Controversy is not leaving the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) poster boy Varun Gandhi. Hogging the limelight for sometime for his alleged anti-Muslim speeches, the young Lok Sabha MP is now caught in a row with journalists.
A group of Uttar Pradesh scribes Thursday accused Varun Gandhi, the BJP MP from Pilibhit of "misbehaviour" and sought security from the Pilibhit district administration while covering his programmes.
About 30 journalists from different media houses submitted a memorandum at the district magistrate's office.
"We have asked the district administration to provide security to media persons during programmes of Varun Gandhi," president of Pilibhit Journalist Association Mohan Kumar told IANS.
Kumar alleged that Varun Gandhi misbehaved with some reporters May 19 when they approached him for his comments over the BJP's poor performance in the state.
"Varun got angry and he along with his security personnel even attacked journalists of some TV news channels. Varun also damaged the camera of a TV journalist," Kumar said.
District magistrate Ajay Chauhan said he was yet to receive the memorandum. "From local newspapers I have come to know that Varun Gandhi allegedly manhandled some journalists," Chauhan told IANS.
"We will take steps accordingly after going through the memorandum," he added.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Two held for corporate blackmail
Two commoners tried to blackmail a Rs 150,771-crore corporate giant. They demanded Rs 50 lakh – Rs 10 lakh of that as initial payment.
The deal they offered in exchange: an affidavit in Mumbai High Court against Reliance Industries Ltd’s merger with Reliance Petro-leum Ltd would be withdrawn.
Jayendra Shah and Dilip Motwani are now in police custody.
The Reliance Group flagship, RIL, is India’s largest private sector enterprise and a Fortune Global 500 company.
An RIL spokesman told HT, “As this is corporate blackmailing, we filed a police complaint. They have arrested these two people.”
The police also suspect the two are not petty fortune hunters. Shah used to say during his threat calls to RIL officials that as he was assigned by some Mumbai-based people, he would need to consult them before withdrawing the petition.
“It seems a perfectly worked-out game plan. First file a petition, follow it up with letters to the Registrar of Companies and then leak the details to the media,” said the RIL spokesman. “Somebody is definitely trying to malign the group.”
The duo was produced in a local court and remanded to two-day police custody.
The deal they offered in exchange: an affidavit in Mumbai High Court against Reliance Industries Ltd’s merger with Reliance Petro-leum Ltd would be withdrawn.
Jayendra Shah and Dilip Motwani are now in police custody.
The Reliance Group flagship, RIL, is India’s largest private sector enterprise and a Fortune Global 500 company.
An RIL spokesman told HT, “As this is corporate blackmailing, we filed a police complaint. They have arrested these two people.”
The police also suspect the two are not petty fortune hunters. Shah used to say during his threat calls to RIL officials that as he was assigned by some Mumbai-based people, he would need to consult them before withdrawing the petition.
“It seems a perfectly worked-out game plan. First file a petition, follow it up with letters to the Registrar of Companies and then leak the details to the media,” said the RIL spokesman. “Somebody is definitely trying to malign the group.”
The duo was produced in a local court and remanded to two-day police custody.
'Dowager's hump' may bode early death
Technically, it's called hyperkyphosis; untechnically, it's called dowager's hump.
Whatever you call the condition -- an excessive forward curve of the upper spine often seen in elderly women -- it appears to be connected to a higher rate of earlier death in those who also have vertebral fractures.
In a study published in the May 19 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine, researchers at UCLA found that the greater the curvature, the higher the risk of death within the study period. This held true regardless of age, the problems caused by the basic spinal osteoporosis or the severity of the fractures.
Here's the release from UCLA;
the abstract from the journal;
basic information about the condition from osteopenia3.com;
and a blog, Dowagers Humps, that though not especially active, does appear to target folks looking for practical solutions and support.
As for what women can do to improve their quality of life, a small unrelated pilot study, also from UCLA and published in the American Journal of Public Health a couple of years ago, found that yoga might help produce better posture in women with hyperkyphosis.
Those researchers said such improvements could have included "increased strength and flexibility (attested to by improvements in physical function measures) and heightened attention to alignment (as reflected in women’s diary entries)."
Whatever you call the condition -- an excessive forward curve of the upper spine often seen in elderly women -- it appears to be connected to a higher rate of earlier death in those who also have vertebral fractures.
In a study published in the May 19 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine, researchers at UCLA found that the greater the curvature, the higher the risk of death within the study period. This held true regardless of age, the problems caused by the basic spinal osteoporosis or the severity of the fractures.
Here's the release from UCLA;
the abstract from the journal;
basic information about the condition from osteopenia3.com;
and a blog, Dowagers Humps, that though not especially active, does appear to target folks looking for practical solutions and support.
As for what women can do to improve their quality of life, a small unrelated pilot study, also from UCLA and published in the American Journal of Public Health a couple of years ago, found that yoga might help produce better posture in women with hyperkyphosis.
Those researchers said such improvements could have included "increased strength and flexibility (attested to by improvements in physical function measures) and heightened attention to alignment (as reflected in women’s diary entries)."
Two American 17-year-olds summit Everest, a third turns back
Two out of three 17-year-olds is not bad for Mt. Everest. In fact, it's an outstanding ratio.
Earlier this week, Johnny Collinson of Snowbird, Utah, made it to the top of the world's tallest peak, becoming the first Westerner to do so. A day later, Johnny Strange of Malibu reached the summit. Their view from 29,035 feet: absolutely stunning.
More recently, though, Erica Dohring of Paradise Valley, Arizona, abandoned her quest during what was to be the summit push.
This dispatch from Rainier Mountaineering team member Dave Hahn: "... Subtly at first, and then a bit more obviously as we came into our first rest break, Erica’s pace began to falter and things didn’t seem quite so easy any longer. This was perplexing at first, since conditions were perfect, the terrain was relatively easy and Erica’s health was excellent.
"As planned at this point of the climb, where the [Khumbu] Icefall steepens and the avalanche hazard to a group increases, I asked Seth, Melissa and Kent, along with Ang Kaji, to go slowly ahead. We’d stay in contact by radio. Erica and I finished our rest and moved upward, but by then it had become clear that Erica was losing confidence in her ability to climb the mountain
"Such moods come and go for climbers and I hoped this one would go soon. We determined to climb on up through the “Popcorn” section of the glacier and to reevaluate our situation at the Icefall’s midpoint. Through the Corn, I was happy to see that Erica’s strength and skills were intact… but clearly she had the weight of the world on her shoulders with some heavy decision-making going on. Her million dark thoughts were spawning a hundred or so in my own less nimble mind.
"I stifled the urge to `argue' Erica into an Everest summit attempt as we walked. I wouldn’t do such a thing for an adult… I certainly couldn’t begin anything of the sort for a seventeen-year-old. Everest is too dangerous a game… I’ve seen too many people die here."
Hahn concluded that the mountain had simply become too big for Dohring, and that she should be proud for trying rather than ashamed for turning back. She has vowed to return, though, and someday, most likely, she too will enjoy that splendid view.
Earlier this week, Johnny Collinson of Snowbird, Utah, made it to the top of the world's tallest peak, becoming the first Westerner to do so. A day later, Johnny Strange of Malibu reached the summit. Their view from 29,035 feet: absolutely stunning.
More recently, though, Erica Dohring of Paradise Valley, Arizona, abandoned her quest during what was to be the summit push.
This dispatch from Rainier Mountaineering team member Dave Hahn: "... Subtly at first, and then a bit more obviously as we came into our first rest break, Erica’s pace began to falter and things didn’t seem quite so easy any longer. This was perplexing at first, since conditions were perfect, the terrain was relatively easy and Erica’s health was excellent.
"As planned at this point of the climb, where the [Khumbu] Icefall steepens and the avalanche hazard to a group increases, I asked Seth, Melissa and Kent, along with Ang Kaji, to go slowly ahead. We’d stay in contact by radio. Erica and I finished our rest and moved upward, but by then it had become clear that Erica was losing confidence in her ability to climb the mountain
"Such moods come and go for climbers and I hoped this one would go soon. We determined to climb on up through the “Popcorn” section of the glacier and to reevaluate our situation at the Icefall’s midpoint. Through the Corn, I was happy to see that Erica’s strength and skills were intact… but clearly she had the weight of the world on her shoulders with some heavy decision-making going on. Her million dark thoughts were spawning a hundred or so in my own less nimble mind.
"I stifled the urge to `argue' Erica into an Everest summit attempt as we walked. I wouldn’t do such a thing for an adult… I certainly couldn’t begin anything of the sort for a seventeen-year-old. Everest is too dangerous a game… I’ve seen too many people die here."
Hahn concluded that the mountain had simply become too big for Dohring, and that she should be proud for trying rather than ashamed for turning back. She has vowed to return, though, and someday, most likely, she too will enjoy that splendid view.
K. Pattabhi Jois, leading teacher of Ashtanga yoga, dies at 94
Sri K. Pattabhi Jois, the leading teacher of Ashtanga yoga who is credited with bringing the practice to a mass audience and introducing it to the West, has died. He was 94.
Jois died Monday at his home in Mysore, India, after a short illness, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.
Considered one of the most physically demanding of yoga practices, Ashtanga presents six increasingly challenging sequences of poses. A student must show proficiency in one sequence before going on to the next. Only a small number of practitioners have achieved every level.
"The goal of yoga is to create a unity of mind, body and spirit, and each system has a different quiver of tools to get there," said David Swenson of Austin, Texas, who studied with Jois for more than 34 years and has written books and produced videos on the subject. "Some have likened it to meditation in motion."
Swenson described Ashtanga as "an ancient system that involves sequences of movement combined with breath."
"It is similar in some respects to tai chi in that it involves a set sequence of movement that you learn and practice for the rest of your life. Ashtanga has these different levels, six sequences; it is through the repetition of study that the magic [from within] is forced to arise," Swenson said.
Jois, known to his disciples as Guruji, or respected teacher, taught Ashtanga for more than 75 years after studying with Sri T. Krishnamacharya, who had learned the practice from his guru in Tibet, Yogeshwara Ramamohan Brahmachari.
According to a biography on his website, Jois was born in July 1915 in the village of Kowshika in India's Karnataka state. His father was an astrologer and priest. At age 12, Jois attended a yoga demonstration conducted by Krishnamacharya and asked him to be his teacher.
Teacher and student ended up in Mysore, where Jois had gone to study Sanskrit. Jois taught yoga at Maharaja's Sanskrit College for many years and later started the Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute, which is in Mysore.
In 1958, he wrote his only book on yoga, "Yoga Mala," which was published in India in 1962 but didn't find an English-language publisher until 1999.
His yoga classes drew a relatively small number of students until 1964, when Andre Van Lysbeth, a Belgian citizen, became the first Westerner to study with Jois in Mysore.
The first American students were Norman Allen and David Williams, who studied with Jois in the late 1960s and early '70s. In 1975, Williams and another early student, Nancy Gilgoff, brought Jois to Encinitas in northern San Diego County to teach. His four-month stay there is considered by many to be the true beginning of the practice of Ashtanga yoga in the United States.
