosed military area" excuse to prevent coverage of its occupation of Palestinian land has been going on for years. But the last time Israel played this game - in Jenin in 2000 - it was a disaster. Prevented from seeing the truth with their own eyes, reporters quoted Palestinians who claimed there had been a massacre by Israeli soldiers - and Israel spent years denying it. In fact, there was a massacre, but not on the scale that it was originally reported.

Now the Israeli army is trying the same doomed tactic again. Ban the press. Keep the cameras out. By yesterday morning, only hours after the Israeli army went clanking into Gaza to kill more Hamas members - and, of course, more civilians - Hamas was reporting the capture of two Israeli soldiers. Reporters on the ground could have sorted out the truth or the lie about that. But without a single Western journalist in Gaza, the Israelis were left to tell the world that they didn't know if the story was true.

On the other hand, the Israelis are so ruthless that the reasons for the ban on journalism may be quite easily explained: that so many Israeli soldiers are going to kill so many innocents - more than three score by last night, and that's only the ones we know about - that images of the slaughter would be too much to tolerate. Not that the Palestinians have done much to help. The kidnapping by a Palestinian mafia family of the BBC's man in Gaza - finally released by Hamas, although that's not being recalled right now - put paid to any permanent Western television presence in Gaza months ago. Yet the results are the same.

The Israeli military strike in Gaza will have "unforeseeable consequences" for the region, warns former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali. In an interview with SPIEGEL ONLINE, he discusses the short-sightedness of Israeli politicians, Egypt's role and his muted hopes for peace.

NABLUS, West Bank -- Fewer than 100 people showed up on Monday in the busy center of Nablus for a demonstration in solidarity with the suffering Palestinians of Gaza. There were a few Palestinian flags, and some posters that featured bombs with Jewish stars and dripping blood and demanded, "Where is the conscience of the world?" But when an organizer asked passers-by to join the rally, only a handful responded.

The lack of interest was not, for certain, lack of support for Hamas. Fury is rising here over the war in Gaza, as are support for Hamas and anger with the Palestinian Authority in this city, which has long been the beating heart of opposition to Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Many want the authority and the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas of the Fatah party, to do more to criticize Israel.

But a complicated internal struggle is also playing out here in the West Bank, separate geographically and governed by the Palestinian Authority, not, like Gaza, by Hamas. Fatah leaders are growing deeply worried over popular reaction and support for its rival, Hamas, to the point of crushing recent demonstrations.

There is also, after so many years of struggle, of Palestinian against Israeli and of Palestinian against Palestinian, no small degree of weariness with yet another deadly round. Even with the war in Gaza, there is no sign of a third intifada, or uprising, despite Hamas's call for one.

"The people are tired," said Jamal Fayez, who runs a modest restaurant in the city center. "They're tired, and they're poor. They're tired of the conflict between Hamas and Fatah, and they're tired from trying to earn bread to eat."

The International Maritime Bureau (IMB) piracy reporting center in Kuala Lumpur has confirmed five attacks so far this year. The first was on New Year's Day when a Malaysian warship helped Indian seamen fight off heavily-armed bandits attempting to board an oil tanker....

Other incidents have not yet been confirmed by the IMB. The Danish navy said one of its anti-piracy warships came to the rescue of a Dutch cargo ship on Friday and rescued five pirates after they were forced into the water. The Dutch foreign ministry has not yet reached a decision on the fate of the pirates, who continue to be held onboard the Danish navy vessel.

Also on Friday, French forces handed over eight pirates to Somali authorities after they responded to a distress signal from a Panamanian cargo ship being pursued by bandits. And on Sunday, a French warship foiled a further two hijacking attempts on cargo vessels, intercepting 19 pirates who will also be transferred to Somali authorities, the French president's office said.

France has been particularly active in the fight against piracy in the vital shipping lanes that link Europe to Asia. Since last April, French forces have arrested 29 pirates.

AFP - Sri Lankan troops battling Tamil rebels Monday captured part of the highly strategic Elephant Pass in a second major success just days after taking the guerrillas' political headquarters, the army said.
  
Military spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said the southern part of Elephant Pass, a causeway linking the northern Jaffna peninsula to the mainland, fell to troops advancing north from Kilinochchi which was seized on Friday.
  
