My Days at Kovalam

My Days at Kovalam

As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh arrives here on a four-day visit, a Sikh rights group has secured summons against him from a US court in connection with the alleged human rights violations in the counter-insurgency operations in Punjab in the 1990s.

The Sikh for Justice (SFJ), the New York-based rights body, is now planning to file an urgent leave "to effect alternative means of service" that would allow it to deliver the summons to the White House staff and members of Singh's security team when he is here. Prime Minister Singh arrives here today for a meeting with President Barack Obama.
Knowledgeable sources said it would be very tough for the SFJ to serve summons to Singh given the tight security around him. There are also procedural difficulties for the SFJ to get the necessary court directions issued for the White House and the Secret Service.
Ravi Batra, the New York-based attorney who represents the Congress Party in a similar case filed against it by the SFJ, termed it as a publicity gimmicks. "SFJ's 'red carpet' welcome, a lawsuit against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the leader of a free, independent and sovereign nation, is headline grabbing while insulting law, decency and common sense," Batra told PTI.
"American courts have tools to handle an out-of-control litigant, whose main goal is to use the court's ministerial act of accepting a complaint, with the USD 350 filing fee paid and then automatically issuing a summons, to falsely imply in pre-made press releases that a  Court had acted on some merits - when it did no such thing," Batra said.
The 24-page complaint alleges that Singh as the Finance Minister in early 1990s approved and financed the practice of "cash rewards" to members of security forces for allegedly killing Sikhs through extra judicial means to curb militancy.
The complaint also alleges that during his tenure as the Prime Minister beginning 2004, Singh actively shielded and protected the members of his political party who were allegedly involved in 1984 anti-Sikh riots. Sikh groups have announced to hold a "Justice Rally" tomorrow in front of White House during Obama-Singh meeting.
Justifying the filing of lawsuit, SFJ's legal advisor Gurpatwant Singh Pannun said the human rights violation law suit against Singh has been filed under Alien Tort Claims Act and Torture Victim Protection Act for funding several counter insurgency operations in Punjab.

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Obama, Iran's Rouhani hold historic phone call