Over the next 20 years, Jois taught widely in this country and returned frequently to Encinitas. It was not uncommon for hundreds of students to show up for his classes. Ashtanga has become popular among celebrities, with Sting, Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow among its practitioners.
Jois is survived by his son Manju, daughter Saraswathi Rangaswamy and two grandchildren, all of whom are yoga teachers.
Jois' funeral took place Tuesday. A memorial service is scheduled for May 31 in Mysore. According to Swenson, it will be attended by practitioners from all over the world.
"There is pain in losing him, as one would feel with a family member, but joy and revelation in the time we spent with him," Swenson said
Jois died Monday at his home in Mysore, India, after a short illness, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.
Considered one of the most physically demanding of yoga practices, Ashtanga presents six increasingly challenging sequences of poses. A student must show proficiency in one sequence before going on to the next. Only a small number of practitioners have achieved every level.
"The goal of yoga is to create a unity of mind, body and spirit, and each system has a different quiver of tools to get there," said David Swenson of Austin, Texas, who studied with Jois for more than 34 years and has written books and produced videos on the subject. "Some have likened it to meditation in motion."
Swenson described Ashtanga as "an ancient system that involves sequences of movement combined with breath."
"It is similar in some respects to tai chi in that it involves a set sequence of movement that you learn and practice for the rest of your life. Ashtanga has these different levels, six sequences; it is through the repetition of study that the magic [from within] is forced to arise," Swenson said.
Jois, known to his disciples as Guruji, or respected teacher, taught Ashtanga for more than 75 years after studying with Sri T. Krishnamacharya, who had learned the practice from his guru in Tibet, Yogeshwara Ramamohan Brahmachari.
According to a biography on his website, Jois was born in July 1915 in the village of Kowshika in India's Karnataka state. His father was an astrologer and priest. At age 12, Jois attended a yoga demonstration conducted by Krishnamacharya and asked him to be his teacher.
Teacher and student ended up in Mysore, where Jois had gone to study Sanskrit. Jois taught yoga at Maharaja's Sanskrit College for many years and later started the Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute, which is in Mysore.
In 1958, he wrote his only book on yoga, "Yoga Mala," which was published in India in 1962 but didn't find an English-language publisher until 1999.
His yoga classes drew a relatively small number of students until 1964, when Andre Van Lysbeth, a Belgian citizen, became the first Westerner to study with Jois in Mysore.
The first American students were Norman Allen and David Williams, who studied with Jois in the late 1960s and early '70s. In 1975, Williams and another early student, Nancy Gilgoff, brought Jois to Encinitas in northern San Diego County to teach. His four-month stay there is considered by many to be the true beginning of the practice of Ashtanga yoga in the United States.
Over the next 20 years, Jois taught widely in this country and returned frequently to Encinitas. It was not uncommon for hundreds of students to show up for his classes. Ashtanga has become popular among celebrities, with Sting, Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow among its practitioners.
Jois is survived by his son Manju, daughter Saraswathi Rangaswamy and two grandchildren, all of whom are yoga teachers.
Jois' funeral took place Tuesday. A memorial service is scheduled for May 31 in Mysore. According to Swenson, it will be attended by practitioners from all over the world.
"There is pain in losing him, as one would feel with a family member, but joy and revelation in the time we spent with him," Swenson said
Tiananmen Now Seems Distant to China’s Students
On April 30, the cellphones of the 32,630 students at Peking University, a genteel institution widely regarded as one of China’s top universities, buzzed with a text message from the school administration. The note warned students to “pay attention to your speech and behavior” on Youth Day because of a “particularly complex” situation.
Few students had to puzzle over the meaning. Youth Day, on May 4, commemorates a 1919 student protest against foreign imperialism and China’s weakness in resisting it. Seventy years later, in 1989, students from Peking University were again massing in the center of Beijing, demanding democracy. The student movement shook the ruling Communist Party to its core and ended with a military crackdown and hundreds of deaths.
And if a student today proposed a pro-democracy protest?
“People would think he was insane,” said one Peking University history major in a recent interview. “You know where the line is drawn. You can think, maybe talk, think about the events of 1989. You just cannot do something that will have any public influence. Everybody knows that.”
Most students also appear to accept it. For 20 years, China’s government has made it abundantly clear that students and professors should stick to the books and stay out of the streets. Students today describe 1989 as almost a historical blip, a moment too extreme and traumatic ever to repeat.
But whether democracy still inspires them is a more complex question.
Interviews with students and teachers at Peking University, as with experts on Chinese society here and abroad, draw a layered portrait of today’s students: disinclined to protest, but also lacking the economic grievances that helped ignite protests in 1989; proud of China’s achievements and flocking to the Communist Party, but seldom driven by ideology.
They are disturbed by government corruption and censorship and tremendously eager to study in the West, especially the United States. And despite the government’s attempts to wipe the 1989 protests from Chinese history, some have found out for themselves what happened. All but one of eight Peking University students interviewed for this article, for instance, said they had managed to download an acclaimed — and banned — documentary on the Tiananmen protests and view it in their dorm rooms.
“There is a stereotypical view that students are not interested in democracy. I don’t buy it,” Cheng Li, research director of the China Center at the Brookings Institution, said in an interview. “At the very least, they have a mixed opinion of the Communist Party.”
Xia Yeliang, a Peking University economics professor, said many students supported democracy in theory but did not want to risk their futures to fight for it. Students joke that they will get involved once pro-democracy forces gather steam, he said. “A rather high percentage of students are not interested in politics,” he said. “They say, ‘We know this is a good thing, but what relation does it have to us?’ They think about their personal affairs, how to get a job, how to go abroad.”
Even the mouthpiece of the Communist Party, People’s Daily, laments a general lack of idealism on campus. “Many university students are clearly very utilitarian in their thinking,” People’s Forum, a magazine published by People’s Daily, complained this month after a conducting a student survey. “Everything is based on ‘whether or not it is useful to me,’ ” the magazine said.
In fact, today’s students have more to lose than did protesters 20 years ago. Then, university students believed that their futures were endangered by a soaring inflation rate of 28 percent, rampant government corruption and shrinking job prospects, according to a 2001 book on the Tiananmen movement by Dingxin Zhao, a University of Chicago sociology professor. Many had lost hope in the government’s economic reforms.
Today, even students who criticize Communist rule are gratified by China’s great strides. “Sometimes we don’t like the policies of our government,” said Wang Yongli, a fourth-year physics major. “But on the other hand, nowadays we are proud of the country and the government because they have moved so many people to a better life.”
The Communist Party is careful to cultivate this image, while seeking to defuse longings for democracy by vowing to govern “democratically.”
Officials say they oppose Western-style multiparty democracy as wrong for China, but embrace the idea of consultation, public review and balloting under party rule. China will continue to open up the political system, step by step, as the country becomes wealthier and more stable, party officials promise.
1 2 Some China analysts suggest that student discontent could rise if the current economic crisis clouds their futures. China sends nine times as many students to institutions of higher education now as it did in 1989, and competition for good jobs is fierce. Nearly one in four graduates last year could not find work, Xinhua, the state-run news agency, reported.
But since 1989, Communist Party leaders have realized they ignore youth at their peril. The government is now trying to ease job anxieties with training programs and incentives for graduates to work in rural areas. “If you are worried, then I am more worried than you,” Prime Minister Wen Jiabao told one student group in December.
The Communist Party has also ratcheted up recruitment and political education, making college students the party’s fastest-growing segment, according to Susan L. Shirk, a political science professor at the University of California, San Diego. More than 8 percent of all students were party members in 2007, compared with less than 1 percent in 1989. At elite institutions like Peking University, percentages are much higher.
Some of those students echo the party’s line that Western-style democracy does not suit China. “China has a large population, and education has a long way to go,” said Song Chao, a Peking University ecology major. “Considering that, we need to put some regulations on people. The major task for China now is development.”
Others hope to nudge the party toward reform. “Of course, if we could become a democratic society, we would like that,” said another history major and party aspirant. “But this is not something you can achieve by radical means. What if there is chaos?”
But a majority of students seek party membership not as an ideological statement but rather as a means to a better job, the survey published by People’s Forum concluded. At Peking University, many students say they nap through the university’s much mocked, though mandatory, political thought classes. “Even the teachers know they are teaching rubbish,” one senior said.
Most students will make such statements only anonymously because government control of campus speech remains tight. Professors say some students are assigned to report to the administration if they hear teachers adopting antigovernment or antiparty lines. Most students interviewed for this article did not want to be identified, saying their comments might be negatively noted in their personal files.
Five years ago, the university shut down a computer bulletin board — a vibrant hub of information for 300,000 users — after the central government’s education minister complained that it did not always reflect “the right view.” Students say they are careful about what they write on the new, restricted and monitored board because their identities can be traced.
Surveys show four of five university students still rely on China’s heavily censored media for their news. But in a digital age when nearly 70,000 Chinese students are studying in the United States and roughly 163,000 foreign students study at Chinese universities, walls against information are porous.
One senior recalled an excruciating roundtable discussion with foreign journalists who visited Peking University in 2007 and asked about the government crackdown on student demonstrators in 1989. “They always ask about this June 4 incident, and we just keep silent,” she said. “It is not because we don’t want to talk. It is because we have no idea what exactly happened!”
“I felt a little bit humiliated because we don’t know our own history,” she said. “So I went to the library and I read about June 4. Basically, everything was written by foreign journalists.”
The restrictions on public debate can reduce even political controversies on Peking University’s own campus to the status of rumors. Two Peking University professors were among the first to sign Charter 08, an online pro-democracy manifesto released in December and backed by many intellectuals.
After signing, Professor Xia, the economist, said he was forced to resign from positions at two research institutes. His fellow signer, He Weifang, a celebrated law professor, was transferred to an obscure college in China’s far west. Professor He’s exile was news overseas. But much like the coming anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown, it drew little notice from students.
One student came to the professor’s defense with an anonymous post on the campus’s computer bulletin board. “The day will come,” he wrote, “when Professor He can go where he wants.”
Few students had to puzzle over the meaning. Youth Day, on May 4, commemorates a 1919 student protest against foreign imperialism and China’s weakness in resisting it. Seventy years later, in 1989, students from Peking University were again massing in the center of Beijing, demanding democracy. The student movement shook the ruling Communist Party to its core and ended with a military crackdown and hundreds of deaths.
And if a student today proposed a pro-democracy protest?
“People would think he was insane,” said one Peking University history major in a recent interview. “You know where the line is drawn. You can think, maybe talk, think about the events of 1989. You just cannot do something that will have any public influence. Everybody knows that.”
Most students also appear to accept it. For 20 years, China’s government has made it abundantly clear that students and professors should stick to the books and stay out of the streets. Students today describe 1989 as almost a historical blip, a moment too extreme and traumatic ever to repeat.
But whether democracy still inspires them is a more complex question.
