Author Archives: Admin

Monday, March 9, 2015 Military forces from Chad and Niger yesterday engaged Boko Haram militants within the borders of Nigeria. This follows African Union endorsement on Friday of the creation of an 8,000-plus strong regional force to combat the threat posed by the militant group. Along with Cameroon, both Chad and Niger have previously engaged Boko Haram forces who have crossed their borders from the territory they hold in northern Nigeria. While all three countries have previously aided Nigeria against Boko Haram, the new attacks are Niger’s first push into foreign territory. The new attacks against Boko Haram follow its leader pledging allegiance on Saturday to Islamic State, as other groups have done. A Nigerian military spokesman, speaking to the BBC, dismissed this as a “plea for help”; Nigerian spokesmen cited recent military defeats inflicted upon Boko Haram as the reason for the militants’ announcement. Retrieved from “https://en.wikinews.org/w/index.php?title=Nigeria_allies_join_fight_against_Boko_Haram&oldid=3313733”

Wednesday, August 3, 2011 A 40-year-old man from the United Kingdom has survived an operation in which he was given a wholly artificial heart. It is believed that this is the first time in the UK that a patient has been able to return home with such an implant. Matthew Green, a father of one, experienced the operation in Papworth Hospital, located in Cambridgeshire, England. His health has declined over the last few years, and he has suffered a substantial heart disorder, identified as arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia (ARVD). He is waiting to have a human heart implanted. The disease would have claimed his life had the operation to implant a plastic heart not occurred. Approximately nine hundred operations of this nature have already taken place worldwide. Having survived the transplant, Green stated that the plastic heart will “revolutionise” his life. “Before I couldn’t walk anywhere,” commented Green. He described…

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Wednesday, July 12, 2006 Canadian media company CHUM Limited has announced that it has agreed to be acquired by larger rival Bell Globemedia Inc. for $1.7 billion CAD cash, bringing the CTV and Citytv broadcast-television networks and such specialty channels as MuchMusic, TSN and Bravo! under the same corporate umbrella. Shareholders will receive $52.50 per common share of CHUM and $47.25 per Class B (non-voting) share. The estate of the late Allan Waters, who died late last year, has agreed to tender all its shares to the bid, netting the Waters family nearly $450 million. In a joint statement, CHUM’s chairman, Jim Waters, said, “In Bell Globemedia’s offer, we not only found value for shareholders, but confidence that we would be placing CHUM in the hands of an owner with the financial resources and track record to continue to grow and build on our collective legacy.” Globemedia CEO Ivan Fecan…

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Wednesday, February 27, 2008 Visa, Inc. announced on February 25, 2008 that it would soon go ahead with a much-anticipated initial public offering (IPO) of about half its shares. This would make it the single biggest IPO in United States history, according to the regulatory filing the company made. Visa hopes to raise about US$17-19 billion, emulating its main rival, MasterCard Inc., which successfully put out an IPO in 2006. Shares are expected to range from $37 to $42 each. Visa is banking on a changing global economy which relies less on liquid cash and more on credit. Revenue at both Visa and MasterCard has climbed as consumers pay for more purchases with credit and debit cards, instead of cash. Cards are expected to be used for 55 percent of all U.S. consumer transactions by 2011, up from 40 percent in 2005. Analysts have suggested that current economic conditions, the…

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Thursday, August 16, 2007 The name Robert Cailliau may not ring a bell to the general public, but his invention is the reason why you are reading this: Dr. Cailliau together with his colleague Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, making the internet accessible so it could grow from an academic tool to a mass communication medium. Last January Dr. Cailliau retired from CERN, the European particle physics lab where the WWW emerged. Wikinews offered the engineer a virtual beer from his native country Belgium, and conducted an e-mail interview with him (which started about three weeks ago) about the history and the future of the web and his life and work. Wikinews: At the start of this interview, we would like to offer you a fresh pint on a terrace, but since this is an e-mail interview, we will limit ourselves to a virtual beer, which you…

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Tuesday, April 20, 2021 Wikinews extended invitations by e-mail on March 23 to multiple candidates running in the Texas’ 6th congressional district special election of May 1 to fill a vacancy left upon the death of Republican congressman Ron Wright. Of them, the office of Democrat Daryl Eddings, Sr. agreed to answer some questions by phone March 30 about their campaigns and policies. The following is the interview with Ms Chatham on behalf of Mr Eddings, Sr. Eddings is a federal law enforcement officer and senior non-commissioned officer in the US military. His experience as operations officer of an aviation unit in the California National Guard includes working in Los Angeles to control riots sparked by the O. J. Simpson murder case and the police handling of Rodney King, working with drug interdiction teams in Panama and Central America and fighting in the Middle East. He is the founder of…

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Sunday, December 17, 2006 Nobel Prize winner Professor Paul J. Crutzen has stated he has data to support his controversial claim that injecting sulfur into the atmosphere would negate the greenhouse effect. The data is intended to quiet critics of the theory he first discussed in the scientific journal Climatic Change in August, 2006. The 1995 Nobel Prize winner in chemistry stated “Our calculations using the best models available have shown that injecting 1 million tonnes of sulfur a year would cool down the climate so the greenhouse effect is wiped out.” The theory uses the idea that an added layer of sulfates in the stratosphere, approximately 16 kilometres above the earth, would reflect sunlight back into space and reduce the amount of solar radiation reaching the Earth’s surface. Critics have shown that the earth has struggled for decades to reduce sulfur pollution, and how it is a component of…

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