Speaking to the EUobserver in her office on Thursday (7 April), Malmstrom said she was deeply disturbed by the news that 250 people fleeing Libya, mostly sub-Saharan refugees, drowned when trying to reach the Italian island of Lampedusa.

"It is absolutely horrible, you'd have to be made out of stone not to be touched by this. Also the fact that there are people taking advantage of this, selling tickets for these overcrowded boats, with no life vests on board."

But she warned against member states sniping at one another. Italian minister Roberto Maroni earlier on Thursday suggested it was Malta's fault for not sending rescue ships in time. For their part, the Maltese armed forces said that the boat was three times closer to Lampedusa than Malta.

Preliminary estimates show Portugal will need rescue loans of around €80bn (£70 billion), the EU's Monetary Affairs Commissioner has said.

Olli Rehn added that talks over a strict reforms programme will start immediately with all major political parties, and he hoped a final deal will be in place by mid-May.

...Mr Rehn said the programme will include structural reforms, spending cuts, a stabilisation programme for the country's financial sector and ambitious privatisation plans.

Socrates was right: sovereignty gone.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

Nick Clegg and Vince Cable will demand major reforms of the banks as the Liberal Democrats flex their muscles and adopt a more "arms length" policy from the Conservatives.

After tensions between Liberal Democrat and Tory ministers over the proposed NHS reorganisation and next month's referendum on the voting system, the structure of the banks could be the next battleground between the Coalition Government partners.

Mr Clegg and Mr Cable, the Business Secretary, will press David Cameron to implement in full proposals to restructure the banks to be published on Monday in the interim report of the Independent Commission on Banking chaired by Sir John Vickers, former head of the Office of Fair Trading.

The new Public Affairs party (VV),  a member of the Czech ruling coalition, is close to imploding after being hit by a corruption scandal exposed by Respekt. "Testimony of a VV politician: `For my silence [on party funding], I got 50,000 [crowns] per month" ran the Prague weekly's headline on April 4, quoting the Vice-President of the party, Jaroslav Skarka, now expelled. VV leader Vit Barta, also questioned, defended himself by saying he was paying out not bribes but loans.

AP - Kosovo's parliament has elected Atifete Jahjaga as its new president, the first woman to head the state.

The 35-year-old received 80 votes, with no votes against, in Thursday's parliament session.

Jahjaga was a compromise candidate agreed on by the ruling coalition and main opposition party after a top court said businessman Behgjet Pacolli's election in February breached the constitution because an opposition boycott left fewer lawmakers then required by law. The opposition threatened to repeat the boycott if Pacolli ran again.

Russian gas export monopoly Gazprom said yesterday (7 April) it would treat Ukraine as a domestic consumer, cutting its gas bills by $8 billion (€5.59 billion) per year, if it joined Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan in a customs union.

"We would use the principle of profit equalisation" in respect of Ukraine if it joined the union, Gazprom Deputy Chief Executive Valery Golubev said.

Almost simultaneously, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich made clear that his country did not want to join a Russia-led customs union, suggesting a free-trade deal with the country instead.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) will name the 90 or so banks that need to undergo a stress test exercise, which will determine which of them need to raise capital to bolster their defences against economic headwinds.

The EBA, keen to be seen as tough after last year's tests flopped, will determine the level of core capital that the banks need to have left on their books when put under the adverse economic scenarios.

BP's £10 billion share-swap with Russian government-owned Rosneft was dealt another blow today after a tribunal blocked the deal until further notice.

The Stockholm tribunal has extended an injunction blocking the swap as it determines whether the deal breaches agreements with its existing Russian partners TNK-BP.

The oil giant currently has until April 14 to complete the deal - which would see BP own 9.5% of Rosneft's shares, while the Russian group would have taken a 5% stake in BP - but plans to discuss extending this deadline with Rosneft.

The embattled supermajor has come to blows with TNK-BP shareholders, a group of Russian oligarchs known as Alfa-Access-Renova, who said BP was obliged to pursue new projects in Russia with TNK-BP.

The Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) and Bosnian system operator BH-Gas signed yesterday (7 April) an agreement paving the way for a future extension of the planned gas pipeline to Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The two companies agreed "to explore opportunities for developing natural gas markets and enhancing supply diversity in South East Europe (SEE)".