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Barack Obama and new Iranian President Hassan Rouhani spoke by telephone on Friday, the highest-level contact between the two countries in three decades and a sign that they are serious about reaching a pact on Tehran's nuclear program.
The call is the culmination of a dramatic shift in tone between Iran and the United States, which cut diplomatic relations with Iran a year after the 1979 revolution that toppled U.S. ally Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and led to the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis in Tehran.
Obama has said for years he was open to direct contact with Iran while also stressing that all options - including military strikes - were on the table to prevent Iran building a nuclear bomb.
The U.S. president had hoped to meet with the relatively moderate Rouhani at the U.N. General Assembly in New York this week, but the Iranian side decided an encounter was too complicated, in what was seen by White House officials as an effort to avoid antagonizing hardliners in Tehran.
On Friday, however, the Iranians said Rouhani expressed interest in a phone discussion before he left the United States, according to a senior administration official. The White House quickly arranged the call, which took place at 2:30 p.m. (1830 GMT) and lasted about 15 minutes.
A source close to Rouhani said the United States had reached out after positive talks between Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif a day earlier.
Speaking to reporters, Obama said he and Rouhani had directed their teams to work quickly toward an agreement on Iran's nuclear program. He said this was a unique opportunity to make progress with Tehran over an issue that has isolated it from the West.
"While there will surely be important obstacles to moving forward and success is by no means guaranteed, I believe we can reach a comprehensive solution," Obama said at the White House.
"The test will be meaningful, transparent, and verifiable actions, which can also bring relief from the comprehensive international sanctions that are currently in place" against Iran, Obama said.
Rouhani, in his Twitter account, said that in the conversation he told Obama "Have a Nice Day!" and Obama responded with "Thank you. Khodahafez (goodbye)."
He added that the two men "expressed their mutual political will to rapidly solve the nuclear issue."
The price of oil fell on Friday as tensions eased between the United States and Iran after the Obama-Rouhani talk.
"The phone call was an important milestone - a calculated risk by two cautious leaders mindful of domestic constraints," said Yasmin Alem, senior fellow at Atlantic Council's South Asia Center. "More than anything else it shows the high level of political capital invested in a peaceful resolution of the nuclear crisis."
TABOO BROKEN
The telephone call, the first between the heads of government of the two nations since 1979, came while Rouhani was heading to the airport after his first visit to the U.N. General Assembly, according to a statement on Rouhani's official website.
"The biggest taboo in Iranian politics has been broken. This is the beginning of a new era," said Ali Vaez, a senior Iran analyst at the International Crisis Group.
Such a call could not have been imagined under Rouhani's predecessor, former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who antagonized Israel and the United States and denied the Holocaust.
A hardline website believed by Iran experts to be affiliated with Ahmadinejad, Rajanews, referred to the call as a "strange and useless action."
As president, Rouhani is the head of the government but has limited powers. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is the ultimate authority in Iran with final say on domestic and foreign policy, though Rouhani says he has been given full authority to negotiate on the nuclear issue.
Obama, who expressed willingness as a presidential candidate in 2007 to reach out to U.S. adversaries, nodded to that power dynamic in his remarks, saying both men had given signals that Iran would not pursue nuclear arms.
"Iran's Supreme Leader has issued a fatwa against the development of nuclear weapons. President Rouhani has indicated that Iran will never develop nuclear weapons," Obama said.
"I have made clear that we respect the right of the Iranian people to access peaceful nuclear energy in the context of Iran meeting its obligations."
Western powers say they believe Iran has been pursuing nuclear weapons for some time. Iran says its aims are peaceful and focused on energy production.
The Obama administration official said the United States had told the Israeli government about the Obama-Rouhani call. Israel is deeply skeptical about the shift in Iran's rhetoric and has warned its allies to be wary of Rouhani.
Rouhani was on a charm offensive during his week in New York, repeatedly stressing Iran's desire for normal relations with Western powers and denying it wanted a nuclear arsenal, while urging an end to sanctions that are crippling its economy.
OUTREACH
In his speech to the 193-nation U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, Obama cautiously embraced Rouhani's gestures as the basis for a possible nuclear deal and challenged him to demonstrate his sincerity.
However, the failure to orchestrate a handshake between the two leaders that day, apparently because of Rouhani's concerns about a backlash from hardliners at home, seemed to underscore how hard it may be to make diplomatic progress.
Iran and the United States back opposite sides in the Syrian civil war and have been at loggerheads for years over Israel, Tehran's support for Hezbollah militants in Lebanon and other issues. Washington broke off diplomatic relations with Iran in 1980 because of the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis. Fifty-two Americans were held hostage for 444 days.
Rouhani, who took office last month, told a news conference earlier on Friday he hoped talks with the United States and five other major powers "will yield, in a short period of time, tangible results," on a nuclear deal.
He said Iran would bring a plan to resolve the decade-long dispute over Tehran's nuclear program to an October meeting with the six powers in Geneva.
He offered no details about that plan, but emphasized that Tehran's nuclear ambitions are entirely peaceful.
(Additional reporting by Yeganeh Torbati, John Irish, Steve Holland, Mark Felsenthal and Marcus George; Editing by Alistair Bell and Xavier Briand)

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FBI releases video of 'delusional' Navy Yard shooter

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The FBI released surveillance video and photos of Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis on Wednesday and said he believed electromagnetic waves had been controlling him for months before the rampage that killed 12 people.

There are no signs that Alexis, 34, was targeting anybody in the September 16 shooting at the Navy Yard in southeast Washington, said Valerie Parlave, the FBI assistant director in charge of the Washington field office.

"We have found relevant communications on his electronic media, which referenced the delusional belief that he was being controlled or influenced by extremely low frequency electromagnetic waves for the past three months," Parlave told a news conference.

Surveillance video released by the FBI showed Alexis driving a rented blue Toyota Prius into a Navy Yard parking garage shortly before 8 a.m. Carrying a backpack, he then entered the Naval Sea Systems Command building, site of the shootings, through a door.

The brief video also shows Alexis, armed with a Remington shotgun and wearing dark clothing, descending a stairway and walking along corridors in a crouch position, weapon held at the ready.
People can be glimpsed at the end of one corridor. Alexis peeks around corners and, at one point, aims the shotgun into a room but does not fire.
Parlave said Alexis, a government technology contractor, had in his possession the shotgun, which had a sawed-off barrel and stock, and a pistol he obtained during the shooting.
'MY ELF WEAPON'
Scratched into the shotgun were the phrases, "End to the torment," "Not what y'all say," "Better off this way" and "My ELF weapon," photos released by the FBI showed. "ELF" is believed to stand for "extremely low frequency."
The photos also showed the backpack hanging in a bathroom stall Alexis entered before starting his rampage. He shot his first victim at 8:16 a.m. and police received the first emergency call a minute later from the fourth floor of the building, according to an FBI timeline.
Alexis, who acted alone, was killed by police on the third floor after exchanging fire with them for an hour, Parlave said.
The shooting spree raised questions about how Alexis was able to get security clearance to enter the base, despite a history of gun misuse.
Alexis had sought help for insomnia from two Veterans Administration hospitals. He also told police in Rhode Island he had heard voices and felt vibrations through hotel room walls.