Interviews with students and teachers at Peking University, as with experts on Chinese society here and abroad, draw a layered portrait of today’s students: disinclined to protest, but also lacking the economic grievances that helped ignite protests in 1989; proud of China’s achievements and flocking to the Communist Party, but seldom driven by ideology.
They are disturbed by government corruption and censorship and tremendously eager to study in the West, especially the United States. And despite the government’s attempts to wipe the 1989 protests from Chinese history, some have found out for themselves what happened. All but one of eight Peking University students interviewed for this article, for instance, said they had managed to download an acclaimed — and banned — documentary on the Tiananmen protests and view it in their dorm rooms.
“There is a stereotypical view that students are not interested in democracy. I don’t buy it,” Cheng Li, research director of the China Center at the Brookings Institution, said in an interview. “At the very least, they have a mixed opinion of the Communist Party.”
Xia Yeliang, a Peking University economics professor, said many students supported democracy in theory but did not want to risk their futures to fight for it. Students joke that they will get involved once pro-democracy forces gather steam, he said. “A rather high percentage of students are not interested in politics,” he said. “They say, ‘We know this is a good thing, but what relation does it have to us?’ They think about their personal affairs, how to get a job, how to go abroad.”
Even the mouthpiece of the Communist Party, People’s Daily, laments a general lack of idealism on campus. “Many university students are clearly very utilitarian in their thinking,” People’s Forum, a magazine published by People’s Daily, complained this month after a conducting a student survey. “Everything is based on ‘whether or not it is useful to me,’ ” the magazine said.
In fact, today’s students have more to lose than did protesters 20 years ago. Then, university students believed that their futures were endangered by a soaring inflation rate of 28 percent, rampant government corruption and shrinking job prospects, according to a 2001 book on the Tiananmen movement by Dingxin Zhao, a University of Chicago sociology professor. Many had lost hope in the government’s economic reforms.
Today, even students who criticize Communist rule are gratified by China’s great strides. “Sometimes we don’t like the policies of our government,” said Wang Yongli, a fourth-year physics major. “But on the other hand, nowadays we are proud of the country and the government because they have moved so many people to a better life.”
The Communist Party is careful to cultivate this image, while seeking to defuse longings for democracy by vowing to govern “democratically.”
Officials say they oppose Western-style multiparty democracy as wrong for China, but embrace the idea of consultation, public review and balloting under party rule. China will continue to open up the political system, step by step, as the country becomes wealthier and more stable, party officials promise.
1 2 Some China analysts suggest that student discontent could rise if the current economic crisis clouds their futures. China sends nine times as many students to institutions of higher education now as it did in 1989, and competition for good jobs is fierce. Nearly one in four graduates last year could not find work, Xinhua, the state-run news agency, reported.
But since 1989, Communist Party leaders have realized they ignore youth at their peril. The government is now trying to ease job anxieties with training programs and incentives for graduates to work in rural areas. “If you are worried, then I am more worried than you,” Prime Minister Wen Jiabao told one student group in December.
The Communist Party has also ratcheted up recruitment and political education, making college students the party’s fastest-growing segment, according to Susan L. Shirk, a political science professor at the University of California, San Diego. More than 8 percent of all students were party members in 2007, compared with less than 1 percent in 1989. At elite institutions like Peking University, percentages are much higher.
Some of those students echo the party’s line that Western-style democracy does not suit China. “China has a large population, and education has a long way to go,” said Song Chao, a Peking University ecology major. “Considering that, we need to put some regulations on people. The major task for China now is development.”
Others hope to nudge the party toward reform. “Of course, if we could become a democratic society, we would like that,” said another history major and party aspirant. “But this is not something you can achieve by radical means. What if there is chaos?”
But a majority of students seek party membership not as an ideological statement but rather as a means to a better job, the survey published by People’s Forum concluded. At Peking University, many students say they nap through the university’s much mocked, though mandatory, political thought classes. “Even the teachers know they are teaching rubbish,” one senior said.
Most students will make such statements only anonymously because government control of campus speech remains tight. Professors say some students are assigned to report to the administration if they hear teachers adopting antigovernment or antiparty lines. Most students interviewed for this article did not want to be identified, saying their comments might be negatively noted in their personal files.
Five years ago, the university shut down a computer bulletin board — a vibrant hub of information for 300,000 users — after the central government’s education minister complained that it did not always reflect “the right view.” Students say they are careful about what they write on the new, restricted and monitored board because their identities can be traced.
Surveys show four of five university students still rely on China’s heavily censored media for their news. But in a digital age when nearly 70,000 Chinese students are studying in the United States and roughly 163,000 foreign students study at Chinese universities, walls against information are porous.
One senior recalled an excruciating roundtable discussion with foreign journalists who visited Peking University in 2007 and asked about the government crackdown on student demonstrators in 1989. “They always ask about this June 4 incident, and we just keep silent,” she said. “It is not because we don’t want to talk. It is because we have no idea what exactly happened!”
“I felt a little bit humiliated because we don’t know our own history,” she said. “So I went to the library and I read about June 4. Basically, everything was written by foreign journalists.”
The restrictions on public debate can reduce even political controversies on Peking University’s own campus to the status of rumors. Two Peking University professors were among the first to sign Charter 08, an online pro-democracy manifesto released in December and backed by many intellectuals.
After signing, Professor Xia, the economist, said he was forced to resign from positions at two research institutes. His fellow signer, He Weifang, a celebrated law professor, was transferred to an obscure college in China’s far west. Professor He’s exile was news overseas. But much like the coming anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown, it drew little notice from students.
One student came to the professor’s defense with an anonymous post on the campus’s computer bulletin board. “The day will come,” he wrote, “when Professor He can go where he wants.”
N.Y. Bomb Plot Suspects Acted Alone, Police Say
The four men arrested Wednesday night in what the authorities said was a plot to bomb two synagogues in the Bronx and shoot down military planes at an Air National Guard base in Newburgh, N.Y. were petty criminals who appeared to be acting alone, not in concert with any terrorist organization, the New York City police commissioner said Thursday.
The men were arrested in an elaborate sting operation at around 9 p.m. on Wednesday after planting what they believed to be bombs in cars outside the Riverdale Temple, a Reform synagogue, and the nearby Riverdale Jewish Center, an Orthodox synagogue. Once the explosives were planted, the men planned to drive to the National Guard base to shoot down military aircraft with a Stinger surface-to-air missile while detonating the bombs with a remote device.
The men did not know that the bombs, obtained with the help of an informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, were fake, and that the missile was incapable of being fired.
In a news conference at the Riverdale Jewish Center, one of the two synagogues said to be the targets of the plot, the commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly, offered new details about the four defendants — James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen — three of whom were arraigned in Federal District Court in White Plains, N.Y., on Thursday.
“It’s hard to envision a more chilling plot,” Eric Snyder, an assistant United States attorney, said at the arraignment. He added, “These are extremely violent men. These are men who eagerly embraced an opportunity” to “bring deaths to Jews.”
They were ordered to be held at a Westchester County jail, and their lawyers declined to file bail applications.
The men, all of whom live in Newburgh, about 60 miles north of New York City, had met in prison. Mr. Cromitie, 53, who authorities described as the plot’s leader, had lived in Brooklyn and had as many as 27 arrests for minor crimes both in upstate New York and in New York City, Mr. Kelly said. Mr. Cromitie, David Williams, and Onta Williams were native-born Americans, while Mr. Payen was born in Haiti and is a Haitian citizen.
The four men arrested are all Muslim, a law enforcement official said. Mr. Cromitie, whose parents had lived in Afghanistan before his birth, had told the informant that he was upset about the war in Afghanistan and that that he wanted to do “something to America.” Mr. Cromitie stated “the best target” — the World Trade Center — “was hit already,” according to the complaint.
Mr. Kelly said: “They stated that they wanted to commit jihad. They were disturbed about what was happening in Afghanistan and Pakistan, that Muslims were being killed. They were making statements that Jews were killed in this attack and that would be all right — that sort of thing.”
“It speaks to our concern about homegrown terrorism,” Mr. Kelly said.
In an interview on Thursday, Mr. Cromitie’s sister, Wanda Cromitie, said she was shocked to learn of her brother’s arrest while watching television this morning. She said she was unaware that her brother may have had extreme political views, and that she had last spoken to him about two years ago when she thought he was working at a Wal-Mart or Kmart store.
“Right now, to me he’s, like, the dumbest person I ever came in contact with in my life,” Ms. Cromitie said.
She added that as far as she knew, he was not a Muslim, but said “they do a little time in jail and they don’t eat pork no more.”
At the Masjid al-Ikhlas mosque in Newburgh where the men first met the F.B.I. informant, they were not considered devoted members, said an imam at the mosque, Salahuddin Mustafa. He also said that the man he believes was the informant showed up about two years ago and started inviting people to meals, where he would talk about jihad and violence. The imam and others believed the man was a government agent and steered clear of him, he said, but Mr. Cromitie apparently took the bait.
An assistant imam at the mosque, Hamin Rashada, said that another one of the four men, Mr. Payen, seemed disturbed. Mr. Payen often talked in circles, showed signs of paranoia and kept bottles of urine in a messy apartment.
“He has some very serious psychological problems,” Mr. Rashada said
1 2 3 The arrests capped what officials described as a “painstaking investigation” that began in June 2008, involving an F.B.I. agent who had been told by the federal informant of the men’s desire to attack targets in America. The informant had been cooperating with the authorities since 2002, when he pleaded guilty to taking part in an unrelated fraud scheme and was sentenced to five years of probation.
The charges against the four men represent some of the most significant allegations of domestic terrorism in some time, and come as President Obama grapples with the question of how to handle detainees at the Guantánamo Bay camp in Cuba. He laid out his policy in a speech Thursday in Washington.
According to the criminal complaint, Mr. Cromitie and the three other men, who were in their 20s and 30s, selected the synagogues and the air base as their targets in April. On May 6, the defendants traveled to a warehouse in Connecticut to obtain what they believed was a surface-to-air guided-missile system and three improvised explosive devices, all of which were actually incapable of being fired or detonated. The men then brought the weapons back to a storage facility in Newburgh, the criminal complaint said.
Rabbi Jonathan I. Rosenblatt, the senior rabbi at the Riverdale Jewish Center, said the police informed him on Wednesday evening that his synagogue was a target of the plot, as well as the Riverdale Temple, a short distance away, on Independence Avenue. Outside the synagogues on Wednesday night, the streets were eerily quiet.
Rabbi Rosenblatt said in a phone interview Wednesday that he took the news with “shock, surprise — a sense of disbelief that something which is supposed to belong to the world of front pages and the evening news had invaded the quiet world of our synagogue.”
Jonathan Mark, associate editor of The Jewish Week newspaper who grew up in Riverdale, said it would have been the third plot in the past decade against the synagogues in Riverdale.
The plot unfolded Wednesday night as one of the suspects placed what he believed were homemade bombs — each equipped with about 37 pounds of inert C-4 plastic explosives — into separate vehicles parked outside the synagogues. The other three suspects served as lookouts, Mr. Kelly said.
