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Saturday, June 13, 2009

Yesterday, Norwegian news outlets reported that Defense Security Service (Forsvarets sikkerhetstjeneste [FOST]) had conducted illegal surveillance against the prime minister’s office and other government offices.

Kripos, a division of the Norwegian Ministry of Justice and the Police, did a police search of the Norwegian Ministry of Defence’s top-secret intelligence agency’s computer equipment in Jørstadmoen, after a request by the Ministry of Defense.

While remaining confident that the case will be investigated in a correct way, Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg stated to Aftenposten late Wednesday that “it’s important that the police now find out what actually has happened.”

Verdens Gang reported that to their knowledge, the surveillance happened in connection with FOST, having the responsibility for the computer security of key personnel within the prime minister’s office and other government offices. For practical reasons these people have been connected to the military secure lines. Sources with insight to the surveillance process explained to Aftenposten that when a possible breach of computer security is detected its protocol that the person be given a notice that he may be in process off or already have broken the security rules. A person, possible within the Prime minister’s office has most likely received such a note and has reacted to the fact that the computer traffic had been under surveillance.

Vice admiral Jan Eirik Finseth told Verdens Gang that the Defense security agency’s computer security section, reported that computer communication lines had been put under surveillance by military communications lines. Vice admiral Finseth stated to Verdens Gang that “the circumstances is of such a nature that the police [were] asked to investigate if anything of this may be illegal.”

When Wikinews contacted State attorney Petter Mandt, who leads the investigation, we received confirmation that a search in Jørstadmoen took place, but he would not comment on what was confiscated, if anything. Mandt also stated that they would not comment on any specifics or give any details on the investigation, but explained that for use of a police search there has to be more than 50% probable suspicion that something illegal may have happened. When asked if suspicion was that the prime minister’s office had been put under illegal surveillance, Mandt refused to comment and stated that he will comment on neither how many nor who the individuals involved are.

Defense political spokesperson for Socialistic left (Sv) Bjørn Jacobsen, told Wikinews that “it’s important to find out what, if anything has happened,” but that “it’s shocking that there even exist[s] a reason for a police search.” When asked what will happen if anything illegal is found to have taken place, Jacobsen responded by pointing out that in this case the prosecutors will have to decide on what to do next, but stated that “parliament will have to see if the law and regulations ha[ve] to be changed. It’s important to stop an eventual bad culture before it sticks to the walls.”

This is the second investigation of illegal government surveillance in Norway since the Lund commission’s report uncovered illegal surveillance of communist, socialist, and other persons, which the Norwegian Police Security Service deemed to be dangerous.

Wikinews was unable to get any comments from the Norwegian Military Defense when contacted.

Tuesday, March 8, 2005Genetic abnormalities behind the premature aging disease Progeria have been corrected in cells in a step towards gene therapy for the condition.

Affecting about one in eight million children, Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria (HGP) causes sufferers to rapidly experience symptoms of old age.

The average life expectancy of those afflicted is just around 14 years, with many dying from such age-related conditions as heart disease.

The disease is known to be caused by a mutation in the gene lamin A.

The mutation is thought to adversely affect the expression of genes by preventing appropriate genetic “editing.”

The inappropriate editing cuts exons—”sentences” of genetic information—too short.

Tom Misteli and colleagues of the US National Cancer Institute have now found a way to correct the editing error.

They did this using synthetic molecules called morpholino oligonucleotides that Misteli likens to a “molecular Band-Aid.”

The researchers say the discovery could aid the development of gene therapy for Progeria.

The research is reported in the journal Nature Medicine.

• Paola Scaffidi & Tom Misteli. “Reversal of the cellular phenotype in the premature aging disease Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome” — Nature Medicine, March 6, 2005
• “Ageing disease ‘gene clue’ found” — BBC News, March 7, 2004

Saturday, January 31, 2009

A local Swiss government has shown some bare cheek and has taken action, after hordes of German naked hikers rambling across the Swiss alps au naturel, caused indignation amongst locals.

Authorities in Swiss canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden have warned that starting from February 9, the government will impose hefty fines of 200 Swiss Francs (£122, €135) on naturists found walking or hiking in the nude without clothes in the picturesque mountains because of a recent influx of visiting German nudists.