The development comes shortly after TAP, which is one of several projects in the so-called 'Southern Gas Corridor' (see 'Background'), found a partner in Croatia, Plinacro Ltd, the country's natural gas transmission system operator, paving the way for further extension in the Western Balkan region.

Boeing inspectors cleared the majority of its older 737s for flight Tuesday after cracks found in Southwest jetliners caused the aviation giant to conduct widespread safety checks on the model.

The space race is no longer just between nations. Space X, a private firm based in California, has stolen a march on Nasa by unveiling plans to launch the most powerful private rocket ever built.

Named Falcon Heavy, the new rocket can carry more cargo than a fully-laden Boeing 737 aircraft and does not only exist in blueprint form - it promises to be complete by the end of next year. It will be the the largest rocket since the Apollo-era Saturn V.

In 2010 Space X stunned the world after it became the first private company to launch a craft that orbited the Earth twice and landed safely within just three hours. Its founder Elon Musk, the American engineer-turned-entrepreneur who made his fortune after co-founding the global online payment system PayPal, promises that Falcon Heavy will bring "revolutionary change, not evolutionary change" to the field of space exploration. "The public should be very excited about this. It re-establishes US leadership in space," he said.

Space X didn't 'stole a march' on NASA: privatising the launcher market was one of the ultra-free-marketista Bush-era policies, and NASA had to contract the new manufacturers. We'll see whether they can deliver on reliability and reusability.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

NETHERLANDS: NS Hispeed finally began running Fyra services between Amsterdam and Breda on April 4, when the interim locomotive-hauled shuttle was extended from Rotterdam to Breda.

...The interim trains are formed of conventional coaches hauled by leased Bombardier Traxx multi-system locos. They operate at up to 160 km/h using ETCS Level 1, meaning that Thalys services to and from Paris also had to operate on Level 1 between Rotterdam and Schiphol.

Because the Thalys trains were running at 300 km/h on the southern section of HSL-Zuid using ETCS Level 2, Fyra services could not be extended south of Rotterdam until the locos had been certified for Level 2 operation. Now this has been achieved, infrastructure provider Infraspeed is expected to switch the northern portion of HSL-Zuid to Level 2, allowing Thalys to run at up to 300 km/h on this section.

...Ridership on the interim Fyra service has failed to reach expected levels, despite several reductions in the premium fares charged, and earlier this year HSA warned that it would have problems meeting the full concession payments to the government.

What a surprise...

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

A container train from Chongqing in China arrived on the evening of 4 April into Duisburg, Germany after travelling for 16 days.

The DB Schenker freight test train completed the journey of 10,300 km after being commission by a `global company.'

The route the train took went south of Mongolia, through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus and then from Poland to Germany. This took half the time it would have taken had the journey been made by sea, which is how most of China's goods enter Europe currently.

In 2008, there were already two test trains that ran from Beijing resp. Xiangtang to Hamburg in 15 resp. 17 days. The difference was the route: the 2008 trains ran along the Transsib.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

CHINA: Work is underway on the first Passenger-Dedicated Line in Inner Mongolia, a 286 km route linking provincial capital Hohhot with the eastern city of Zhangjiakou...

In northeast China, construction of the 360 km PDL from Jilin to the port of Hunchun and Tumen near the border with North Korea was launched on March 3...

An interim report from the Banking Commission due on Monday will not support the total break-up of Britain's biggest banks, the BBC understands.

Instead it will favour ring-fencing their risky investment banking operations, so they do not jeopardise the savings of ordinary depositors.

The move will still cause anger at big banks like Barclays, according to BBC business editor Robert Peston.

It means their investment banking units will find it more expensive to borrow.

"I understand that the Commission will recommend that within megabanks like Barclays, HSBC, or Royal Bank of Scotland, new legal barriers - or 'firewalls' - should be constructed," our correspondent said.

"So that if a crisis occurs in the investment bank it can't hurt our savings in the retail bank."

(Reuters) - Britain should reinstate school attendance payments as part of a range of measures to help reduce its huge government debt, the Paris-based OECD said on Thursday.

The scrapping of Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) payments in England last October prompted many pupils to join violent student demonstrations against higher university fees.

