St. Anthony Foundation provides hope
Friday, September 23, 2005 On the corner of Golden Gate Ave. and Jones St. in the Tenderloin, San Francisco, right next to the Civic Center you can see a throng of low-income and homeless people lining up outside of St. Anthony’s Dining Room hall which opens up it’s doors everyday at 11:30 a.m. Volunteers dressed in St. Anthony Foundation shirts help keep the lines moving as hundreds of homeless and low income people shuffle their way towards the dining hall underneath the watchful eyes of a small statue of St. Francis of Assisi. “There’s a lot of people who go hungry out here and it ain’t right.” says Jimmy Scott, a slightly brawny 44-year-old black man who has been living homeless in San Francisco for the past three years. “There are families out here with kids and everything and they have to walk around all night just to stay awake…
Thomson Corporation and Reuters agree to merge
Wednesday, May 16, 2007 The Thomson Corporation and Reuters Group PLC announced Tuesday that they have agreed to combine the two companies. The boards of both Thomson and Reuters will recommend the merger to their shareholders. The Canadian Thomson-family holding company Woodbridge, which controls 70% of Thomson, has agreed to vote in favour of the deal and the Reuters Founders Share Company, which controls a special share in Reuters, will also support the merger. Based on the TSX CA$46.36 closing share price of Thomson on May 14, 2007, each Reuters share would be valued at 691 pence and, therefore, the full capital of Reuters valued at approximately £8.7 billion. Cash requirements for the deal are to be provided by Thomson. Woodbridge will own approximately 53 percent of the combined company, other Thomson shareholders 23 percent and Reuters shareholders about 24 percent. The merger arrangement will leave two separate companies that…
Jade Rabbit lunar rover declared lost
Wednesday, February 12, 2014 Chinese state news today declared Jade Rabbit, China’s first moon rover, irreparably damaged. The Chang’e 3 lander, the first lunar lander for 37 years and of the third nationality, touched down and launched Jade Rabbit in December. Jade Rabbit was designed to spend three months seeking out natural resources but has not functioned since a fault was discovered on January 25. The probes have to shut down for two weeks each month to survive the “lunar night”, during which surface temperature drops to -180 °C or less. The first lunar night of the mission was weathered successfully but Chinese scientists suspected the rover had failed on the 25th when the second night rolled in. Communication could only be attempted when the night ended on Monday, but reactivation efforts failed and the rover is now confirmed derelict. State-owned Xinhua news agency blamed the fault on “the complicated…
Doha round of trade talks suspended after negotiations fail
Tuesday, July 25, 2006 The director-general of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Pascal Lamy, suspended negotiations in the Doha round of trade talks on Monday, after a meeting of six “core” negotiators India, Brazil, the United States, European Union, Japan, and Australia in Geneva failed to make any headway in reconciling differences over agricultural trade liberalisation. The US wanted cuts in import tariffs for farm products, which were rejected by EU, Japan and India, who asked for cuts in agricultural subsidies. Peter Mandelson, the EU trade commissioner, told the Financial Times: “If the US continues to demand dollar-for-dollar compensation in market access [cutting tariffs] for reducing domestic support, no one in the developing world will ever buy that and the EU will not either.” Brazil also identified the US stand on subsidies as the reason the talks failed. Susan Schwab, the US trade representative, said that the other countries sought…
Pupils fed through gates, school criticised
Friday, September 15, 2006 Schoolchildren at Rawmarsh Comprehensive School in South Yorkshire, England, are being fed fish and chips by their parents through the school gates at lunchtimes because parents do not believe their children are being given enough choice of food at lunchtime. The parents are standing outside the school gates in a cemetery to take the orders of food from the children, and then go and pick up the food for them. Parents say that this is because the children do not like the quality of food being served in the school cafeteria, and so the parents are only giving the children what they want – which is a hot and tasty lunchtime meal. Head Teacher John Lambert has lashed back at the parents, calling the delivery of food through the gates immoral and stating that it is not “helping the children or their school” by bringing the…
Jay Walsh named Wikimedia Foundation Head of Communications
Tuesday, January 8, 2008 This article mentions the Wikimedia Foundation, one of its projects, or people related to it. Wikinews is a project of the Wikimedia Foundation. Recently of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), where he worked in media and public relations, Mr. Jay Walsh was announced as the replacement for Sandy Ordonez as the communications officer for the Wikimedia Foundation on an internal mailing list on Tuesday, 8 January. “I’m extremely grateful for [Sandy Ordonez’s] hard work and excellent judgement,” said Sue Gardner, Executive Director of Wikimedia Foundation, in her announcement. Ordonez managed the WMF’s public and media relations from January 2007, and will stay on in Florida until the end of the month when the Tampa office is closed. “The goal is to give Jay a fairly long handover time. So until the end of January, please continue to work directly with Sandy, while she helps Jay get…
Romanian tourism to be rebranded
Friday, May 6, 2005 Romania’s National Authority for Tourism (ANT) announced that they would promote tourism in Romania through a new branding strategy, in collaboration with the United States Agency for International Development. The director of ANT, Marius Critonescu, said that the branding exercise will be “a significant component of the Romania’s development as a new tourist destination of international level.” He also added that the development of an integrated brand for Romanian tourism will promote a more positive image for the country, thereby increasing the number of tourists and investors. In recent times, there has been quite a lot of investment in “national branding”, especially in the field of tourism, as most marketing experts believe that branding for a product or a country is theoretically the same thing, and that the same strategies and approach should be used for both. Concerning the Romanian tourism rebranding, international tourism and marketing…
Russian mathematician declines Fields Medal
Tuesday, August 22, 2006 A Russian mathematician, Grigori (“Grisha”) Perelman, who is credited proving the Poincaré conjecture declined to accept the Fields Medal, regarded as the highest honor in the field of mathematics. The Fields Medal, often referred to as the “Nobel Prize of mathematics”, was awarded this year to Andrei Okounkov (Russia/US), Terence Tao (Australia/US) and Wendelin Werner (France) in addition to Perelman. The award was handed out by King Juan Carlos of Spain and is accompanied by a C$15’000 (approximately US$13’400 or 10’400EUR) cash prize (less than the one million Euros that come with the Nobel prize). Nominees have to be under 40 years, because the founder of the award, Canadian mathematician John Charles Fields wanted the medal to be a stimulus for future endeavours. Perelman submitted two papers in 2002 and 2003 outlining a proof for Thurston’s geometrization conjecture, which in turn, implies a proof for the…
Pakistan’s intelligence agency said to support Taliban
Sunday, June 13, 2010 A report from the London School of Economics claims that the intelligence agency of Pakistan, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has close ties to the Taliban in Afghanistan. According to the report, the ISI actively provides the Taliban with services such as funding, weapons, and the training of troops. Additionally, the report, which is based on interviews with members of the Taliban, says that numerous ISI officials are part of the Taliban’s council of war, the Quetta Shura, although some Taliban commanders say that all Quetta Shura members have ties to the ISI. A senior Taliban official said that “[i]t is impossible to be a member of the Quetta shura without membership of the ISI.” Taliban commanders said that the ISI has specifically provided support to or encouraged strategies such as attacking specific NATO military installations or infrastructure essential to NATO operations such as roads or bridges…
News briefs:August 2, 2010
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