At the Pentagon, Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter offered details on reviews meant to identify and close security gaps revealed by the shooting. His timeline included a Defense Department-wide report to be ready in December.

Carter acknowledged surprise at how Alexis' 2007 background check failed to mention a 2004 shooting. Alexis had used a gun to blow out car tires in Seattle three years before he joined the Navy and applied for a 10-year "secret" security clearance.
"What certainly caught my eye and the secretary's eye is exactly that kind of thing: evidence that there was behavior well before the Washington Navy Yard incident," Carter said.

Hewlett-Packard Co said it had terminated its relationship with The Experts, the subcontractor that employed Alexis at the Navy Yard.

The decision was based on what the company now knew about conduct by The Experts, "including its failure to respond appropriately to Aaron Alexis' mental health issues," said a Hewlett-Packard spokesman.
Hewlett-Packard did not elaborate.

The Experts said it was disappointed by HP's decision and noted that an HP site manager closely supervised Alexis.

"The Experts had no greater insight into Alexis' mental health than HP, particularly given that an HP site manager closely supervised him, including during the events in Rhode Island," it said in a statement.
(Editing by Scott Malone, Bernadette Baum, Andre Grenon and Gunna Dickson)

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Mexico storms death toll rises to 123, crop lands damaged

ACAPULCO (Reuters) - The death toll from a pair of storms that flooded much of Mexico rose to 123 on Monday, and large tracts of farmland were declared lost as the country cleans up some of the worst storm damage in decades.
Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, Mexico's interior minister, gave the new estimate of casualties from last week's Tropical Storm Ingrid and Hurricane Manuel at a news conference in the heavily damaged Pacific resort city of Acapulco.
He added that some 59,000 people had been evacuated from their homes as recovery efforts continued across the country.
The agriculture ministry declared 613,000 hectares (1.5 million acres) of planted land "completely lost" as a result of the storms, or about 3 percent of the country's total farmland.
It was unclear which crops were most affected, but a top official with Mexico's sugar chamber said earlier on Monday that the upcoming sugar harvest will be largely unscathed by the flooding.
In southern Guerrero state, the most severely hit, dozens of people were still missing and feared dead after a mudslide caused by torrential rains buried 40 homes in La Pintada.
Five corpses were dug up from the village on Monday.
President Pena Nieto said over the weekend there was little hope anyone had survived the village mudslide.
On Sunday, the president said Mexico's Congress will revise its proposed 2014 budget to allow for more disaster spending beyond the roughly 12 billion pesos available in emergency funding.
The government is expected to provide a preliminary report of the country's damaged infrastructure on Tuesday.
Mudslides and flooding buried homes and wrecked highways and bridges in all but five of the country's 31 states, according to government officials.
(Reporting by Luis Enrique Martinez

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NAIROBI: Kenya said its security forces had taken control of the Nairobi shopping mall where Islamist fighters killed at least 62 people, and that police were doing a final sweep of shops early Tuesday after the last of the hostages had been rescued.

There was an eerie silence outside the mall after a day in which gunfire and explosions were heard in the Westgate mall. A trickle of survivors escaped the building throughout the day on Monday, but the fate of people listed as missing was unclear.

