SAfrica: Mandela in hospital with lung infection

FILE - In this June 17, 2010 file photo, former South African President Nelson Mandela leaves the chapel after attending the funeral of his great-granddaughter Zenani Mandela in Johannesburg, South Africa. The South African presidency says Nelson Mandela was re-admitted to hospital with a recurrence of a lung infection Thursday March 28, 2013. (AP Photo/Siphiwe Sibeko, Pool, File)

FILE - In this June 17, 2010 file photo, former South African President Nelson Mandela leaves the chapel after attending the funeral of his great-granddaughter Zenani Mandela in Johannesburg, South Africa. The South African presidency says Nelson Mandela was re-admitted to hospital with a recurrence of a lung infection Thursday March 28, 2013. (AP Photo/Siphiwe Sibeko, Pool, File)

FILE - In this Wednesday May 30, 2012 file photo South Africa's former president Nelson Mandela, after receiving a torch to celebrate the African National Congress' centenary from ANC chairperson Baleka Mbete in Mandela's home village of Qunu in rural eastern South Africa. The South African presidency says Nelson Mandela was re-admitted to hospital with a recurrence of a lung infection Thursday March 28, 2013. (AP Photo/Lulamile Feni-Daily Dispatch) SOUTH AFRICA OUT

In this photo taken on Friday, March 15, 2013, a man look's at a statue of former South African President Nelson Mandela at the entrance to the Robben Island ferry departure point at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, South Africa. Nelson Mandela, the anti-apartheid leader who became South Africa's first black president, has been admitted to a hospital with a recurring lung infection, South Africa said Thursday, March 28, 2013. Mandela, 94, has become increasingly frail in recent years and has been hospitalized several times since last year, mostly recently earlier this month when he received what a presidential spokesman described as a "successful" medical test. (AP Photo/Schalk van Zuydam)

JOHANNESBURG (AP) ? Nelson Mandela, the anti-apartheid leader who became South Africa's first black president, has been admitted to a hospital with a recurring lung infection, South Africa said Thursday.

Mandela, 94, has become increasingly frail in recent years and has been hospitalized several times since last year, most recently earlier this month when he underwent what authorities said was a scheduled medical test. The Nobel laureate is a revered figure in South Africa, which has honored his legacy of reconciliation by naming buildings and other places after him and printing his image on national banknotes.

"I'm so sorry. I'm sad," said Obed Mokwana, a Johannesburg resident. "I just try to pray all the time. He must come very strong again."

The Nobel laureate was admitted to a hospital just before midnight Wednesday "due to the recurrence of his lung infection," the office of President Jacob Zuma said in a statement.

"Doctors are attending to him, ensuring that he has the best possible expert medical treatment and comfort," the statement said. It appealed "for understanding and privacy in order to allow space to the doctors to do their work."

It did not identify the hospital. In December, Mandela spent three weeks in a hospital in the South African capital of Pretoria, where he was treated for a lung infection and had a procedure to remove gallstones.

Presidential spokesman Mac Maharaj acknowledged there was cause for worry, but said the medical specialists treating Mandela were very competent.

"The health has been OK given his age, but the downturn last night ? obviously when the lung infection recurs, the doctors will want to do everything possible and make sure that they don't allow the infection to spread, that they arrest it as quickly as possible," Maharaj said in an interview with eNCA, a South African news channel.

He said there had been a global outpouring of messages expressing concern for Mandela's health.

Zuma wished Mandela a speedy recovery, referring to him affectionately by his clan name, "Madiba."

"We appeal to the people of South Africa and the world to pray for our beloved Madiba and his family and to keep them in their thoughts. We have full confidence in the medical team and know that they will do everything possible to ensure recovery," the presidential statement quoted Zuma as saying.

Mandela spent a night in a hospital and was released on March 10 following a medical test. At that time, spokesman Maharaj said Mandela was "well."

In February 2012, Mandela spent a night in a hospital for minor diagnostic surgery to determine the cause of an abdominal complaint. In January 2011, he was admitted to a Johannesburg hospital for what officials initially described as tests but what turned out to be an acute respiratory infection. He was discharged days later.

He also had surgery for an enlarged prostate gland in 1985.

Under South Africa's white-minority apartheid regime, Mandela served 27 years in prison, where he contracted tuberculosis, before being released in 1990. He later became the nation's first democratically elected president in 1994 under the banner of the African National Congress, helping to negotiate a relatively peaceful end to apartheid despite fears of much greater bloodshed. He served one five-year term as president before retiring.