"Troops are now consolidating in the southern part of Elephant Pass," he said.
  
Tamil Tiger rebels had held the Elephant Pass since April 2000. There was no immediate comment from the ethnic rebels, who have seen their northern fiefdom crumble in recent months in the face of a massive government onslaught.

India's foreign minister said.
   
"We have today handed over to Pakistan evidence of the links with elements in Pakistan of the terrorists who attacked Mumbai on 26th November, 2008," Pranab Mukherjee told reporters.
   
"What happened in Mumbai was an unpardonable crime. As far as the government of Pakistan is concerned, we ask only that it implement the bilateral commitments that it has made at the highest levels to India, and practises her international obligations. These are clear," he added.
   
New Delhi has also shared the evidence with foreign ministers around the world, the minister said.

The Minnesota State Canvassing Board on Monday certified the results of the recount of Republican Sen. Norm Coleman's fight to retain his seat against Franken. The results showed Franken with a 225-vote lead.

"I am proud to stand before you as the next senator from Minnesota," Franken told reporters Monday night. "It's clear that we have a lot of important work to do ... I'm ready to go to Washington and get to work as soon as possible."

Coleman's attorney, Tony Trimble, said shortly after the ruling that the campaign will officially file a lawsuit.

Short DiFi:

Torture is Very Serious and totally awesome, and anybody who sez otherwise is an America-hater.

After the last eight years, you learn to appreciate the small joys in life.  Seeing Cahleefornyah's uber-fascist senator pissed off over being ignored is one of truly good ones.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.

The opening of the new embassy is in line with a change of power that was effected on New Year's Day, when U.S. forces in Iraq officially came under an Iraqi mandate.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani attended the opening ceremony.

In a courtyard between two wings of the new building, the Iraqi national anthem was played, then U.S. Marines raised an American flag to the tune of the Star Spangled Banner.

"It is from here men and women, civilian and military, will help build the new Iraq," Negroponte said in a speech.

U.S. ambassador Ryan Crocker called the embassy's opening "a new era for Iraq and United States relations".

Talabani thanked the United States for helping create a democratic Iraq "which will serve as a model for other peoples of the eastern world".

There are lots of reasons to be concerned over Obama's appointments. Here comes the worst one.

According to the well informed Nelson Report (via Jim Lobe), Dennis Ross will be Special Envoy under Hillary Clinton in charge of negotiations with Iran.

Dennis Ross worked under Paul Wolfowitz during the Reagan administration and later in George H.W. Bush's administration before becoming "Israel's lawyer" in the Clinton administration.

---
Additionally Richard Haass will become Special Envoy for Israel-Arab affairs. He recently published a report with AIPAC and WINEP tool Martin Indyk which also recommends a blockade of Iran and, after that act of war fails, a military attack.

The Transport minister Lord Adonis said at the weekend that an international rail interchange could be built at Heathrow, in compensation for the environmental damage a new runway would cause. He was taking over an idea produced by the Conservatives, who said that they would build a new high-speed rail line to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds instead of the third runway - thus obviating the need for more short-haul flights to provincial cities. The "Heathrow Hub", costing £4.5bn, would extend the high-speed rail network from the Channel Tunnel line at St Pancras station into the rest of Britain.

John Stewart, of the campaign group Heathrow Association for the Control of Aircraft Noise, said the Government was "in disarray" about the project. "They never talked about a rail link until the Tories brought it up," he added. "To add it on at the last minute is just a cynical ploy."

The British political world is finally turning on its head.

*Traitor*, n.
A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.

Users of Wikipedia have seen off a threat that the website would be forced to carry advertisements or charge for access, after one of the most successful online fundraising campaigns ever.

The free online encyclopaedia was struggling to raise $6m (£4.1m) to cover its running costs for 2009 and launched a campaign seeking donations on 3 November.

Motorcycle gangs have long kept the police busy with violence and drug trafficking. But now investigators are alarmed by a new threat: Militant neo-Nazis are rising through the ranks of the Hells Angels in Germany.

China's government has launched a nationwide campaign against major Web sites "to clean up a vulgar current on the Internet". The Financial Times reported on Monday that China is arming censors with more advanced filtering software.