Somalia's al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which began at lunchtime on Saturday. Kenyan officials say there were 10 to 15 attackers.
President Barack Obama offered U.S. support, saying he believed Kenya - the scene of one of al Qaeda's first major attacks, in 1998, and a neighbour of chaotic Somalia - would continue to be a regional pillar of stability.
Kenyan security forces believed the end was in sight for the siege at the upmarket shopping mall in the capital, saying its forces were "in control" as the ordeal entered its fourth day.
A government official said there was no resistance from the attackers late on Monday night after a barrage of gunfire and blasts throughout the day, but that the security forces were cautious in case some attackers were hiding in the building.
"Our forces are combing the mall floor by floor looking for anyone left behind. We believe all hostages have been released," the Ministry of Interior said on Twitter.
The siege has followed a pattern of bursts of gunfire and activity followed by long lulls.
Patronised by well-to-do Kenyans and expatriates, Westgate mall epitomised the African consumer bonanza that is drawing foreign investment - from West and East - to one of the world's fastest growing regions.
Al Qaeda killed more than 200 people when it bombed the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi in 1998. When fighters from its Somali ideological counterpart stormed the mall on Saturday, they hit a high-profile symbol of Kenya's economic power.
Obama, whose father was born in Kenya, said the United States stood with Kenyans against "this terrible outrage".
"We will provide them with whatever law enforcement support that is necessary. And we are confident that Kenya will continue to be a pillar of stability in eastern Africa," he said in New York.
Kenya has sent troops to Somalia as part of an African Union force trying to stabilise the country, which was long without a functioning government, and push back al Shabaab.
It has also suffered internal instability. President Uhuru Kenyatta, who lost a nephew in the weekend bloodbath, faces charges of crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court for his alleged role in coordinating violence after disputed elections in 2007. He denies the charges.
Kenyatta has dismissed a demand that he pull Kenyan forces out of Somalia, saying he would not relent in a "war on terror".
British Defence Secretary Philip Hammond said he believed six Britons had died in the attack. Other known foreign victims are from China, Ghana, France, the Netherlands and Canada. Kenyan officials said the total death toll was at least 62.
FOREIGN FIGHTERS
Kenya believes there are also foreigners among the attackers, with military chief Julius Karangi saying they came from all over the world. "We are fighting global terrorism here," he said, without giving their nationalities.
Kenyan Foreign Minister Amina Mohamed said in a U.S. television interview that "two or three Americans" and a British woman were among the attackers.
She told the "PBS Newshour" show that the Americans were "young men, about between maybe 18 and 19" years old. "Of Somali origin or Arab origin, but that lived in the U.S., in Minnesota and one other place," Mohamed said.
U.S. authorities are urgently looking into information given by the Kenyan government that residents of Western countries, including the United States, may have been among the attackers, U.S. security sources said.
White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said he had no direct information that Americans had participated in the attack, but expressed U.S. worries.
"We do monitor very carefully and have for some time been concerned about efforts by al Shabaab to recruit Americans or U.S. persons to come to Somalia," Rhodes told reporters travelling with Obama to the United Nations in New York.
Interior Minister Joseph Ole Lenku said the militants had set fire to mattresses in a supermarket on the mall's lower floors and his ministry later said the blaze was under control. Two attackers were killed on Monday, taking the total of dead militants so far to three, he told a news conference.
Speculation rose about the identity of the attackers. Ole Lenku said they were all men but that some had dressed as women.
Despite his comments, one intelligence officer and two soldiers told Reuters that one of the dead militants was a white woman. This is likely to fuel speculation that she is the wanted widow of one of the suicide bombers who together killed more than 50 people on London's transport system in 2005.
Called the "white widow" by the British press, Samantha Lewthwaite is wanted in connection with an alleged plot to attack hotels and restaurants in Kenya. Asked if the dead woman was Lewthwaite, the intelligence officer said: "We don't know."
A spokesman for al Shabaab warned they would kill hostages if Kenyan troops tried to storm their positions. "The mujahideen will kill the hostages if the enemies use force," Sheikh Ali Mohamud Rage said in an online audio statement.
From Mali to Algeria, Nigeria to Kenya, violent Islamist groups - tapping into local poverty, conflict, inequality or exclusion but espousing a similar anti-Western, anti-Christian creed - are striking at state authority and international interests, both economic and political.
John Campbell, a former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria, said he believed insurgents such as those who rebelled in Mali last year, the Nigerian Boko Haram Islamist sect and the Nairobi mall raiders were also partly motivated by anger with what he called "pervasive malgovernance" in Africa.

"This is undoubtedly anti-Western and anti-Christian but it also taps into a lot of deep popular anger against the political economy in which they find themselves, in which a very small group of people are basically raking off the wealth," he said.
(Reporting by Duncan Miriri and James Macharia; Additional reporting by Pascal Fletcher in Johannesburg and Steve Holland in New York; Writing by David Stamp and James Macharia; Editing by Kevin Liffey and Eric Beech)


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Google announces Android Kitkat, `Nexus 5' shows up!

The next update to Android OS will be Android Kitkat (Android 4.4). After the launch of Android 4.3, it was said that Android 5.0Key Lime Pie would follow. However, the latest announcement says that Google entered into a deal with Nestlé, the makers of Kitkat, and is coming out with the Android Kitkat. Image Credit: Sundar Pichai Earlier Android versions were named after desserts such as Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Froyo,Gingerbread, Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, and Jelly Bean. "As everybody finds it difficult to stay away from chocolate we decided to name the next version of Android after one of our favorite chocolate treats, Kitkat"said Google on its Android Kitkat page. As part of this deal, Nestle will promote the software by selling 50 million Android-branded KitKat bars in 19 countries, where purchasers have the chance to win a Google Nexus 7 tablet or Google play gift cards. This deal does not include exchange of money. Like most tech giants, Google is also looking to enter into smartwatch market, and analysts say that the new OS will support this venture. Nexus 5 shows up! Image: The Verge The Verge has published this photo of a Google employee taking pictures using a device, which might be the `Nexus 5'. The image is a grab from Google’s Android Kitkat promotional video. Unlike in the Nexus 4 devices, this device has a horizontal Nexus logo, which is similar to the one on latest Nexus 7. Let us hope Google will launch Nexus 5 along with Android Kitkat.

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Village genius rockets to NASA

NEW DELHI: First there was Kalpana Chawla, the Indian-American astronaut whose roots were in Karnal, Haryana. Now there’s 19-year-old Ashish Yadav from the state’s backwater town of Narnaul who’s on his way to the National Aeronautic Space Administration (NASA) of the United States. Yadav is among the three students selected from India for a three-year astronaut training programme in America, the entire cost of which will be taken care of by NASA. Yadav leaves next month.

“My dream was to go into space since childhood and that’s why I took physics, chemistry and biology with mathematics as subjects in high school,” says the astronaut- in- the- making. “Initially, I had set a target for myself to become a doctor, inspired by my cousin brother who is a doctor.

I appeared for Pre Medical Examination (PMT) this year after completing Class 12th with 84 per cent marks from Saraswati Vidya Mandir Higher Secondary School in Nangal Chaudhry village of Mahendragarh district. I was ranked 37th in India,” says Yadav.

Just the beginning

That was just the beginning for this bright young man.

“Since mathematics is also my optional subject, I appeared for the IIT entrance exam this year. I got an All-India rank of 112.

I was interested more in medical science and had zeroed in on the All India Institute of Medical sciences (AIIMS),” he says.

Yadav also cleared the Indian Institute of Space Aeronautics and Technology (IISAT) competition organised by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). “When I get selected for ISRO, I decided to choose this as a career and become an astronaut,” Yadav explains.

NASA selects aspiring astronauts on the basis of tests conducted by space institutions of various countries. This year, NASA has selected 10 students from across the world , including three from India. The other two are from Andhra Pradesh and Kerala, with Yadav in the first position.

“I appeared for a written examination to get selected in NASA followed by six interviews held at ISRO office in Delhi. I was quite nervous when facing NASA scientists for the first time but became comfortable later. The NASA scientists had suggested after the sixth interview on September 3 that I would be selected for their astronaut training programme and they sent me an email a day later confirming my selection,” says Yadav.

Yadav has been a model student since childhood. “My son has very good knowledge of all subjects. While he was studying in Class 2 in his native village Dhaulera, he used solve the questions of higher classes.

I then decided to provide him good education in the city school despite our limited resources. My husband, serving at a lower rank in the Army, was the only earning member in my family,” says Yadav’s mother Suman.

Hard worker

“As Narnaul is the nearest city and our district headquarter is at Mahendragarh, we had to move to the city and rent out a room so Ashish could get a quality education. He used to study six hours every day on an average apart from his school hours,” Suman adds.

Her husband, Radhe Shyam Yadav, got a job with the bomb disposal squad of the Delhi Police after he retired from the Army.

“I never thought he would achieve so such.

This is a dream come true for any father. I am quite satisfied with my son’s achievement and I hope that he will serve the nation after completing his NASA training programme,” Radhe Shyam says. “Some of the noted previous astronauts of Indian origin such as Kalpana Chawla or Sunita Williams were born in the US but Ashish has got on the same page as them while living and studying in a backward city of Haryana,” he adds with obvious pride.

Ashish Yadav has been honoured with the Pratibha Samman by Haryana government, Chief Minister Ashish came 37th in the all-Indian Pre- Medical Examination and 112th in the IIT exam this year

Minister Bhupendra Singh Hooda personally presenting him with a cheque for ` 1.5 lakh. Yadav gives credit to his family members but his role model is former President Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.

“Kalam sir had worked for the country as scientist and become President of India. I want to be like him,” says Yadav.

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