In its latest "Going for Growth" report, the OECD said that improving the educational achievement of young people could boost youth employment in Britain, propelling economic growth and helping it cut a record budget deficit.

The organisation called on the government to "encourage participation in secondary education by reintroducing the Education Maintenance Allowance," among other recommendations.

Nato today said its airstrikes had hit rebels using tanks in their fight with the government forces in eastern Libya, but said it would not apologize for the deaths.

Rear Admiral Russell Harding, the deputy commander of the NATO operation, said the military alliance had no previous information the rebels were operating tanks. In the past, only forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi had used heavy armored vehicles, he said.

Huh!? How come we knew that the rebels had tanks (even if not used in the quick push West), but NATO didn't?... How come their reconnaissance didn't see the tanks moving out of Benghazi?

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

The grim discovery came a week after the International Committee of the Red Cross said at least 800 bodies had been found in the town of Duekoue after an explosion of inter-communal violence.

United Nations human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said today that UN workers had found 15 more bodies in Duekoue, where the burnings took place, and had discovered more than 60 in Guiglo and 40 in Blolequin - all yesterday.

He said it was hard to say who was responsible as long-running ethnic tensions in the region have grown alongside fighting between forces loyal to presidential claimant Alassane Ouattara and those of his rival Laurent Gbagbo.

However, he said the victims in Duekoue appeared to be from the Guere ethnic group supporting Gbagbo, and that the killings took place when fighters loyal to Ouattara took control of the town in their advance towards the south.

..."Some of the victims seem to have been burnt alive, and some corpses were thrown down a well," he said, adding that the murders appeared to have been in retaliation for the mid-March killing of 100 people by pro-Gbagbo forces in the same town.

Witnesses say security forces killed at least three people when they fired on demonstrators demanding sweeping political reform in the southern city of Deraa Friday. Similar protests have been reported in other parts of the country.

REUTERS - Dozens of anti-government protesters in Yemen were shot and wounded in fresh clashes with police on Friday as President Ali Abdullah Saleh rejected a new deal to secure an end to his 32 years in power.

Saleh, facing an unprecedented challenge from hundreds of thousands of protesters, initially accepted an offer by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab states as part of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) to hold talks with the opposition.

On Wednesday, Qatar's Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani said the GCC would strike a deal for Saleh to leave.

"We don't get our legitimacy from Qatar or from anyone else...we reject this belligerent intervention," Saleh told a crowd of tens of thousands of supporters in the capital Sanaa.

AP - An anti-tank missile fired from the Gaza Strip struck a school bus in southern Israel Thursday, wounding two people, including one critically, Israeli officials said, prompting the fiercest Israeli retaliation on the coastal territory since a broad military offensive two years ago.

Israel unleashed airstrikes and tank fire against Hamas targets across the border, killing four people and wounding 32 others, including four critically, said Palestinian health official Adham Abu Salmiya.

He said one of the dead was a 50-year-old civilian who was sitting outside his home when he was struck by tank fire. Two other men, in their 20s, were killed near the southern Gaza town of Rafah. It was unclear if they were civilians or militants. The fourth man was a Hamas policeman.

"Hamas targets", they say.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

US President Barack Obama has met with congressional Republicans to reach a budget deal ahead of Friday's deadline, in a last ditch effort to end a political stalemate and avoid a government shutdown.

EL PASO, Texas -- An elderly Cuban former CIA operative accused of lying during a U.S. immigration hearing was acquitted on all charges Friday, with jurors taking just three hours to reach a verdict after enduring 13 weeks of often-delayed testimony.  Luis Posada Carriles, 83, broke out in a huge grin when the verdict was read and hugged all three of his attorneys simultaneously. One of the attorneys broke down in tears. (...) Posada participated in the doomed Bay of Pigs invasion, served as a 2nd Lieutenant in the U.S. Army and was a CIA operative until 1976. He then moved to Venezuela and served as head of that country's intelligence service. Also in 1976, he was arrested for planning the bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed 73 people. Posada was acquitted by a military tribunal, but escaped from prison while still facing a civilian trial.  He helped the U.S. funnel support to Nicaraguan Contra rebels in the 1980s, and, in 2000, was arrested in Panama amid a plot to kill Castro during a summit there. He was pardoned by Panama's president in 2004 and turned up in the U.S. the following March.