A huge underground thermal lake has been discovered below a Turkish bath in the Hungarian capital, Budapest.

Divers have spent weeks exploring its hidden depths while the government discusses opening the lake to the public.

Today, the most fervent attention in biofuel development has shifted from soil to the sea, and specifically to marine algae. Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, along with researchers at UCSD's Division of Biological Sciences, are part of an emerging algal biofuel consortium that includes academic collaborators, CleanTECH San Diego, regional industry representatives, and public and private partners.

Scripps scientists see algae as a "green bullet," science and society's best hope for a clean bioenergy source that will help loosen broad dependence on fossil fuel, counteract climate warming, and power the vehicles of the future.

[...]

Marine algae, as Mitchell is quick to point out to anyone who asks, are the most efficient organisms on Earth for absorbing light energy and converting it into a natural biomass oil product, the biofuel equivalent of crude oil.

"Algae yields five to 10 times more bioenergy molecules per area, per time, than any terrestrial plant," said Mitchell, a native of oil-rich Houston, Texas. "Nothing else comes close."

From a sustainability perspective, algae hold the upper hand against other biofuel candidates, such as corn and soybeans. Algae can be grown on barren desert land using salt water, averting competition with agricultural cropland and the need for large amounts of precious fresh water for irrigation.

Since they require carbon dioxide for growth, algae are inherently carbon neutral, and they can suck up CO2 directly from industrial pollution sources. Furthermore, algae can feed off the nutrients in discarded wastewater. Adding yet another layer to their allure, the rich protein left over from algae harvests can be converted to animal feed.

Yes, I know, another magic bullet story...

Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine - Patti Smith

"We have to act now to address this crisis and break the momentum of the recession, or the next few years could be dramatically worse," Obama told reporters after a separate meeting with top economic advisers. He plans to deliver a speech on the economy on Jan. 8.

The plan would aim to boost consumer demand by providing tax breaks worth $500 for individuals and $1,000 for couples. The change would come by altering tax-withholding rules so workers would see an immediate increase in their take-home pay.

Cutting the [federal distinct from state and city] payroll tax "would be more efficient" in helping the economy, Michael Darda, chief economist for MKM Partners LP, said on Bloomberg Television. He cautioned that "there is no silver bullet."  ...

Obama, 47, said he wants lawmakers to finish most of their work on the plan, including tax cuts and spending, by the end of this month or no later than the first week of February. The president-elect is asking that tax cuts make up 40 percent of the plan, Democratic aides and a transition official said.

Majority View

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Obama told the lawmakers that economists are suggesting a U.S. stimulus plan may have to be as large as $1.3 trillion.

Obama "has indicated that there's at least 20 economists that he's talked with, and all but one of those believe it should be from $800 billion to $1.2 trillion or $1.3 trillion," Reid said after the meeting. ...

The president-elect met with his economic advisers, including Treasury Secretary-designate Tim Geithner and Lawrence Summers, whom Obama picked as his director of the National Economic Council. Obama, who takes office Jan. 20, was accompanied to the Capitol by Vice President-elect Joe Biden.

Meetings Today

Obama plans to meet again today with advisers including Geithner and Summers on budget issues and health-care costs.

Obama pledged "unprecedented transparency" as policymakers hash out the stimulus plan. He said he is considering publishing online "very detailed information about all the projects that are taking place."

Like any child who has lost a parent, it was only natural that Benazir Bhutto's eldest daughter would wish to express her grief for her murdered mother. Less obvious, perhaps, was that the tribute would come in the form of a mournful rap song.

It was the second time that Giovanni Venosa had been arrested for mafia links.

In a case where life appears to imitate art, Giovanni Venosa was arrested for trying to extract a "pizzo" - mafia tax - from businesses in the Caserte region to the north of Naples, Italian newspapers said.

Based on the best-selling book by Italian journalist Roberto Saviano, Gomorrah won the top prize at the Cannes film festival and is in the running for the Oscar awards.

Already sentenced two months ago to a period of community service in the north of Italy for drug-trafficking, Venosa took advantage of a Christmas break to return to Naples, where he was accused of the extortion.