Perceived successes during Mandela's tenure include the introduction of a constitution with robust protections for individual rights and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a panel that heard testimony about apartheid-era violations of human rights as a kind of national therapy session. South Africa still struggles with crime, economic inequality and other social ills.

Mandela last made a public appearance on a major stage when South Africa hosted the 2010 World Cup soccer tournament.

He had spent more time in the rural village of Qunu in Eastern Cape province, where he grew up. He was visited there in August by Hillary Clinton, who was U.S. secretary of state at the time.

Doctors said in December that he should remain at his home in the Johannesburg neighborhood of Houghton for the time being to be close to medical facilities that can provide the care he needs.

During Mandela's previous hospitalizations, the South African government had criticized some media outlets for what it described as rumor-mongering and a failure to respect the privacy of the former leader and his family. The media, in turn, expressed concern about an alleged lack of transparency and occasionally conflicting reports from officials.

Maharaj, the presidential spokesman, told eNCA on Thursday that authorities were mindful of public interest in Mandela's health, but would allow the medical team to focus on treating the former president.

"Our updates will be dependent always on what the doctors tell us and we are not pressurizing them to give us updates every few hours," he said. "We think that they should attend to their work. We are confident that they know that if there is an upturn for the good, or for the bad, they will always keep us informed."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-03-28-South%20Africa-Mandela/id-d3289dccf0b74079b178950bd2b659bb

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Softbank and Sprint say no to Huawei in hopes of getting merger back on track

In an effort to speed up an already contested $20.1 billion merger, Softbank and Sprint have reportedly agreed not to use Huawei network equipment within the US carrier's existing network. In fact, the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Mike Rogers, recently told The New York Times that the two outfits have pledged to remove Huawei hardware from Clearwire's network, too. These promises are likely a reaction to Congress' security concerns, which saw Huawei exiled from America's first responder network back in October. While Rogers is happy with Softbank and Sprint's new game plan, this deal is far from done. The two firms still need to make it past the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US, which reviews national security risks connected to business transactions. Until then, Dan Hesse may wanna hold off on any extracurricular activities.

Filed under: Wireless, Networking, Mobile, Sprint

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Via: The Register

Source: The New York Times

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/29/softbank-sprint-agree-to-exclude-huawei/

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Cyprus controls expected to hit foreign transactions

By Michele Kambas and Costas Pitas

NICOSIA (Reuters) - Cyprus is expected to stop people taking their money out of the country but will not restrict dealings at home as it tries to avert a run on its banks after agreeing a tough rescue package with international lenders.

Cypriots have taken to the streets of Nicosia in their thousands to protest against a bailout deal that will push their country into an economic slump and cost many their jobs.

European leaders said the deal averted a chaotic national bankruptcy that might have forced Cyprus out of the euro.

With banks due to reopen on Thursday after nearly two weeks, Finance Minister Michael Sarris said capital controls will be "within the realms of reason" and a business leader said he had been told they would affect only international transactions.

"We will look at the best way to limit the possibility of large sums of money leaving, and not imposing punitive conditions on the economy, businesses and individuals," Sarris told local television.

Speaking after meeting government officials, the head of the Cyprus chamber of commerce said: "We have been assured that limitations will not affect transactions within Cyprus at all."

"Where there will be limitations is on what we spend abroad and also on capital outflows," Phidias Pelides told reporters.

The central bank governor said earlier that "loose" controls would apply temporarily to all banks. Earlier, the finance minister said they could be in place for weeks. Banks have been shut since final bailout talks got under way in mid-March.

Russia, whose citizens have billions of euros in Cyprus and use Cypriot banks to move money around even among Russian firms, cautioned Nicosia against imposing onerous controls on healthy banks and noted that Moscow was reviewing loan terms to Cyprus.

"If there are such measures, this will not foster trust but only provoke additional problems for participants, depositors," Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Tuesday.

He cautioned that Russian willingness to restructure and extend a 2.5-billion euro loan made to Cyprus in 2011 would depend on the island's decision on capital controls.

"We will discuss (restructuring of the loan) in the context of the decisions the parliament adopts," he said. "We are prepared to discuss within these parameters."

State-controlled Russian bank VTB has a subsidiary in Cyprus, Russian Commercial Bank, which has not been directly affected by a bailout deal which focuses on big local banks that lost badly in the restructuring of debts in neighboring Greece.