“There was a driver who was a cooperator, and there was the individual who placed the bombs in the vehicle, and then there were three lookouts,” Mr. Kelly said. “As everyone was going back to the car, that is when the signal was given to the emergency service officers to move in.”
An 18-wheel New York Police Department vehicle — known as a “low-boy” — blocked the suspects’ black sport utility vehicle at 237th Street and Riverdale Avenue. The F.B.I. informer also served as the driver of the suspects’ S.U.V., Mr. Kelly said.
Another armored vehicle arrived and officers from the department’s Emergency Service Unit smashed the blackened windows of the S.U.V., removed the men from the vehicle, and handcuffed them on the ground. None offered resistance.
Other police officers, along with members of the Joint Terrorist Task Force, the F.B.I., and the state police, were also on hand, and “moved in and took those individuals away,” Mr. Kelly said. Three of the four men were escorted by federal agents from Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan around 1 a.m. Thursday. They were handcuffed and did not respond to reporters’ questions as they were loaded into the back of vehicles to be taken to the nearby Metropolitan Correctional Center. There, they emerged one by one.
Mr. Cromitie, who was wearing a dark blue shirt and jeans, gazed at the assembled reporters and photographers but again did not respond to questions. David and Onta Williams also did not answer questions as they quickly walked by, staring at the ground. A federal law enforcement official described the plot as “aspirational” — meaning that the suspects wanted to do something but had no weapons or explosives — and described the operation as a sting with a cooperator within the group.
“It was fully controlled at all times,” a law enforcement official said.
Mr. Kelly told Jewish leaders Wednesday evening that the attackers planned simultaneous attacks. After the men left the bombs in cars in front of the two synagogues, they planned to drive back to Newburgh and retrieve cellphone-detonating devices and then proceed with the attack on the air base — simultaneously shooting down aircraft while remotely setting off the devices in the carsStewart International Airport is used by the New York Air National Guard and United States Air Force, according to the complaint, and it stores aircraft used to transport military supplies and personnel to the military in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The shadowy figure of the F.B.I. informant is, in many ways, a driving force of the plot laid out by prosecutors. The informant, who has been cooperating with the F.B.I. for the past six years, first met with Mr. Cromitie at the Masjid al-Ikhlas, a mosque in Newburgh, in June 2008. At that time, Mr. Cromitie told the informant that he was interested in returning to Afghanistan. Mr. Cromitie spoke about how, if he were to die a martyr, he would go to paradise, the complaint said.
A month later, the informant lied to Mr. Cromitie, telling him that he was a member of Jaish al-Mohammed, a terrorist organization based in Pakistan. Mr. Cromitie said he would be interested in joining up “to do jihad.” The informant, who audio and video taped many of his meetings with the defendants, later told them that the surface-to-air missiles and explosives were provided by the terrorist group.
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and elected officials joined Mr. Kelly at the news conference on Thursday morning, which was held as worshipers arrived for morning services.
The mayor praised the Police Department, which worked with the F.B.I. and other agencies on the case, and described the disruption of the terror plot as a frightening but exceptional occurrence. “Most people in New York City want to live together, work together, and I think we’re as safe today as we’ve ever been before,” the mayor said.
Political leaders responded to the news of the arrests with statements expressing relief.
State Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, a Bronx Democrat who represents Riverdale, and is a member of the congregation at the Riverdale Temple, also praised law enforcement authorities for their efforts.
“I think most people will agree that we’re very angry, but very sad, that this kind of plot would take place in our community,” he said. “There are people out there motivated by religious hatred, hatred against Jews frankly, but the good news is that the N.Y.P.D. and F.B.I. were on top of this from the very beginning.”
The men were arrested in an elaborate sting operation at around 9 p.m. on Wednesday after planting what they believed to be bombs in cars outside the Riverdale Temple, a Reform synagogue, and the nearby Riverdale Jewish Center, an Orthodox synagogue. Once the explosives were planted, the men planned to drive to the National Guard base to shoot down military aircraft with a Stinger surface-to-air missile while detonating the bombs with a remote device.
The men did not know that the bombs, obtained with the help of an informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, were fake, and that the missile was incapable of being fired.
In a news conference at the Riverdale Jewish Center, one of the two synagogues said to be the targets of the plot, the commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly, offered new details about the four defendants — James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen — three of whom were arraigned in Federal District Court in White Plains, N.Y., on Thursday.
“It’s hard to envision a more chilling plot,” Eric Snyder, an assistant United States attorney, said at the arraignment. He added, “These are extremely violent men. These are men who eagerly embraced an opportunity” to “bring deaths to Jews.”
They were ordered to be held at a Westchester County jail, and their lawyers declined to file bail applications.
The men, all of whom live in Newburgh, about 60 miles north of New York City, had met in prison. Mr. Cromitie, 53, who authorities described as the plot’s leader, had lived in Brooklyn and had as many as 27 arrests for minor crimes both in upstate New York and in New York City, Mr. Kelly said. Mr. Cromitie, David Williams, and Onta Williams were native-born Americans, while Mr. Payen was born in Haiti and is a Haitian citizen.
The four men arrested are all Muslim, a law enforcement official said. Mr. Cromitie, whose parents had lived in Afghanistan before his birth, had told the informant that he was upset about the war in Afghanistan and that that he wanted to do “something to America.” Mr. Cromitie stated “the best target” — the World Trade Center — “was hit already,” according to the complaint.
Mr. Kelly said: “They stated that they wanted to commit jihad. They were disturbed about what was happening in Afghanistan and Pakistan, that Muslims were being killed. They were making statements that Jews were killed in this attack and that would be all right — that sort of thing.”
“It speaks to our concern about homegrown terrorism,” Mr. Kelly said.
In an interview on Thursday, Mr. Cromitie’s sister, Wanda Cromitie, said she was shocked to learn of her brother’s arrest while watching television this morning. She said she was unaware that her brother may have had extreme political views, and that she had last spoken to him about two years ago when she thought he was working at a Wal-Mart or Kmart store.
“Right now, to me he’s, like, the dumbest person I ever came in contact with in my life,” Ms. Cromitie said.
She added that as far as she knew, he was not a Muslim, but said “they do a little time in jail and they don’t eat pork no more.”
At the Masjid al-Ikhlas mosque in Newburgh where the men first met the F.B.I. informant, they were not considered devoted members, said an imam at the mosque, Salahuddin Mustafa. He also said that the man he believes was the informant showed up about two years ago and started inviting people to meals, where he would talk about jihad and violence. The imam and others believed the man was a government agent and steered clear of him, he said, but Mr. Cromitie apparently took the bait.
An assistant imam at the mosque, Hamin Rashada, said that another one of the four men, Mr. Payen, seemed disturbed. Mr. Payen often talked in circles, showed signs of paranoia and kept bottles of urine in a messy apartment.
“He has some very serious psychological problems,” Mr. Rashada said
1 2 3 The arrests capped what officials described as a “painstaking investigation” that began in June 2008, involving an F.B.I. agent who had been told by the federal informant of the men’s desire to attack targets in America. The informant had been cooperating with the authorities since 2002, when he pleaded guilty to taking part in an unrelated fraud scheme and was sentenced to five years of probation.
The charges against the four men represent some of the most significant allegations of domestic terrorism in some time, and come as President Obama grapples with the question of how to handle detainees at the Guantánamo Bay camp in Cuba. He laid out his policy in a speech Thursday in Washington.
According to the criminal complaint, Mr. Cromitie and the three other men, who were in their 20s and 30s, selected the synagogues and the air base as their targets in April. On May 6, the defendants traveled to a warehouse in Connecticut to obtain what they believed was a surface-to-air guided-missile system and three improvised explosive devices, all of which were actually incapable of being fired or detonated. The men then brought the weapons back to a storage facility in Newburgh, the criminal complaint said.
Rabbi Jonathan I. Rosenblatt, the senior rabbi at the Riverdale Jewish Center, said the police informed him on Wednesday evening that his synagogue was a target of the plot, as well as the Riverdale Temple, a short distance away, on Independence Avenue. Outside the synagogues on Wednesday night, the streets were eerily quiet.
Rabbi Rosenblatt said in a phone interview Wednesday that he took the news with “shock, surprise — a sense of disbelief that something which is supposed to belong to the world of front pages and the evening news had invaded the quiet world of our synagogue.”
Jonathan Mark, associate editor of The Jewish Week newspaper who grew up in Riverdale, said it would have been the third plot in the past decade against the synagogues in Riverdale.
The plot unfolded Wednesday night as one of the suspects placed what he believed were homemade bombs — each equipped with about 37 pounds of inert C-4 plastic explosives — into separate vehicles parked outside the synagogues. The other three suspects served as lookouts, Mr. Kelly said.
“There was a driver who was a cooperator, and there was the individual who placed the bombs in the vehicle, and then there were three lookouts,” Mr. Kelly said. “As everyone was going back to the car, that is when the signal was given to the emergency service officers to move in.”
An 18-wheel New York Police Department vehicle — known as a “low-boy” — blocked the suspects’ black sport utility vehicle at 237th Street and Riverdale Avenue. The F.B.I. informer also served as the driver of the suspects’ S.U.V., Mr. Kelly said.
Another armored vehicle arrived and officers from the department’s Emergency Service Unit smashed the blackened windows of the S.U.V., removed the men from the vehicle, and handcuffed them on the ground. None offered resistance.
Other police officers, along with members of the Joint Terrorist Task Force, the F.B.I., and the state police, were also on hand, and “moved in and took those individuals away,” Mr. Kelly said. Three of the four men were escorted by federal agents from Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan around 1 a.m. Thursday. They were handcuffed and did not respond to reporters’ questions as they were loaded into the back of vehicles to be taken to the nearby Metropolitan Correctional Center. There, they emerged one by one.
Mr. Cromitie, who was wearing a dark blue shirt and jeans, gazed at the assembled reporters and photographers but again did not respond to questions. David and Onta Williams also did not answer questions as they quickly walked by, staring at the ground. A federal law enforcement official described the plot as “aspirational” — meaning that the suspects wanted to do something but had no weapons or explosives — and described the operation as a sting with a cooperator within the group.
“It was fully controlled at all times,” a law enforcement official said.
Mr. Kelly told Jewish leaders Wednesday evening that the attackers planned simultaneous attacks. After the men left the bombs in cars in front of the two synagogues, they planned to drive back to Newburgh and retrieve cellphone-detonating devices and then proceed with the attack on the air base — simultaneously shooting down aircraft while remotely setting off the devices in the carsStewart International Airport is used by the New York Air National Guard and United States Air Force, according to the complaint, and it stores aircraft used to transport military supplies and personnel to the military in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The shadowy figure of the F.B.I. informant is, in many ways, a driving force of the plot laid out by prosecutors. The informant, who has been cooperating with the F.B.I. for the past six years, first met with Mr. Cromitie at the Masjid al-Ikhlas, a mosque in Newburgh, in June 2008. At that time, Mr. Cromitie told the informant that he was interested in returning to Afghanistan. Mr. Cromitie spoke about how, if he were to die a martyr, he would go to paradise, the complaint said.