Peru, LIMA - Two people were killed and 44 others injured Thursday when Peruvian police sought to clear protesters occupying a bus station in the southern city of Mollendo.  It was 5:00 a.m. when police moved against supporters of the Islay province Defense Front taking part in mobilizations against a giant mining project, an assistant director of the Peruvian national ombud's office told Efe.

Unredacted: As international investors salivate over President Obama's pledge today to back a long-debated U.S.-Colombia free trade pact, the publication of our latest Electronic Briefing Book should be seen as fair warning to those corporations looking to set up shop in Colombia's always-uncertain security landscape. The Chiquita Papers, published on our Web site early this morning, provide an unprecedented view of the financial, legal and ethical gymnastics required for a business to operate in the Colombian hinterland, far away from the relative security of the Colombian capital, Bogotá.

Cambio, (Bolivia): The government and farmers organizations convened the Central Obrera Boliviana (COB) to resume the dialogue. On the first day of general strike with demonstrations, workers staged violence in downtown La Paz. The measure of 'a thousand corners', accompanied by dynamite, hurt and frightened people, who rejected the protest. Hundreds of patients were not treated in the health funds and there was irregular presence of teachers in schools.  Rural sectors strongly rejected violence, called for resuming talks, warning that they will come out in defense of the change process to ensure resources for productive development and thus avoid all the wealth going to benefit only the salaried sectors.

Interview with Edgardo Lander: The Path for Venezuela can not be Neoliberalism or Stalinism: There is a widespread impression in this society, not just by those of the opposition but also those who have supported a process of change in all these years, that we are in a situation of deterioration, that the opposition is gaining ground including among popular sectors (as we can see from results in the areas of Petare, La Vega, Caricuao for example). This fact can not be denied. In December, two documents emerged that were very important. One by some leaders of PSUV called A Proposal for the Present Emergency of the Bolivarian Revolution which, apart from being a critical reflection of many problems, also emphasises the lack of collective leadership and the absence of debate and collective construction of proposals. The other was an editorial of the Tribuna Popular (official newspaper of the Venezuelan Communist Party), where the main concern was the lack of collective leadership of the revolutionary process. This is what the Communists are saying. Whether it is said publicly or not, support for the government is reducing, and among social organisations and Chavista supporters there is a great sense of unease as well as demands for change and correction of errors.

A United Nations expert on human trafficking has called for New Zealand to act over allegations of slavery on foreign charter boats fishing mainly Maori quotas in the country's exclusive economic zone.

It comes as both Labour Minister Kate Wilkinson and Fishing Minister Phil Heatley deny there is any problem with the approximately 2500 men working in what have been described as sweatshop conditions on 21 ageing Asian boats.

The Sunday Star-Times reported last weekend that the men are beaten and forced to work for days without rest, earning between $260 and $460 a month.

Their catch, worth about $300 million a year, is marketed to the world as "Produce of New Zealand".

Matt Friedman, regional programme manager in Bangkok for the United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking, said: "This kind of thing must be stopped."

The EU-27 and 19 other European countries are preparing to launch intergovernmental talks that are expected to result in a legally-binding agreement on sustainable use of forests in 2013. In parallel, the European Commission is kicking off talks to revamp its forest policy.

Will they ban clear-cutting?

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The European Union has signaled its desire to link the bloc's emissions trading scheme (ETS) with a similar system in California, due to open next year.

EU climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard has been in California this week to discuss the idea with state governor Jerry Brown and Californian Air Resources Board chairwoman Mary Nicholls.

Turkey is planning to build a nuclear power station at İğneada, a small town close to the Bulgarian border on the Black Sea coast. No official Bulgarian reaction has yet been recorded, but Internet forums were overwhelmed with alarmed messages regarding the possible consequences of the decision.

İğneada, which lies on the Black Sea coast in the region of Thrace, is the safest location for the plant in terms of earthquake resistance, Turkish officials said, according to a report in Turkish newspaper Hürriyet on Wednesday (6 April).

A nuclear plant at İğneada would be the third such project recently announced by Turkey. Ankara has already approved plans to build two nuclear plants, one in Akkuyu on the Mediterranean and another one at Sinop, on the northern edge of Turkey's Black Sea coast.