POPULAR ANGER

The terms of the 10-billion euro ($13-billion) rescue from the European Union, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank have stirred popular anger within Cyprus at the country's partners in the EU, notably Germany, the bloc's main paymaster and fiercest advocate of austerity.

On Tuesday, many hundreds of high school students protested at parliament, in the first major expression of popular anger since the bailout was agreed in the early hours of Monday in Brussels. The deal largely side-stepped the Cypriot parliament, and has triggered opposition calls for a referendum.

"They've just got rid of all our dreams," said one student, named Thomas.

Outside the central bank on Tuesday, about 200 employees of the country's biggest commercial lender, the Bank of Cyprus, demanded the resignation of central bank governor Panicos Demetriades, chanting "Hands off Cyprus" and "Disgrace".

Dimos Dimosthenous, a veteran Bank of Cyprus employee, said: "The bank is being driven to closure. That will be the end."

A Bank of Cyprus official said its chief executive, Yiannis Kypri, had been removed on the orders of the central bank.

It follows the appointment of a special administrator to run the bank, which is being restructured as part of the bailout deal, and an offer to resign by its chairman, Andreas Artemis.

ACCOUNTS FROZEN

The second largest lender, Cyprus Popular Bank, also known as Laiki, is to be shut down, and accounts of under 100,000 euros and some loans will be moved to the Bank of Cyprus. Deposits at both banks over the 100,000-euro mark, which is an EU benchmark for state insurance, will be frozen.

Government officials have estimated that these larger depositors, many of them wealthy foreigners including Russians, could lose around 40 percent of their cash.

On Wednesday, the government was appointing special crisis teams of economic experts to advise ministers.

Many Cypriots say they do not feel reassured by the bailout deal, however, and are expected to besiege banks as soon as they reopen after a shutdown that began over a week ago.

The long closure of the banks has hurt business, according to Andreas Hadjiadamou, president of the Cyprus Supermarkets Association, who said consumer confidence had "hit the floor".

Maria Benaki, who runs a family silverware business on Nicosia's biggest shopping street, said she had not had a customer in days.

"The situation is dire," she said. "What will happen at the end of the month when I need to pay my bills?"

(Additional reporting by Agnieszka Flak in Durban, Douglas Busvine and Steve Gutterman in Moscow and Laura Noonan and Karolina Tagaris in Nicosia; Writing by Giles Elgood and Matt Robinson; Editing by Will Waterman and Alastair Macdonald)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cyprus-readies-capital-controls-avert-bank-run-090603283--finance.html

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BlackBerry Posts Promising Q4 Results After BB10 Launch: EPS Of $0.22, Revenue Of $2.7B, ~1M Z10s Shipped

For the past year BlackBerry has been trying to prove to the world that it?s not a mobile has-been just yet, and that all came to a head earlier this year when the company finally released the BlackBerry 10 mobile OS to the masses. While the company?s future is still unclear, BlackBerry released its fiscal Q4 2013 earnings early this morning and they?re more impressive than you would expect for a company going through some major upheavals.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/_Uh0_yyU9Fo/

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Haiti splashes slum with psychedelic colors

In this picture taken March 21, 2013, homes painted in bright colors cover a hill in Jalousie, a cinder block shantytown in Petionville, Haiti. Workers this month began painting the concrete facades of buildings in Jalousie slum a rainbow of colors, inspired by the dazzling ?cities-in-the-skies? of well-known Haitian painter Prefete Duffaut, who died last year. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)

In this picture taken March 21, 2013, homes painted in bright colors cover a hill in Jalousie, a cinder block shantytown in Petionville, Haiti. Workers this month began painting the concrete facades of buildings in Jalousie slum a rainbow of colors, inspired by the dazzling ?cities-in-the-skies? of well-known Haitian painter Prefete Duffaut, who died last year. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)

In this March 21, 2013 photo, a man paints green the exterior wall of a home in Jalousie, a cinder block shantytown in Petionville, Haiti. The $1.4 million effort titled ?Beauty versus Poverty: Jalousie in Colors? is part of a government project to relocate people from the displacement camps that sprouted up after Haiti's 2010 earthquake. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)

A painting by Haitian artist Prefete Duffaut titled "Friends of Haiti" hangs on exhibit at the Galerie Monnin in Petionville, Haiti, Monday, March 25, 2013. Workers this month began painting the concrete facades of buildings in Jalousie slum, one of Haiti's biggest shantytowns, a rainbow of purple, peach, lime and cream, inspired by the dazzling ?cities-in-the-skies? of well-known Haitian painter Prefete Duffaut, who died last year. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)