A month later, the informant lied to Mr. Cromitie, telling him that he was a member of Jaish al-Mohammed, a terrorist organization based in Pakistan. Mr. Cromitie said he would be interested in joining up “to do jihad.” The informant, who audio and video taped many of his meetings with the defendants, later told them that the surface-to-air missiles and explosives were provided by the terrorist group.
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and elected officials joined Mr. Kelly at the news conference on Thursday morning, which was held as worshipers arrived for morning services.
The mayor praised the Police Department, which worked with the F.B.I. and other agencies on the case, and described the disruption of the terror plot as a frightening but exceptional occurrence. “Most people in New York City want to live together, work together, and I think we’re as safe today as we’ve ever been before,” the mayor said.
Political leaders responded to the news of the arrests with statements expressing relief.
State Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, a Bronx Democrat who represents Riverdale, and is a member of the congregation at the Riverdale Temple, also praised law enforcement authorities for their efforts.
“I think most people will agree that we’re very angry, but very sad, that this kind of plot would take place in our community,” he said. “There are people out there motivated by religious hatred, hatred against Jews frankly, but the good news is that the N.Y.P.D. and F.B.I. were on top of this from the very beginning.”
First Labour MP quits over expenses
A Labour MP has announced he will stand down from the House of Commons at the next general election after allegations that he overclaimed £15,000 in expenses for mortgage interest.
Wirral South's Ben Chapman is the first Labour MP to quit Westminster as a result of the expenses controversy which has dominated politics over the past fortnight.
Mr Chapman insisted that he had done nothing wrong and said his decision was prompted by the "hurtful" impact of publicity surrounding his claim on his family and supporters.
In a statement issued by his office, Mr Chapman said: "I maintain that I have done nothing wrong and have acted in good faith and with absolute transparency throughout. The House of Commons Fees Office have expressed their apologies and regret that the advice they gave me was incorrect.
"But the publicity in the Daily Telegraph, and subsequently elsewhere, has been hurtful to my family, friends and local party members and supporters, and I have therefore decided to stand down at the next general election."
Earlier, PM Gordon Brown was forced to defend two more of his Cabinet ministers. He insisted there was "no problem" with financial arrangements which meant Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon and Work and Pensions Secretary James Purnell did not pay capital gains tax on second homes.
But he also lashed out at the "appalling" practices that were being uncovered at Westminster and expressed "surprise" at some of the MPs who had been taking part in them.
His comments came as a third Conservative MP, Peter Viggers, was effectively kicked out of the party after it emerged that he had claimed £1,645 for a "duck island" for his pond. David Cameron confirmed that Sir Peter had been told he could either stand down from his Gosport constituency at the next general election, or be expelled from the parliamentary party.
Meanwhile, Conservative MP for Mid-Worcestershire Peter Luff spent £17,000 of taxpayers' money on furniture and other items for his two homes during a four-year period, it has been reported.
Mr Luff made expenses claims for three lavatory seats, three food mixers, two microwaves, four beds, five tables, two ironing boards, three kettles and 10 sets of bed linen, according to the Daily Telegraph. Mr Luff insisted that his claims were "within the letter and spirit of the rules" and said he would repay any money found to have breached them.
courtsey:the guardian u.k
Wirral South's Ben Chapman is the first Labour MP to quit Westminster as a result of the expenses controversy which has dominated politics over the past fortnight.
Mr Chapman insisted that he had done nothing wrong and said his decision was prompted by the "hurtful" impact of publicity surrounding his claim on his family and supporters.
In a statement issued by his office, Mr Chapman said: "I maintain that I have done nothing wrong and have acted in good faith and with absolute transparency throughout. The House of Commons Fees Office have expressed their apologies and regret that the advice they gave me was incorrect.
"But the publicity in the Daily Telegraph, and subsequently elsewhere, has been hurtful to my family, friends and local party members and supporters, and I have therefore decided to stand down at the next general election."
Earlier, PM Gordon Brown was forced to defend two more of his Cabinet ministers. He insisted there was "no problem" with financial arrangements which meant Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon and Work and Pensions Secretary James Purnell did not pay capital gains tax on second homes.
But he also lashed out at the "appalling" practices that were being uncovered at Westminster and expressed "surprise" at some of the MPs who had been taking part in them.
His comments came as a third Conservative MP, Peter Viggers, was effectively kicked out of the party after it emerged that he had claimed £1,645 for a "duck island" for his pond. David Cameron confirmed that Sir Peter had been told he could either stand down from his Gosport constituency at the next general election, or be expelled from the parliamentary party.
Meanwhile, Conservative MP for Mid-Worcestershire Peter Luff spent £17,000 of taxpayers' money on furniture and other items for his two homes during a four-year period, it has been reported.
Mr Luff made expenses claims for three lavatory seats, three food mixers, two microwaves, four beds, five tables, two ironing boards, three kettles and 10 sets of bed linen, according to the Daily Telegraph. Mr Luff insisted that his claims were "within the letter and spirit of the rules" and said he would repay any money found to have breached them.
courtsey:the guardian u.k
Child abuse row goes on as Catholics get new leader
The new archbishop of Westminster faced continuing criticism from victims of child abuse today
as he was formally installed as the leader of the 4.2 million Catholics in England and Wales.
Child safety campaigners were outraged when the Most Rev Vincent Nichols said it took "courage" for religious orders and clergy to "face the facts from their past" in response to a report examining the systematic abuse of thousands of children by Ireland's religious orders and state-run institutions. The comment was made in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
Judge Sean Ryan, who chaired the nine-year inquiry, only praised one order, the Rosminians, for attempting to understand the abuse as well as document it.
The Christian Brothers, who ran the largest number of institutions, agreed to drop legal challenges and give evidence only once a deal was agreed not to name guilty clerics. A spokesman for the Irish Survivors of Child Abuse, John Kelly, said: "The religious orders ran to the safety and sanctuary of the Ryan inquiry knowing their guilty evidence was granted privilege and immunity."
The archbishop sought to clarify his remarks before his investiture. On BBC 5 Live he said the "main use of the word courage" referred to victims and that anyone who overcame an addiction had to overcome "self deceit". He said: "It is a tough road to take, to face up to our own weaknesses. That is certainly true of anyone who has deceived themselves that all they have been doing is taking a bit of comfort from children."
The archbishop's spokesman reiterated an earlier call for perpetrators to face legal and police processes.
as he was formally installed as the leader of the 4.2 million Catholics in England and Wales.
Child safety campaigners were outraged when the Most Rev Vincent Nichols said it took "courage" for religious orders and clergy to "face the facts from their past" in response to a report examining the systematic abuse of thousands of children by Ireland's religious orders and state-run institutions. The comment was made in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
Judge Sean Ryan, who chaired the nine-year inquiry, only praised one order, the Rosminians, for attempting to understand the abuse as well as document it.
The Christian Brothers, who ran the largest number of institutions, agreed to drop legal challenges and give evidence only once a deal was agreed not to name guilty clerics. A spokesman for the Irish Survivors of Child Abuse, John Kelly, said: "The religious orders ran to the safety and sanctuary of the Ryan inquiry knowing their guilty evidence was granted privilege and immunity."
The archbishop sought to clarify his remarks before his investiture. On BBC 5 Live he said the "main use of the word courage" referred to victims and that anyone who overcame an addiction had to overcome "self deceit". He said: "It is a tough road to take, to face up to our own weaknesses. That is certainly true of anyone who has deceived themselves that all they have been doing is taking a bit of comfort from children."
The archbishop's spokesman reiterated an earlier call for perpetrators to face legal and police processes.
New Zealand couple flee after finding £4m in their bank account
It might be time to end our cynicism towards cheery slogans peddled by the world's commercial banks. A couple from New Zealand, for example, now have every reason to believe their local bank's motto: making the most of life.
The pair, named in media reports as Leo Gao and Cara Young, could hardly believe their luck when they checked their account at Westpac bank on 5 May, hoping to find their request for a NZ$10,900 (£4,000) overdraft had been accepted.
Instead, the bank had deposited 1,000 times that amount: NZ$10m, or around £4m. With so many borrowers around the world constantly being told "no" by their creditors, here, finally, was a bank that liked to say "yes".
Last night the accidental millionaires from Rotorua, a tourist city on the north island overlooking, appropriately enough, the Bay of Plenty, are on an Interpol wanted list after fleeing with the bulk of their windfall two weeks ago.
While their whereabouts remains a mystery, local reports speculated they may have fled to China or South Korea after transferring as much as NZ$6m to an offshore account.
The local newspaper, the Rotorua Review, said a police official had been sent to China to search for the couple.
Police said they were treating the case as theft but offered only sketchy details. "We are currently conducting an investigation into the individuals that may have been involved in the withdrawal of the money," detective David Harvey told reporters in Rotorua, which until now was known mainly for its geysers and mud pools.
"The individuals associated with this account are believed to have left New Zealand and police were working through Interpol to locate those individuals," he said, adding that the bank had recovered some of the cash, thought to be about NZ$4m.
Westpac, an Australian bank with 10 million customers, said the overpayment had been the result of human error and it was "pursuing vigorous criminal and civil action" to recover the money.
Gao and Young, who ran a BP petrol station on the outskirts of the city, had reportedly been struggling financially for several months. The station was closed on 6 May and the couple vanished the following day. Twenty-four hours later, their business was put into receivership.
Though Gao and Young hardly qualify as a modern-day Bonnie and Clyde – they are thought to be armed with little more than a change of clothes, passports and an ATM card – the unlikely fugitives have become the topic du jour among Rotorua's 55,000 residents.
Neighbours described Gao as a "really nice guy" who lived with his mother and brothers, and Young and her daughter Lena, all of whom have vanished. "We thought he was pretty honest, but it turns out he's not," the manager of the neighbourhood's off-licence told 3 News. The saga has hurled New Zealanders into the kind of moral maze that Gao and Young appeared to have spent just a few seconds navigating before deciding to skirt around it altogether.
Given the battering the banking industry has taken over the past year, many admitted that, if gifted with a similar sum, they would rather live as wealthy fugitives than remain out of pocket but with a clear conscience.
"Best of luck to them," wrote one browser on the 3 News website. "The banks are as honest as the power companies."
But another was horrified by the level of support for the couple: "I can't believe the number of people that say they would keep the money. These people have taken money that wasn't theirs, no matter which way you look at it."
Experts do not expect it will take investigators long to catch up with the couple; the only question is how much they can splurge before they are found.
In a case in the US last year, a Pennsylvania couple quit their jobs and fled the state after withdrawing $175,000 (£110,000) that had mistakenly been credited to their account. They were arrested in Florida.
The pair, named in media reports as Leo Gao and Cara Young, could hardly believe their luck when they checked their account at Westpac bank on 5 May, hoping to find their request for a NZ$10,900 (£4,000) overdraft had been accepted.