The new ordinance is expected to be passed this spring. If it is approved by the local parliament on February 9 it should be effective on April 26. The Swiss canton aims to stop spread of ‘indecent practice’ by minimally-clad German climbers.

The problem started with a group of “boot-only hikers” who were stopped by the police in the Alpine region last autumn. They had wandered there regularly, proudly marching through nature with bare bums, and had also advertised what they thought was a naked paradise on the internet. But it was all too much for the Swiss.

A nude rambler dressed in nothing more than a rucksack and walking boots in the eastern Appenzell region was arrested and detained in the canton, but authorities were unable to file lawsuit because the act was not punished by law or ordinance at the time.

“We were forced to introduce the legislation against this indecent practice before the warm weather starts,” Melchior Looser, the canton’s justice and police minister, said. “Ultimately, in the summer lots of kids stay in our mountains,” he added.

In the guidelines imposed, arrested offenders who cannot pay the fine, will face legal action. The new enabling ordinance has, however, been met with protests by nude hikers. “We simply try to tune into nature. It’s the most harmless pursuit possible,” said Dietmar, age 58, a German lawyer.

German tabloid Bild Zeitung has editorially attacked Swiss intolerance and even suggested nudist alternatives worldwide, after hinting a Swiss tourism boycott. Local authorities of Harz mountain range in central Germany have also announced the openness to any visitor of an “official naked walking route” in nature’s outdoors.

Freikörperkultur (“FKK”), or “free body culture”, is a popular pastime in Germany. It is a German movement which endorses a naturistic approach to sports and community living. Behind that is the joy of the experience of nature or also on being nude itself, without direct relationship to sexuality. The followers of this culture are called traditional naturists, FKK’ler, or nudists.

The naked ramblers have hoped it doesn’t lead to another naturist-clothed ‘war’, like the one at a beach between German and Polish holidaymakers in 2008. Naturism has roots traced from the start of the 20th century. “Abandoning unpractical clothes enables a direct contact with the wind, sun and temperature”, naked hiker website nacktwandern.de stated.

But Markus Dörig, a spokesman for Appenzell Innerrhoden canton has defended the law, explaining that the “public nuisance” was a foreign import. “We have been receiving many complaints. The local people are upset and we in the government share their concern. How would one feel if one was to go walking in nature and suddenly came across a group of naked people? They are definitely not people from the area, and I think many of them come from Germany,” he noted.

“We are a small and orderly community and such things are simply out of place here. Perhaps in vast mountain areas naked people would not be much of a problem but here they simply stick out,” Dörig added. “I can understand that we all have to live in this world together,” said Barbara Foley, International Naturist Foundation member of the central committee. “But I would certainly enjoy doing the hike in the nude and I wouldn’t want to be deprived of it. It’s nice to feel the sun on your skin. Maybe they should designate a couple of trails and people would know they might come across naturists there,” she added.

Appenzell Innerrhoden (Appenzell Inner Rhodes) is the smallest canton of Switzerland by population and the second smallest by area, Basel-City having less area. The population of the canton was 15,471 as of 2007, of which 1,510 (or 9.76%) were foreigners. The canton in the north east of Switzerland has an area is 173 km². It was divided in 1597 for religious reasons from the former canton Appenzell, with Appenzell Ausserrhoden being the other half.

Appenzell is the capital of this canton. The constitution was established in 1872. Most of the canton is pastoral, this despite being mountainous. Cattle breeding and dairy farming are the main agricultural activities: Appenzeller cheese is widely available throughout Switzerland. Due to the split of Appenzell along religious lines, the population (as of 2000) is nearly all Roman Catholic (81%), with a small Protestant minority (10%).

The town, however is far from liberalism: the canton granted women the right of suffrage only in 1990 under pressure from the Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland and international human rights groups. The Alpine village of Appenzell Innerrhoden, being known for its beautiful landscape, has recently been declared a “naked rambler paradise” by a German mountaineering website, which was created by a lobby group of hikers.

Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Today H.E. Suzanne Mubarak, wife of the Egyptian president, and H.R.H. Prince Charles inaugurated the British University in Egypt. The visit started with a tour of the campus, where they saw a demonstration physics laboratory as well as seminars in engineering and business. This was followed by speeches in front of the main building (pictured) by the chairman of the board of trustees Mr Farid Khamis, H.E. Suzanne Mubarak and finally by H.R.H. Prince Charles. The ceremony was completed when Mrs Mubarak and Prince Charles unveiled a plaque at the entrance to the main building.

Saturday, April 16, 2005

A Paris fire in a hotel killed 22 people, 10 of whom were children, while injuring 53 — 11 seriously. The hotel was an overcrowded, budget accommodation type of housing. Most of the inhabitants were African, many housed by social services, according to an Associated Press report.

The 32 room, six-story Paris Opera hotel, was made to house 61 guests, but 90 were staying at the time of the fire, with 84 of them placed by city or state social services.

The fire is thought to have started in the breakfast room at 2:20 am Friday, local time.

Along with the Africans, who were mostly refugees, others wounded included French, Senegalese, Portuguese, Americans, Ukrainians, and Tunisians, according to a report from Turkish Zaman.com. The hotel is situated near to La Galerie Lafayette, Printemps shopping center, and Paris Opera.

It took nearly 250 fire-fighters to control the fire, and the number of casualties was high because of the single exit.

“It’s hard in that kind of situation to tell people to calm down. They jumped. People on the first floor threw their children out the windows,” Alfred Millot, head of the fire service at the nearby upmarket Galeries Lafayette department store, told Agence France-Presse.

“With our own equipment, we started fighting the fire from the ground floor. I came running and people were already jumping through the windows,” said Millot.

His store warehouse was used as a temporary morgue. Families were counselled and assisted in re-uniting by the Red Cross.

Saturday, June 1, 2019

At around 12:20 p.m. local time on Wednesday (1620 UTC) in the United States capital city Washington DC, Arnav Gupta, 33-year-old of Bethesda, Maryland, set himself on fire in a publicly accessible area called the Ellipse, between the south lawn of the White House and the Washington Monument. Gupta was transported to a local hospital and originally listed in critical condition, according to officials, with burns over reportedly 85% of his body. He died that night.

Emergency responders included the Secret Service and US Park Police. Responders drove their vehicles onto the Ellipse where an officer used a fire extinguisher to put out the flames. The Secret Service confirmed a single male was transported to a local hospital and the response took place within seconds.

On Wednesday morning Gupta’s family members filed a missing persons report, according to the Montgomery County Police Department.

Tourists captured pictures and video of the incident. Once the white extinguisher smoked cleared the man had collapsed. Surrounding areas were reportedly shut down. As of Thursday, no official statement had been made on the man’s motivation.

Gupta’s self-immolation follows another attempt in April where a wheelchair-using individual attempted to set his jacket on fire along the north lawn fence line.

Thursday, December 18, 2008

A team of eight transplant surgeons in Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, USA, led by reconstructive surgeon Dr. Maria Siemionow, age 58, have successfully performed the first almost total face transplant in the US, and the fourth globally, on a woman so horribly disfigured due to trauma, that cost her an eye. Two weeks ago Dr. Siemionow, in a 23-hour marathon surgery, replaced 80 percent of her face, by transplanting or grafting bone, nerve, blood vessels, muscles and skin harvested from a female donor’s cadaver.

The Clinic surgeons, in Wednesday’s news conference, described the details of the transplant but upon request, the team did not publish her name, age and cause of injury nor the donor’s identity. The patient’s family desired the reason for her transplant to remain confidential. The Los Angeles Times reported that the patient “had no upper jaw, nose, cheeks or lower eyelids and was unable to eat, talk, smile, smell or breathe on her own.” The clinic’s dermatology and plastic surgery chair, Francis Papay, described the nine hours phase of the procedure: “We transferred the skin, all the facial muscles in the upper face and mid-face, the upper lip, all of the nose, most of the sinuses around the nose, the upper jaw including the teeth, the facial nerve.” Thereafter, another team spent three hours sewing the woman’s blood vessels to that of the donor’s face to restore blood circulation, making the graft a success.

The New York Times reported that “three partial face transplants have been performed since 2005, two in France and one in China, all using facial tissue from a dead donor with permission from their families.” “Only the forehead, upper eyelids, lower lip, lower teeth and jaw are hers, the rest of her face comes from a cadaver; she could not eat on her own or breathe without a hole in her windpipe. About 77 square inches of tissue were transplanted from the donor,” it further described the details of the medical marvel. The patient, however, must take lifetime immunosuppressive drugs, also called antirejection drugs, which do not guarantee success. The transplant team said that in case of failure, it would replace the part with a skin graft taken from her own body.

Dr. Bohdan Pomahac, a Brigham and Women’s Hospital surgeon praised the recent medical development. “There are patients who can benefit tremendously from this. It’s great that it happened,” he said.

Leading bioethicist Arthur Caplan of the University of Pennsylvania withheld judgment on the Cleveland transplant amid grave concerns on the post-operation results. “The biggest ethical problem is dealing with failure — if your face rejects. It would be a living hell. If your face is falling off and you can’t eat and you can’t breathe and you’re suffering in a terrible manner that can’t be reversed, you need to put on the table assistance in dying. There are patients who can benefit tremendously from this. It’s great that it happened,” he said.

Dr Alex Clarke, of the Royal Free Hospital had praised the Clinic for its contribution to medicine. “It is a real step forward for people who have severe disfigurement and this operation has been done by a team who have really prepared and worked towards this for a number of years. These transplants have proven that the technical difficulties can be overcome and psychologically the patients are doing well. They have all have reacted positively and have begun to do things they were not able to before. All the things people thought were barriers to this kind of operations have been overcome,” she said.

The first partial face transplant surgery on a living human was performed on Isabelle Dinoire on November 27 2005, when she was 38, by Professor Bernard Devauchelle, assisted by Professor Jean-Michel Dubernard in Amiens, France. Her Labrador dog mauled her in May 2005. A triangle of face tissue including the nose and mouth was taken from a brain-dead female donor and grafted onto the patient. Scientists elsewhere have performed scalp and ear transplants. However, the claim is the first for a mouth and nose transplant. Experts say the mouth and nose are the most difficult parts of the face to transplant.

In 2004, the same Cleveland Clinic, became the first institution to approve this surgery and test it on cadavers. In October 2006, surgeon Peter Butler at London‘s Royal Free Hospital in the UK was given permission by the NHS ethics board to carry out a full face transplant. His team will select four adult patients (children cannot be selected due to concerns over consent), with operations being carried out at six month intervals. In March 2008, the treatment of 30-year-old neurofibromatosis victim Pascal Coler of France ended after having received what his doctors call the worlds first successful full face transplant.

Ethical concerns, psychological impact, problems relating to immunosuppression and consequences of technical failure have prevented teams from performing face transplant operations in the past, even though it has been technically possible to carry out such procedures for years.

Mr Iain Hutchison, of Barts and the London Hospital, warned of several problems with face transplants, such as blood vessels in the donated tissue clotting and immunosuppressants failing or increasing the patient’s risk of cancer. He also pointed out ethical issues with the fact that the procedure requires a “beating heart donor”. The transplant is carried out while the donor is brain dead, but still alive by use of a ventilator.

According to Stephen Wigmore, chair of British Transplantation Society’s ethics committee, it is unknown to what extent facial expressions will function in the long term. He said that it is not certain whether a patient could be left worse off in the case of a face transplant failing.

Mr Michael Earley, a member of the Royal College of Surgeon‘s facial transplantation working party, commented that if successful, the transplant would be “a major breakthrough in facial reconstruction” and “a major step forward for the facially disfigured.”

In Wednesday’s conference, Siemionow said “we know that there are so many patients there in their homes where they are hiding from society because they are afraid to walk to the grocery stores, they are afraid to go the the street.” “Our patient was called names and was humiliated. We very much hope that for this very special group of patients there is a hope that someday they will be able to go comfortably from their houses and enjoy the things we take for granted,” she added.

In response to the medical breakthrough, a British medical group led by Royal Free Hospital’s lead surgeon Dr Peter Butler, said they will finish the world’s first full face transplant within a year. “We hope to make an announcement about a full-face operation in the next 12 months. This latest operation shows how facial transplantation can help a particular group of the most severely facially injured people. These are people who would otherwise live a terrible twilight life, shut away from public gaze,” he said.