In this March 21, 2013 photo, workers paint red the exterior of a home in Jalousie, a cinder block shantytown in Petionville, Haiti. Jalousie is unique in that its mountainside presence makes it visible to people living in the wealthy district of Petionville. Critics have suggested that the choice of Jalousie for a makeover is as much about giving the posh hotels of Petionville a pretty view as helping the slum's residents. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)

In this March 21, 2013 photo, a worker paints red the exterior wall of a home in Jalousie, a cinder block shantytown in Petionville, Haiti. While most residents welcome the attempt to beautify Jalousie, a slum of 45,000 inhabitants, critics say the project is the latest example of cosmetic changes carried out by a government that has done little to improve people's lives in the Western Hemisphere's poorest country. (AP Photo/Dieu Nalio Chery)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) ? One of Haiti's biggest shantytowns, a vast expanse of grim cinderblock homes on a mountainside in the nation's capital, is getting a psychedelic makeover that aims to be part art and part homage.

Workers this month began painting the concrete facades of buildings in Jalousie slum a rainbow of purple, peach, lime and cream, inspired by the dazzling "cities-in-the-skies" of well-known Haitian painter Prefete Duffaut, who died last year.

The $1.4 million effort titled "Beauty versus Poverty: Jalousie in Colors" is part of a government project to relocate people from the displacement camps that sprouted up after Haiti's 2010 earthquake. The relocation has targeted a handful of high-profile camps in Port-au-Prince by paying a year's worth of rent subsidies for residents to move into neighborhoods like Jalousie. The government is now trying to spruce up these poor neighborhoods and introduce city services.

"We're not trying to do Coconut Grove. We're not trying to do South Beach," said Clement Belizaire, director of the government's housing relocation program, referring to Miami neighborhoods. "The goal that we are shooting for is a neighborhood that is modest but decent, where residents are proud to be from that area."

While most residents welcome the attempt to beautify Jalousie, a slum of 45,000 inhabitants, critics say the project is the latest example of cosmetic changes carried out by a government that has done little to improve people's lives in the Western Hemisphere's poorest country.

"This is just to make it look like they're doing something for the people but in reality they are not," said Sen. Moise Jean-Charles, an outspoken critic of President Michel Martelly, arguing that the money could have been better spent.

Others wonder why Jalousie was chosen for the makeover, though officials say they plan to expand the project to other Port-au-Prince shantytowns.

Jalousie is unique in that its mountainside presence makes it visible to people living in the wealthy district of Petionville. Critics have suggested that the choice of Jalousie is as much about giving the posh hotels of Petionville a pretty view as helping the slum's residents.

Belizaire said he welcomes controversy, adding that the project's visibility is important. It's a concrete accomplishment for the government and he contends that it does indeed help Jalousie residents.

"People are sitting on the balcony, having a beer, smoking a cigarette ? whatever ? and you have all of Port-au-Prince at your feet, and you're living in colors," Belizaire said, sitting in his office.

Jalousie, perched above rich Petionville, has become a flashpoint for class controversy in Haiti recently. It is among many slums that have sprawled across the hills of Port-au-Prince in recent decades because governments past and present have failed to provide affordable housing and basic services. Many of the homes crash down the hills every year during the country's rainy seasons.

Haiti's class divisions spilled into the streets last year when more than 1,000 people from Jalousie protested in central Port-au-Prince. They threw rocks at a luxury hotel and criticized rich Haitians, threatening to burn down Petionville if the government followed through with a plan to demolish their homes. Officials had wanted to tear down the homes next to a ravine to build a flood-protection project. During heavy rainfall, rocks from the ravine clog the entrance to a private school for the children of diplomats and wealthy Haitians.

The demolition never happened.

These days, most people in Jalousie chalk the protests up to a "misunderstanding," and talk about the project with pride.

"It's beautiful. Jalousie is not the same anymore," Resilia Pierre, a 53-year-old wife and mother, said as she waited at a well to buy water. "We don't have the means to do it ourselves. I would like to say 'thank you' to the people who did that."

The government's goal it to eventually paint 1,000 homes and other buildings.

Workers hired by three companies began two weeks ago by putting concrete finishes on the ash-colored facades of the slum's cinderblock houses. Then they paint over the finish with bright colors using rollers, standing atop wobbly ladders next to buckets of paint. The entire effort is supposed to take six months.

Duffaut, one of Haiti's most famous painters, was born in the country's south in 1923. He studied at the Centre D'Art in the late 1940s and his work, appearing in museums worldwide, has long been a source of national pride.

While the project in Jalousie may be inspired by Duffaut, when completed it will still require a bit of imagination by the viewer to see his psychedelic cities in the sky, with their dazzling colors and surreal tiers that seemingly hovering in the air.

What residents will have in their neighborhood high up on a mountainside will be a lot of bright colors and a love of the artist.

"The people of Jalousie," said Jamesson Misery, a coordinator of the project who lives in the slum, "we plan to honor Prefete Duffaut."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-03-25-Haiti-Slum%20Makeover/id-ee0075adbd804597b21fb4db38a484f0

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Derrick Nix, Keith Appling Towel-Fight: Michigan State Teammates Argue During Memphis Timeout (VIDEO)

Michigan State wasn't just throwing everything it had at Memphis on Saturday, the Spartans were also battling one another.

Leading by 11 with 12:45 remaining in the game, a pair of Michigan State teammates started arguing with each other... with towels.

As the team huddled after Memphis called a timeout, tempers flared between Derrick Nix and Keith Appling. The two threw towels and appeared to yell at each other while head coach Tom Izzo was drawing up a play. Izzo and the rest of the team calmed the two down and then went right back to the clipboard.

Over the next 12:45, the Spartans outscored the Tigers 27-16 and went on to win by 22 to advance to the Sweet 16.

"It?s great, isn?t it? It reminds me of (Mateen) Cleaves and them (on the 2000 national championship team)," Izzo said after the game, via Fox Sports Detroit. "It?s better when your team is getting a little feisty. Keith didn?t want to take anything from Nix, so he told him. That?s all good. Trust me, in my program, that?s all good. They got into it a little bit and I enjoyed it."

Not surprisingly, the argument caught some attention on Twitter.

Matt Mosley

I love how Izzo kept drawing that play during the Nix-Appling altercation. Didn't really faze him.

Bob Wojnowski

Nix and Appling threw towels at each other in the MSU huddle. No biggie. Memphis' entire putrid offense is throwing in the towel.

Vincent Goodwill

Appling and Nix getting into it...Izzo looking like he really loved it

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/24/derrick-nix-keith-appling_n_2942177.html

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NFL Star Says Marriage Equality Effort On Par With ?Civil Rights,? Evangelist Tony Perkins Disagrees

During an exclusive appearance on Face The Nation on CBS, Baltimore Ravens linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo said he attributes his strong support for marriage equality to his upbringing as a minority in California. Ayanbadejo consider the fight the civil rights issue of our time.

?This is something I?ve been speaking about since 2009, and in my opinion, it?s just the evolution of civil rights and equal rights and athletes do a lot to change society, and this is something we can make a big difference on. It starts with bullying kids in elementary school and goes all the way to legislative and treating everybody equally,? Ayanbadejo said.

?This is a fight myself and a bunch of my colleagues we want to take to and we feel that everyone should be treated equally and we?re not going to stop until everyone is treated fairly, especially including the LGBT community,? he said,

Host Bob Schieffer noted that isn?t something you see very often from the NFL community but Ayanbadejo, along with Minesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe filed a friend of the court brief in February that encourage the Supreme Court to strike down proposition 8. Since they filed it additional NFL players have joined their cause.

Ayanbadejo grew up in Santa Cruz, California so the anti-gay marriage proposition struck him particularly hard. Ayanbadejo said he thinks the efforts to legalize gay marriage are no different from the efforts of the civil rights and suffrage movements. ?I know what it feels like to be treated differently and discriminated. So this is no different, the way the LGBT community is treated,? said

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, told Schieffer that the national polls that show changing attitudes on this issue aren?t important because when it goes to the ballot box it wins by large numbers. He rejects the idea that gay marriage will one day become acceptable in the United States.

?If it?s inevitable, as the media would like us to believe, then there?s no reason for the court to interject itself into this,? Perkins said.

?We?re far from being at a point where America has embraced same-sex marriage,? he said.

Watch clip below via CBS

Source: http://www.mediaite.com/tv/nfl-star-says-marriage-equality-effort-on-par-with-civil-rights-evangelist-tony-perkins-disagrees/

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