Instead, the bank had deposited 1,000 times that amount: NZ$10m, or around £4m. With so many borrowers around the world constantly being told "no" by their creditors, here, finally, was a bank that liked to say "yes".
Last night the accidental millionaires from Rotorua, a tourist city on the north island overlooking, appropriately enough, the Bay of Plenty, are on an Interpol wanted list after fleeing with the bulk of their windfall two weeks ago.
While their whereabouts remains a mystery, local reports speculated they may have fled to China or South Korea after transferring as much as NZ$6m to an offshore account.
The local newspaper, the Rotorua Review, said a police official had been sent to China to search for the couple.
Police said they were treating the case as theft but offered only sketchy details. "We are currently conducting an investigation into the individuals that may have been involved in the withdrawal of the money," detective David Harvey told reporters in Rotorua, which until now was known mainly for its geysers and mud pools.
"The individuals associated with this account are believed to have left New Zealand and police were working through Interpol to locate those individuals," he said, adding that the bank had recovered some of the cash, thought to be about NZ$4m.
Westpac, an Australian bank with 10 million customers, said the overpayment had been the result of human error and it was "pursuing vigorous criminal and civil action" to recover the money.
Gao and Young, who ran a BP petrol station on the outskirts of the city, had reportedly been struggling financially for several months. The station was closed on 6 May and the couple vanished the following day. Twenty-four hours later, their business was put into receivership.
Though Gao and Young hardly qualify as a modern-day Bonnie and Clyde – they are thought to be armed with little more than a change of clothes, passports and an ATM card – the unlikely fugitives have become the topic du jour among Rotorua's 55,000 residents.
Neighbours described Gao as a "really nice guy" who lived with his mother and brothers, and Young and her daughter Lena, all of whom have vanished. "We thought he was pretty honest, but it turns out he's not," the manager of the neighbourhood's off-licence told 3 News. The saga has hurled New Zealanders into the kind of moral maze that Gao and Young appeared to have spent just a few seconds navigating before deciding to skirt around it altogether.
Given the battering the banking industry has taken over the past year, many admitted that, if gifted with a similar sum, they would rather live as wealthy fugitives than remain out of pocket but with a clear conscience.
"Best of luck to them," wrote one browser on the 3 News website. "The banks are as honest as the power companies."
But another was horrified by the level of support for the couple: "I can't believe the number of people that say they would keep the money. These people have taken money that wasn't theirs, no matter which way you look at it."
Experts do not expect it will take investigators long to catch up with the couple; the only question is how much they can splurge before they are found.
In a case in the US last year, a Pennsylvania couple quit their jobs and fled the state after withdrawing $175,000 (£110,000) that had mistakenly been credited to their account. They were arrested in Florida.
Council lawyers admit Baby P could have been put into care
There was probably sufficient evidence to justify taking Baby P into care days before he was brutally killed, council lawyers at the centre of the case have privately admitted, according to documents seen by the Guardian.
The admission contradicts the legal advice given to social workers a week before the toddler died that proceedings to remove him from his family could not go ahead because the risk "threshold" to trigger an application to take him into care had not been crossed.
Council lawyers later told an independent serious case review inquiry investigating the tragedy that the advice, given by a locum lawyer inexperienced in child protection, was flawed and not clearly expressed.
The revelations shed fresh light on the death of Baby Peter, who was found dead on 3 August 2007 after suffering horrific injuries, including a cracked spine and bruising to his face and body. His mother and her lover were convicted in November of causing his death. They will be sentenced today.
The details of the legal advice were set out in a serious case review into the death completed in 2008. But this original report was judged inadequate by ministers. A revised report by the new head of Haringey's local safeguarding children board, Graham Badman, will be released today. It is expected to say that the care threshold adopted by Haringey officials was too high. It will also criticise the lack of urgency and thoroughness of professionals involved in the case.
Documents seen by the Guardian show that a legal meeting on Baby Peter, who was on Haringey's child protection register, had been sought by police and social workers on 4 June 2007, three days after the discovery by social workers of marks and bruises to the boy's face. But administrative errors and workload pressures meant that the meeting did not take place for another for seven weeks.
When it was finally convened, the lawyer verbally advised safeguarding officers that the threshold was not met for legal proceedings. The formal written memorandum to social workers confirming this advice was, by bitter coincidence, prepared only on the morning of Peter's death.
Asked by the original serious case review inquiry to explain its actions, the legal department admitted that, in hindsight, it was "likely that the threshold criteria were met at the time [of the legal planning meeting]".
It justified the lawyer's decision not to apply for care proceedings on the grounds that it "may have not been appropriate" to do so "if there were adequate safeguards in place to protect [Baby Peter] pending the outcome of further investigations".
Haringey's legal department admitted that there had been serious shortcomings in its conduct of the case. The original serious case review report is understood to have noted that legal services had "difficulty commenting on the appropriateness of [the lawyer's] advice" because of "insufficient recording of the legal planning meeting".
Haringey legal services told the inquiry that it was "preferable" to ensure this kind of legal advice came from experienced child protection lawyers but this had not always been possible because of "recruitment difficulties".
The revelations came as Peter's mother apologised for the first time for failing to protect a child she called "my baby boy" from the violence meted out to him over several months by her live-in boyfriend.
In a handwritten letter presented at the last minute to an Old Bailey judge on the eve of her sentencing today, the 27-year- old mother, who cannot be named, asked for forgiveness. She has admitted causing or allowing her son's death. "I except [sic] I failed my son Peter for which I pleaded guilty," she wrote. "By not being fully open with the social workers I stopped them from being able to do a full job. As a direct result of this my son got hurt and sadly lost his short life. I am never going to see my lovely son grow into the lovely sweet man I believe he would have been. I have lost all I hold dear to me, now every day of my life is full of guilt and trying to come to terms with my failure as a mother."
The letter was written in black ballpoint pen on paper torn from an exercise book and submitted to the judge by the mother in a last-minute plea for leniency.
"I can only hope and pray my family and ex-husband included can one day forgive my mistakes however I can never forgive myself for my shortcomings. I am truly sorry."
It is the only expression of remorse she has made since being arrested after the death of her only son. Peter's lifeless body was found in his blood-splattered cot on 3 August 2007. He had suffered more than 50, injuries despite 60 visits from social workers.
He was gasping for breath in the last hours of his life but neither his mother nor her boyfriend took him to hospital or called a doctor.
The mother sat in the dock playing with her hair yesterday as her child's horrific injuries were rehearsed again in advance of her sentencing and that of her 32-year-old boyfriend and another man, Jason Owens, 37, both of whom were convicted last November of causing or allowing Peter's death. The mother's boyfriend will also be sentenced for the rape of another child who was on the council's child protection register.
The admission contradicts the legal advice given to social workers a week before the toddler died that proceedings to remove him from his family could not go ahead because the risk "threshold" to trigger an application to take him into care had not been crossed.
Council lawyers later told an independent serious case review inquiry investigating the tragedy that the advice, given by a locum lawyer inexperienced in child protection, was flawed and not clearly expressed.
The revelations shed fresh light on the death of Baby Peter, who was found dead on 3 August 2007 after suffering horrific injuries, including a cracked spine and bruising to his face and body. His mother and her lover were convicted in November of causing his death. They will be sentenced today.
The details of the legal advice were set out in a serious case review into the death completed in 2008. But this original report was judged inadequate by ministers. A revised report by the new head of Haringey's local safeguarding children board, Graham Badman, will be released today. It is expected to say that the care threshold adopted by Haringey officials was too high. It will also criticise the lack of urgency and thoroughness of professionals involved in the case.
Documents seen by the Guardian show that a legal meeting on Baby Peter, who was on Haringey's child protection register, had been sought by police and social workers on 4 June 2007, three days after the discovery by social workers of marks and bruises to the boy's face. But administrative errors and workload pressures meant that the meeting did not take place for another for seven weeks.
When it was finally convened, the lawyer verbally advised safeguarding officers that the threshold was not met for legal proceedings. The formal written memorandum to social workers confirming this advice was, by bitter coincidence, prepared only on the morning of Peter's death.
Asked by the original serious case review inquiry to explain its actions, the legal department admitted that, in hindsight, it was "likely that the threshold criteria were met at the time [of the legal planning meeting]".
It justified the lawyer's decision not to apply for care proceedings on the grounds that it "may have not been appropriate" to do so "if there were adequate safeguards in place to protect [Baby Peter] pending the outcome of further investigations".
Haringey's legal department admitted that there had been serious shortcomings in its conduct of the case. The original serious case review report is understood to have noted that legal services had "difficulty commenting on the appropriateness of [the lawyer's] advice" because of "insufficient recording of the legal planning meeting".
Haringey legal services told the inquiry that it was "preferable" to ensure this kind of legal advice came from experienced child protection lawyers but this had not always been possible because of "recruitment difficulties".
The revelations came as Peter's mother apologised for the first time for failing to protect a child she called "my baby boy" from the violence meted out to him over several months by her live-in boyfriend.
In a handwritten letter presented at the last minute to an Old Bailey judge on the eve of her sentencing today, the 27-year- old mother, who cannot be named, asked for forgiveness. She has admitted causing or allowing her son's death. "I except [sic] I failed my son Peter for which I pleaded guilty," she wrote. "By not being fully open with the social workers I stopped them from being able to do a full job. As a direct result of this my son got hurt and sadly lost his short life. I am never going to see my lovely son grow into the lovely sweet man I believe he would have been. I have lost all I hold dear to me, now every day of my life is full of guilt and trying to come to terms with my failure as a mother."
The letter was written in black ballpoint pen on paper torn from an exercise book and submitted to the judge by the mother in a last-minute plea for leniency.
"I can only hope and pray my family and ex-husband included can one day forgive my mistakes however I can never forgive myself for my shortcomings. I am truly sorry."
It is the only expression of remorse she has made since being arrested after the death of her only son. Peter's lifeless body was found in his blood-splattered cot on 3 August 2007. He had suffered more than 50, injuries despite 60 visits from social workers.
He was gasping for breath in the last hours of his life but neither his mother nor her boyfriend took him to hospital or called a doctor.
The mother sat in the dock playing with her hair yesterday as her child's horrific injuries were rehearsed again in advance of her sentencing and that of her 32-year-old boyfriend and another man, Jason Owens, 37, both of whom were convicted last November of causing or allowing Peter's death. The mother's boyfriend will also be sentenced for the rape of another child who was on the council's child protection register.
Markets fall as debt worries rise
Global stock markets have fallen after a warning that the UK's top credit rating is at risk.
UK shares were hit after ratings agency Standard & Poor's (S&P) changed the UK's outlook to negative.
The move sparked fears that other economies, such as the US, might face a similar fate.
The Dow Jones index ended the day down 1.5%, while the UK's FTSE 100 fell 2.8%, France's Cac 40 lost 2.7% and Germany's Dax shed 2.7% by their close.
A credit rating downgrade would make it more expensive for the UK to borrow on international markets and could jeopardise spending plans.
Governments worldwide are borrowing more as they try to stimulate their economies.
"It raises questions about our own situation (in the US) in terms of our deficits and our national debt," said Alan Skrainka, US-based chief market strategist at Edward Jones.
Asian shares also ended the day lower with the Nikkei down 1%.
'Downbeat'
Meanwhile there was more pessimism about the US economy
Claims for unemployment benefits set a record for the 16th straight week, data released earlier showed.
On Wednesday the Fed said it expected the economy would contract between 1.3% and 2% this year.
Earlier in the year, the bank predicted the economy could contract between 0.5% and 1.3%.
It also warned that US unemployment could reach 10%.
"Minutes of the last meeting painted a downbeat outlook for global economies and the financial sector, suggesting that any feelings among traders that the worst was behind us could prove premature," said David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index.
"This combination of news over the last 24 hours has resulted in a predictable knee-jerk sell off - the question from here is whether it is the start of a more sustained slide to correct the impressive gains seen since mid-March," he added.
Debt concerns
S&P cited rising UK debt levels as a major concern.
UK public debt hit a record £8.46bn in April compared to £1.84bn in the same month last year.
Standard & Poor's said UK debt could be close to 100% of gross domestic product, and remain at that level in the medium term.
S&P's change of view on the UK economy led to a brief fall in the value of the pound against the dollar.
Immediately after the outlook change, sterling fell 3 cents to a low of $1.5519.
But the currency later recovered to hit a fresh 6-1/2 month high of $1.5890 as the dollar bore the brunt of selling pressure.
"No one wants to admit it but there might be investors nervous enough with the extreme levels of indebtedness of the US government so that just the thought of a downgrade would provide an excuse to sell dollars," said Matt Esteve, a trader at Tempus Consulting in Washington.
"If such a thing happened, the impact would be huge."
UK shares were hit after ratings agency Standard & Poor's (S&P) changed the UK's outlook to negative.
The move sparked fears that other economies, such as the US, might face a similar fate.
The Dow Jones index ended the day down 1.5%, while the UK's FTSE 100 fell 2.8%, France's Cac 40 lost 2.7% and Germany's Dax shed 2.7% by their close.
A credit rating downgrade would make it more expensive for the UK to borrow on international markets and could jeopardise spending plans.
Governments worldwide are borrowing more as they try to stimulate their economies.
"It raises questions about our own situation (in the US) in terms of our deficits and our national debt," said Alan Skrainka, US-based chief market strategist at Edward Jones.
Asian shares also ended the day lower with the Nikkei down 1%.
'Downbeat'
Meanwhile there was more pessimism about the US economy
Claims for unemployment benefits set a record for the 16th straight week, data released earlier showed.
On Wednesday the Fed said it expected the economy would contract between 1.3% and 2% this year.
Earlier in the year, the bank predicted the economy could contract between 0.5% and 1.3%.
It also warned that US unemployment could reach 10%.
"Minutes of the last meeting painted a downbeat outlook for global economies and the financial sector, suggesting that any feelings among traders that the worst was behind us could prove premature," said David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index.
"This combination of news over the last 24 hours has resulted in a predictable knee-jerk sell off - the question from here is whether it is the start of a more sustained slide to correct the impressive gains seen since mid-March," he added.
Debt concerns
S&P cited rising UK debt levels as a major concern.
UK public debt hit a record £8.46bn in April compared to £1.84bn in the same month last year.
Standard & Poor's said UK debt could be close to 100% of gross domestic product, and remain at that level in the medium term.
S&P's change of view on the UK economy led to a brief fall in the value of the pound against the dollar.
Immediately after the outlook change, sterling fell 3 cents to a low of $1.5519.
But the currency later recovered to hit a fresh 6-1/2 month high of $1.5890 as the dollar bore the brunt of selling pressure.
"No one wants to admit it but there might be investors nervous enough with the extreme levels of indebtedness of the US government so that just the thought of a downgrade would provide an excuse to sell dollars," said Matt Esteve, a trader at Tempus Consulting in Washington.
"If such a thing happened, the impact would be huge."
US 'bomb gang extremely violent'
Four men accused of plotting to bomb New York synagogues and fire missiles at aircraft have been described as "extremely violent men" by prosecutors.
Charged with weapons and conspiracy charges at their first court appearance, they were detained until 5 June for a preliminary hearing.
They were arrested after planting what they allegedly thought were bombs at two synagogues.
Prosecutor Eric Snyder said they were "eager to bring death to Jews".
'Best target'
James Cromitie (also known as Abdul Rahman), David Williams (aka Daoud and DL), and Onta Williams (aka Hamza) appeared together in shackles at court in White Plains, New York.
Mr Snyder said Mr Cromitie had "complained" that the "best target" - the World Trade Center destroyed on September 11, 2001 - had already been targeted.
The fourth man, Laguerre Payen (aka Amin and Almondo), appeared later in court, with a bandage on his head.
Mr Payen's lawyer Marilyn Reader said he had been injured during his arrest.
She also said he suffered from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and could not read or write in English.
He is a Haitian citizen, and the other three are Americans.
Before the court hearing, New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, visiting one of the synagogues, said all four "wanted to commit jihad".
The men had allegedly agreed to buy explosives from FBI agents posing as Islamic militants.
The four are charged with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction within the US and conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles, officials said.
The charges carry jail terms of between 25 years and life imprisonment.
A senior FBI official in New York said three were US citizens and one was from Haiti.
BBC defence and security correspondent Rob Watson says the case appears to be a classic sting operation against suspected home-grown militants rather than a plot with any links to known international terrorism.
'No risk'
Speaking outside the Riverdale Temple, one of the intended targets, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg praised the work of New York's police and the FBI.
The alleged plot served as a reminder to New Yorkers to remain vigilant "at all times", the mayor said.
"The bottom line is that we have to be constantly vigilant and we have to constantly be sure that we have the best police department in the world, that they are well led and well trained."
Mr Kelly, the police commissioner, stressed that the arrests were the result of a lengthy operation and that despite the serious nature of the charges, no-one was ever actually put at risk.
According to prosecutors, the men planned to detonate cars packed with C-4 plastic explosives outside the Riverdale Temple and the Riverdale Jewish Center in the Bronx district of the city.
They also intended to target military planes at the New York Air National Guard base at Stewart Airport, 60 miles (85 km) north of New York City.
See a map of alleged targets
In their efforts to obtain weapons for the attack, the men dealt with an informant from the FBI, who is said to have provided the group "with an inactive missile and inert explosives."
"This was a very tightly-controlled operation but these individuals did place bombs - or what they thought were bombs - right in front of the building in which we are standing and the temple a few blocks away," Mr Kelly said.
'Sought weapons'
Outlining the charges on Wednesday night, law enforcement officials said the group set up what they believed to be 30lbs (14kg) of explosives.
According to prosecutors, Mr Cromitie told an FBI informant in June 2008 that he was angry over the US-led war in Afghanistan
He "expressed an interest in 'doing something to America"'.
From October 2008, the informant began meeting him regularly along with the four others at a house in which the FBI had concealed video and audio equipment.
The group allegedly "expressed desire" to attack targets in New York and Mr Cromitie "asked the informant to supply surface-to-air guided missiles and explosives", prosecutors say.
In April 2009, the group agreed on the synagogues they intended to attack and proceeded to conduct surveillance, including taking photographs of the warplanes at the military base, prosecutors say.
Mr Cromitie allegedly pointed out Jews in the street, saying "if he had a gun, he would shoot each one in the head", according to the district attorney's statement.
According to the statement, he told the informant that attacking the Jewish community centre would be a "piece of cake".
He also said he would be interested in joining Jaish-e-Mohammed - a Pakistan-based group considered a terrorist organisation by Washington - "to do jihad".
Charged with weapons and conspiracy charges at their first court appearance, they were detained until 5 June for a preliminary hearing.
They were arrested after planting what they allegedly thought were bombs at two synagogues.
Prosecutor Eric Snyder said they were "eager to bring death to Jews".
'Best target'
James Cromitie (also known as Abdul Rahman), David Williams (aka Daoud and DL), and Onta Williams (aka Hamza) appeared together in shackles at court in White Plains, New York.
Mr Snyder said Mr Cromitie had "complained" that the "best target" - the World Trade Center destroyed on September 11, 2001 - had already been targeted.
The fourth man, Laguerre Payen (aka Amin and Almondo), appeared later in court, with a bandage on his head.
Mr Payen's lawyer Marilyn Reader said he had been injured during his arrest.
She also said he suffered from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and could not read or write in English.
He is a Haitian citizen, and the other three are Americans.
Before the court hearing, New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, visiting one of the synagogues, said all four "wanted to commit jihad".
The men had allegedly agreed to buy explosives from FBI agents posing as Islamic militants.
The four are charged with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction within the US and conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles, officials said.
The charges carry jail terms of between 25 years and life imprisonment.
A senior FBI official in New York said three were US citizens and one was from Haiti.
BBC defence and security correspondent Rob Watson says the case appears to be a classic sting operation against suspected home-grown militants rather than a plot with any links to known international terrorism.
'No risk'
Speaking outside the Riverdale Temple, one of the intended targets, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg praised the work of New York's police and the FBI.
The alleged plot served as a reminder to New Yorkers to remain vigilant "at all times", the mayor said.
"The bottom line is that we have to be constantly vigilant and we have to constantly be sure that we have the best police department in the world, that they are well led and well trained."
Mr Kelly, the police commissioner, stressed that the arrests were the result of a lengthy operation and that despite the serious nature of the charges, no-one was ever actually put at risk.
According to prosecutors, the men planned to detonate cars packed with C-4 plastic explosives outside the Riverdale Temple and the Riverdale Jewish Center in the Bronx district of the city.
They also intended to target military planes at the New York Air National Guard base at Stewart Airport, 60 miles (85 km) north of New York City.
See a map of alleged targets
In their efforts to obtain weapons for the attack, the men dealt with an informant from the FBI, who is said to have provided the group "with an inactive missile and inert explosives."
"This was a very tightly-controlled operation but these individuals did place bombs - or what they thought were bombs - right in front of the building in which we are standing and the temple a few blocks away," Mr Kelly said.
'Sought weapons'
Outlining the charges on Wednesday night, law enforcement officials said the group set up what they believed to be 30lbs (14kg) of explosives.
According to prosecutors, Mr Cromitie told an FBI informant in June 2008 that he was angry over the US-led war in Afghanistan
He "expressed an interest in 'doing something to America"'.
From October 2008, the informant began meeting him regularly along with the four others at a house in which the FBI had concealed video and audio equipment.
The group allegedly "expressed desire" to attack targets in New York and Mr Cromitie "asked the informant to supply surface-to-air guided missiles and explosives", prosecutors say.
In April 2009, the group agreed on the synagogues they intended to attack and proceeded to conduct surveillance, including taking photographs of the warplanes at the military base, prosecutors say.
Mr Cromitie allegedly pointed out Jews in the street, saying "if he had a gun, he would shoot each one in the head", according to the district attorney's statement.