The study, which the ministry received at the end of June 2010, came to the conclusion that 30% is possible without any special measures, 35% if politics changes the framework, and 40% if there are technological advances with off-shore wind and geothermal. he ministry first kept it under wraps, then published it on its website in February 2010 without telling the media.

Meanwhile, the Federal Environment Ministry was among the supporters of the recently launched Kombikraftwerk 2 research project, which aims to test supply on demand from 100% renewables (combining wind, solar and biogas) from the viewpoint of network stability.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

General Electric (GE) has unveiled a $600m investment strategy to beef up its presence in the growing solar energy market, announcing that it will build a 400MW factory to produce what it says will be the most efficient solar cell on the market.

The conglomerate said yesterday that a thin film solar cell made from cadmium telluride, which it has been developing with PrimeStar Solar, was independently certified as capable of converting sunlight to electricity more efficiently than any other solar technology available on the market.

I love the blatant marketing spin... it's record-setting in its own category only:

The record-setting panels, produced on the PrimeStar 30MW manufacturing line in Colorado, was measured by the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) as delivering a 12.8 per cent aperture area efficiency.

"This panel surpasses all previously published records for CdTe thin film, which is the most affordable solar technology in the industry," said GE in a statement.

News of the World publisher News International sought to draw a line under the phone hacking scandal today, apologising and admitting liability in a number of cases.

The company said it had instructed lawyers to set up a compensation scheme to deal with "justifiable claims" and said "past behaviour" at the newspaper was "a matter of genuine regret".

A Royal Navy serviceman was arrested today over a shooting on board a nuclear-powered submarine which left one of his colleagues dead and a second with life-threatening injuries.

Local civic dignitaries, including the mayor and council leader were visiting HMS Astute, which is currently docked in Southampton, at the time of the incident.

The Ministry of Defence said the shooting was not terrorist-related and there was no threat to the wider public.

Why do they speak about terrorism in connection with an attack on a military target?

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

One in 10 cancers in men and one in 33 in women across Western Europe are caused by drinking, according to new research.

While even small amounts increases the risk, drinking above recommended limits causes the majority of cancer cases linked to alcohol, experts said.

And even former drinkers who have now quit are still at risk of cancer, including of the oesophagus, breast, mouth and bowel.

Under the new law, which is about to go before parliament, cigarette packets will be stripped of all logos, colours, brand imagery and promotional text. Their only distinguishing feature will be the brand name, printed in a small, uniform font.

The aim is to deprive tobacco companies of the last remaining means of advertising their products, and to make cigarettes less appealing, particularly to young people. Drab olive-green was chosen because research suggested it was the least attractive colour to smokers. "We want to make sure that the glamour that might have been attached to smoking in the past is dead and gone," the Health Minister, Nicola Roxon, said yesterday. "Cigarette packs will now only show the death and disease that can come from smoking. The new packs have been designed to have the lowest appeal to smokers and to make clear the terrible effects that smoking can have on your health."

The myth that the Nazi-era German armed forces, the Wehrmacht, was not involved in war crimes persisted for decades after the war. Now two German researchers have destroyed it once and for all. Newly published conversations between German prisoners of war, secretly recorded by the Allies, reveal horrifying details of violence against civilians, rape and genocide.

The astronomer Royal has won this year's £1m Templeton Prize, an award denounced by many atheist scientists as an underhand attempt to promote religion by linking it with science.

Martin Rees, the former president of the Royal Society and master of Trinity College, Cambridge, was given the award for "exceptional contributions to affirming life's spiritual dimension" through his research and writings on cosmology. Lord Rees of Ludlow, who has said he holds no religious beliefs, defended the prize on the grounds it was awarded by a foundation which has given money to fund important science projects at respectable research institutions, including Cambridge.

...Jerry Coyne, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Chicago, said the Templeton Foundation is "sneakier than the creationists" by introducing the idea of faith into a discipline where faith is anathema. "Religion is based on dogma and belief, whereas science is based on doubt and questioning. In religion, faith is a virtue. In science, faith is a vice," he said.

Dust and dirt whipped up by high winds blinded dozens of motorists on a north German highway on Friday, triggering a mass accident, which killed at least five people and injured 60 others.

