| U.S. government official, Chinese immigrants charged in espionage case
WASHINGTON A Defense Department analyst and a former engineer for Boeing Co. were charged Monday in separate spy cases for allegedly selling military secrets to the Chinese government, the Justice Department said. Additionally, two Chinese immigrants accused of working with the defense analyst were arrested after an FBI raid Monday morning on a New Orleans home where one of them lived. The two cases based in Alexandria, Va., and Los Angeles have no connection, and investigators said it was merely a coincidence that charges would be brought against both on the same day. The cases show "that foreign spying remains a serious threat in the post-Cold War world," Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein said in a prepared statement. The Justice Department was to discuss the charges at an afternoon news conference in Washington.
South African blacks say video painful
The campus was quiet Thursday a day after police used a stun grenade to disperse stone-throwing students protesting the video. White and black students walked to and from classes — but seldom together. A few police patrolled the campus. In the video, which was made last year but surfaced this week, the Afrikaans-speaking students refer sarcastically to the university's policy of integrating the campus dorms. University rector Frederick Fourie said he was reduced to tears by the student's duplicity. "Their actions were despicable," he said. Fourie acknowledged integration at the school was "not perfect." .
It’s official: Rockford lands Ireland flights
Twice-weekly flights between Rockford and Shannon, Ireland, will start June 26, according to Kenny Tours. The Maryland-based company signed a deal Thursday with North American Airlines to fly the route through Aug. 31, said Bob Nay, Kenny Tours' director of sales and marketing. The flights will be Thursdays and Sundays. Round-trip airfares start at $888, including taxes and airport fees. Six-night motor coach tours, including airfare and hotels, start at $1,489. Six-night bed-and-breakfast stays, including airfare and car rental, start at $1,489. The seasonal model is similar to Chicago Rockford International Airport's other international route, Apple Vacations' weekly flights to Cancun, Mexico, in the winter. But the Ireland flights will be on Boeing 757s with almost 200 seats, which would be the largest plane used on a regularly scheduled passenger route from Rockford.
Guantánamo and back: an interview with Moazzam Begg
Today, Begg is releasing a book, Enemy Combatant: A British Muslim's Journey To Guantánamo And Back, about his experiences. This happens by chance, he says to coincide with the release of Michael Winterbottom's new film, The Road to Guantánamo, about the three other British detainees, the "Tipton Three". The timing seems good: criticism of the Guantánamo detention centre is intensifying within the US, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel has called for it to be closed, and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair called it an "anomaly" that would have to be "dealt with sooner or later", after one of his ministers backed Merkel's call. So, might the detention centre be closed? "I don't think so. Closing it would be a huge embarrassment to the US, after almost five years of telling the whole world that these dangerous people need to be kept there," said Begg, speaking in London last night.
BN uses taxi drivers to spread propaganda
The Umno presidents meeting with the association of taxi drivers has now put us on notice that, the next time we get into a cab, well be getting a dose of Barisan Nasional propaganda from the drivers. Speaking at the launch of a campaign by the Association of Malaysian Taxi/Limousine and Hire Car Drivers (Pertekma) in Penang on Monday (25 February), Abdullah Ahmad Badawi hoped taxi drivers would help the government in explaining to the passengers on the issue of higher petrol prices and the efforts taken by the government to protect the people from the adverse effects (Bernama, 25 February).This is, of course, after assuring them that the government always looked for various ways to ensure that the people were not burdened by the rising cost of petrol and other goods, including providing free text books to school children, abolishing school and examination fees and reducing charges for treatment and health care at government hospitals.
Xbox 360 team skipped quality testing of console to beat Sony to ...
Last summer, amidst a flurry of reports from Xbox 360 gamers, DailyTech exposed retailers' estimates that up to one-third of Xbox 360 consoles experience hardware failures within the first year of ownership. Just days after the report, Microsoft extended its warranty to cover the specific hardware failure for three years from purchase. Now, six months later, a supposed Microsoft insider confirms that around 30% of Xbox 360 consoles, most based on the original 'Xenon' design, fail. "It's around 30 percent, and all will probably fail early," the source told 8Bit Joystick. "This quarter they are expecting 1M failures, most of those Xenons. Some of those are repeat failures." Although Microsoft now covers all Xbox 360 consoles for three years against the Red Ring of Death (RROD) – the sign of a hardware failure – there is no specific time frame for the defect to appear.
Local group's bid to save Sonics up to Olympia
A high-powered local ownership group says its $300 million plan to renovate KeyArena could convince the NBA to keep the Sonics in Seattle. Now all they have to do is convince state lawmakers to approve the idea before they adjourn next week. .
PHOTOS BY DREW PERINE/THE NEWS TRIBUNE
Almost 60 percent were eligible for free or reduced lunch. Almost 10 percent were bilingual. Our needs are broader, and because of that, we are reaching broader, she said. FEDERAL WAY This school district appears to offer an approach most similar to UP's, although its demographic profile is much different. Half of Federal Way's 22,800 students last year were minorities. About 16 percent were Latino; 15 percent were Asian; 14 percent were black. It created a community task force in 2001 to examine disparities in achievement. Among the programs is a Latino night school where students and their families can find resources, earn credits for graduation and take English classes. To address the gap for minority boys, Federal Way created the Heritage Leadership Camp.
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