According to the statement, he told the informant that attacking the Jewish community centre would be a "piece of cake".
He also said he would be interested in joining Jaish-e-Mohammed - a Pakistan-based group considered a terrorist organisation by Washington - "to do jihad".
Obama vow on Guantanamo inmates
The US will find a way to cope securely with dangerous detainees at Guantanamo Bay, President Barack Obama has said.
He described Guantanamo as a "misguided experiment", but conceded some of those held still posed a threat to the US.
Some could be jailed in mainland US prisons, Mr Obama suggested, under a new legal framework for detainees that would see the camp close by early 2010.
Congress has rejected Mr Obama's move to fund the closure of Guantanamo, amid concern over moving inmates to the US.
Speaking afterwards, former Vice-President Dick Cheney strongly defended Bush-era security strategies.
He recalled the experience of being in a White House bunker during the 9/11 attacks and said this shaped the way he viewed his responsibilities.
And he defended the "enhanced interrogation" authorised by the Bush administration to extract information from terror suspects as "legal, essential, justified and successful".
Transfer concern
Mr Obama's speech on Guantanamo was made against a backdrop of rising concern in the US Congress at the president's plan to close the camp by January 2010.
Speaking at the US National Archives, where the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights are kept, the president regularly spoke of the need to respect the rule of law, at one point calling the US "a nation of laws".
Mr Obama said the administration was reviewing every one of the 240 detainees still held at Guantanamo and considering what to do with them.
Where feasible, some would be tried in US civilian courts, he said; those who violated the laws of war would need to face a military commission; some had been ordered released by the courts; others could be safely transferred to another country.
The most tricky category, Mr Obama said, would be those detainees who could not be prosecuted but who posed a "clear danger to the American people".
Some detainees had received explosives training, or pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda, or made it clear, the president said, that they still wanted to kill Americans.
'No dangerous releases'
Telling his audience that he would not endanger American lives, Mr Obama said that nevertheless a new policy for this group, based in law, would need to be drawn up.
"We must have clear, defensible and lawful standards for those who fall into this category," he said.
"We must have fair procedures so that we don't make mistakes. We must have a thorough process of periodic review, so that any prolonged detention is carefully evaluated and justified
He praised the US network of maximum-security jails, from which no prisoner has ever escaped.
"We are treating these cases with the care and attention that the law requires and our security demands," he stressed, describing the Bush-era approach as "poorly-planned, [and] haphazard".
The existence of the prison camp itself, Mr Obama said, probably "created more terrorists around the world than it ever detained".
He conceded that following through on his pledge to close Guantanamo would be "difficult and complex", but insisted it was possible.
As president, I refuse to allow this problem to fester. Our security interests won't permit it. Our courts won't allow it."
Twice during the speech he directly promised not to release potentially dangerous people onto the streets of the US.
"We are not going to release anyone if it would endanger our national security, nor will we release detainees within the United States who endanger the American people," he said.
Cheney riposte
Mr Obama's keynote speech was followed by remarks of a very different tone by Mr Cheney.
Dick Cheney said the Bush-era decisions had saved US lives
Mr Cheney, who has emerged as a strong critic of the Obama White House, addressed a Washington think-tank to lay out the "strategic thinking" behind the Bush administration's actions.
He began by saying that Mr Obama deserved cross-party support for wise decisions, but added that: "When he mischaracterises the decisions we made, he deserves an answer."
Mr Cheney recalled the dangerous hours on 11 September 2001 as he was shepherded to a White House bunker as hijacked airliners hit New York and the Pentagon.
He said the experience deeply affected him, and said the Bush administration's policies were dedicated to making sure no attacks of that kind could ever happen again.
Mr Cheney dismissed the "theory" that the use of waterboarding on terror suspects acted as a recruitment tool for those intent on attacking the US.
And he criticised attempts to change Bush-era terminology: even if the phrase "enemy combatants" was not used, Mr Cheney said, "the same assortment of killers and would-be mass murderers are still there".
"Finding some less judgemental or more pleasant-sounding name doesn't change what they are or what they would do."
US MEDIA REACT TO OBAMA'S SPEECH
Obama's speech this morning, like most Obama speeches, made pretty points in rhetorically effective ways about the Constitution, our values, transparency, oversight, the state secrets privilege, and the rule of law. But his actions, in many critical cases, have repeatedly run afoul of those words.
Glenn Greenwald, of Salon.com, sees a gap between rhetoric and reality in the president's speech.
Obama's is the speech of a young senator who was once a part-time law professor - platitudinous and preachy, vague and pseudo-thoughtful in an abstract kind of way... he's more comfortable as a debater, not as someone who takes responsibility for decisions.
Bill Kristol, writing in the Weekly Standard, preferred Dick Cheney's speech.
This speech, to my mind, was a conservative one by a conservative president who seeks first and foremost to use existing institutions to address the new challenges of the moment, and then seeks pragmatic compromises, always open to future checks and balances, in those places where such institutions clearly need reform and adjustment.
Atlantic Monthly's Andrew Sullivan had his faith in the president reaffirmed.
Obama found himself in a real jam about Guantanamo. He and the rest of the Left had made a bogey of it... Well, Obama wins the election, and he finds that Guantanamo does the job... But he is stuck with his original language and assertions. What to do? You can't admit error; you can't cut the Bush administration any slack. So you cover Guantanamo with a fog of words... I think that is what Obama has done in this speech.
Jay Nordlinger, in the National Review, thinks the president has been forced to face facts.
It's not an argument that can be boiled down to a bumper-sticker slogan, but it's not so complicated, either, and I think it's an effective rejoinder to his critics. He's basically saying, Look, we've got to do something so if you don't like my idea, come up with a better one. But we can't keep doing the same thing. It effectively puts the ball back in his critics' court.
He described Guantanamo as a "misguided experiment", but conceded some of those held still posed a threat to the US.
Some could be jailed in mainland US prisons, Mr Obama suggested, under a new legal framework for detainees that would see the camp close by early 2010.
Congress has rejected Mr Obama's move to fund the closure of Guantanamo, amid concern over moving inmates to the US.
Speaking afterwards, former Vice-President Dick Cheney strongly defended Bush-era security strategies.
He recalled the experience of being in a White House bunker during the 9/11 attacks and said this shaped the way he viewed his responsibilities.
And he defended the "enhanced interrogation" authorised by the Bush administration to extract information from terror suspects as "legal, essential, justified and successful".
Transfer concern
Mr Obama's speech on Guantanamo was made against a backdrop of rising concern in the US Congress at the president's plan to close the camp by January 2010.
Speaking at the US National Archives, where the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights are kept, the president regularly spoke of the need to respect the rule of law, at one point calling the US "a nation of laws".
Mr Obama said the administration was reviewing every one of the 240 detainees still held at Guantanamo and considering what to do with them.
Where feasible, some would be tried in US civilian courts, he said; those who violated the laws of war would need to face a military commission; some had been ordered released by the courts; others could be safely transferred to another country.
The most tricky category, Mr Obama said, would be those detainees who could not be prosecuted but who posed a "clear danger to the American people".
Some detainees had received explosives training, or pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda, or made it clear, the president said, that they still wanted to kill Americans.
'No dangerous releases'
Telling his audience that he would not endanger American lives, Mr Obama said that nevertheless a new policy for this group, based in law, would need to be drawn up.
"We must have clear, defensible and lawful standards for those who fall into this category," he said.
"We must have fair procedures so that we don't make mistakes. We must have a thorough process of periodic review, so that any prolonged detention is carefully evaluated and justified
He praised the US network of maximum-security jails, from which no prisoner has ever escaped.
"We are treating these cases with the care and attention that the law requires and our security demands," he stressed, describing the Bush-era approach as "poorly-planned, [and] haphazard".
The existence of the prison camp itself, Mr Obama said, probably "created more terrorists around the world than it ever detained".
He conceded that following through on his pledge to close Guantanamo would be "difficult and complex", but insisted it was possible.
As president, I refuse to allow this problem to fester. Our security interests won't permit it. Our courts won't allow it."
Twice during the speech he directly promised not to release potentially dangerous people onto the streets of the US.
"We are not going to release anyone if it would endanger our national security, nor will we release detainees within the United States who endanger the American people," he said.
Cheney riposte
Mr Obama's keynote speech was followed by remarks of a very different tone by Mr Cheney.
Dick Cheney said the Bush-era decisions had saved US lives
Mr Cheney, who has emerged as a strong critic of the Obama White House, addressed a Washington think-tank to lay out the "strategic thinking" behind the Bush administration's actions.
He began by saying that Mr Obama deserved cross-party support for wise decisions, but added that: "When he mischaracterises the decisions we made, he deserves an answer."
Mr Cheney recalled the dangerous hours on 11 September 2001 as he was shepherded to a White House bunker as hijacked airliners hit New York and the Pentagon.
He said the experience deeply affected him, and said the Bush administration's policies were dedicated to making sure no attacks of that kind could ever happen again.
Mr Cheney dismissed the "theory" that the use of waterboarding on terror suspects acted as a recruitment tool for those intent on attacking the US.
And he criticised attempts to change Bush-era terminology: even if the phrase "enemy combatants" was not used, Mr Cheney said, "the same assortment of killers and would-be mass murderers are still there".
"Finding some less judgemental or more pleasant-sounding name doesn't change what they are or what they would do."
US MEDIA REACT TO OBAMA'S SPEECH
Obama's speech this morning, like most Obama speeches, made pretty points in rhetorically effective ways about the Constitution, our values, transparency, oversight, the state secrets privilege, and the rule of law. But his actions, in many critical cases, have repeatedly run afoul of those words.
Glenn Greenwald, of Salon.com, sees a gap between rhetoric and reality in the president's speech.
Obama's is the speech of a young senator who was once a part-time law professor - platitudinous and preachy, vague and pseudo-thoughtful in an abstract kind of way... he's more comfortable as a debater, not as someone who takes responsibility for decisions.
Bill Kristol, writing in the Weekly Standard, preferred Dick Cheney's speech.
This speech, to my mind, was a conservative one by a conservative president who seeks first and foremost to use existing institutions to address the new challenges of the moment, and then seeks pragmatic compromises, always open to future checks and balances, in those places where such institutions clearly need reform and adjustment.
Atlantic Monthly's Andrew Sullivan had his faith in the president reaffirmed.
Obama found himself in a real jam about Guantanamo. He and the rest of the Left had made a bogey of it... Well, Obama wins the election, and he finds that Guantanamo does the job... But he is stuck with his original language and assertions. What to do? You can't admit error; you can't cut the Bush administration any slack. So you cover Guantanamo with a fog of words... I think that is what Obama has done in this speech.
Jay Nordlinger, in the National Review, thinks the president has been forced to face facts.
It's not an argument that can be boiled down to a bumper-sticker slogan, but it's not so complicated, either, and I think it's an effective rejoinder to his critics. He's basically saying, Look, we've got to do something so if you don't like my idea, come up with a better one. But we can't keep doing the same thing. It effectively puts the ball back in his critics' court.
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