One of the capital's most popular and dramatic tourist destinations, the Reichstag cupola was closed to most tourists last autumn following concerns about a possible Mumbai-style terrorist attack on the building. Since then, only groups that have registered in advance have been able to enter the dome. Other disappointed visitors have been greeted with signs in German, English, French and Spanish indicating that the cupola is closed.

Starting April 21, however, individual tourists who have registered at least two workdays in advance by Internet, mail or fax, will be able to visit the dome. It will be open daily from 8 a.m. to midnight, with the last permitted entrance at 11 p.m.

Designed by the British architect Sir Norman Foster, the dome offers spectacular 360-degree views of Berlin, and a birds-eye glimpse of the workings of the Bundestag. A keen eye might even be able to make out German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the distance.

Cyberstalking is now more common than physical harassment, according to new figures due to be released next week, with many victims finding themselves pursued by complete strangers online.

The first study of its kind to look at the extent and effect of cyberstalking, taking in social networking sites, email and mobile phones, has revealed the profile of perpetrators to be radically different from those who pursue victims face-to-face. Victims surveyed by Echo (Electronic Communication Harassment Observation), at Bedford University, reported that their harassers were more likely to be a complete stranger or a casual acquaintance than a former partner.

Another major finding was that nearly 40% of cyberstalking victims are men. Past studies have identified women as much more at risk from face-to-face stalking.

Ireland's police chief has been forced to apologise for the behaviour of several officers who were unwittingly recorded joking about raping two women protesters in their custody.

Garda commissioner Martin Callinan said five members of his force had been confined to desk duties while the police watchdog, Garda Ombudsman, investigates.

"I am sorry for the offence caused to the community we serve and for the hurt and pain felt, in particular, by victims of sexual crime," Callinan said.

The apology came just hours after the two women protesters involved went public to demand an independent inquiry into the policing of oil giant Shell's contentious Corrib gas pipeline project, on the north Mayo coastline.

Most people are unaware of the existence or reach of this shadowy organization. The members of ALEC would rather you remain ignorant of their purposes. In fact, these folks are so uncomfortable with anyone knowing about them that a University of Wisconsin history professor is being hammered by the Republican Party of that state for suggesting in an entry on his blog that in order to better understand the actions in various states with new Republican governors whose radical legislative proposals are remarkably similar, it might be worthwhile paying attention to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

'the ultimate smoke-filled room'

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

Posted on an FBI website in response to a Freedom of Information request, the papers show that the agency was engaged at the outset of its investigation in searching for links between the death in the 1997 of Brooklyn's Notorious B.I.G, also known as Biggie Smalls, whose real name was Christopher Wallace, and the murder just a few months earlier in Las Vegas of another hip hop star, Tupac Shakur. Almost a decade and a half later neither the Los Angeles murder of Wallace or of Shakur has been solved and the twin mysteries of their violent deaths continue to grip the hip-hop scene.

The papers also confirm that the FBI received tip-offs from informants pointing to an officer with the Los Angeles Police Department. They describe what appears to be solid ballistic evidence linking the killing to the officer, whose name, like many other identifying details, was redacted from the documents before their posting.

...Other passages in the documents, when cross-referenced with information already in the public domain, make clear he is David Mack, who soon after the Wallace slaying was convicted and sent to prison for a bank heist. He was unsuccessfully targeted in a wrongful death civil suit by the Wallace estate in 2007.

EUOBSERVER / COPENHAGEN - How did the post of European president get to be created? And how did someone completely unknown to most Europeans end up in it?

This is the story revealed in a new TV documentary, 'The President', a film by Danish director Christoffer Guldbrandsen.

Yawn. For the upteenth time, he is not Europe's President, just the permanent President of the European Council – various other EU institutions had several Presidents before and currently...

...Tony Blair, previously Britain's prime minister, was for a long time seen as a serious contender whose political standing would give Europe a central role in the new world order.

Despite being centre-left, Blair had the backing of Nicolas Sarkozy, the centre-right French president. Ultimately however, Blair's own party allies in the Social Democrat group in the European Parliament blocked the road, the film reveals.

People in the EU had better start taking a hard look at what is happening here; this is your future if you don't wake the fuck up.

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre