ndian Politician 'Should Be Raped' Uproar

An Indian politician has been arrested and her house set on fire for allegedly suggesting a rival should be raped to better understand the plight of sex attack victims.

Rita Bahguna Joshi (L) and Mayawati

Rita Bahuguna Joshi, chief of the Congress party in the northern Uttar Pradesh state, is being held for 14 days pending a probe into the matter.

It is alleged she promoted social enmity, insulted a woman's modesty and insulted a person of lower caste.

No charges have been filed yet, but the three offences are punishable by up to 10 years in jail.

Joshi's house in Uttar Pradesh capital Lucknow was set on fire on Wednesday night, hours after she made a speech criticising state Chief Minister Mayawati.

Victims should "throw the money at Mayawati's face and tell her, 'You should also be raped and I will give you 10 million rupees"'.

Rita Bahuguna Joshi's controversial comment

Mayawati, a single woman, belongs to the Bahujan Samaj Party which draws its support from the low-caste Hindus.

For centuries, those from low castes have remained underprivileged in India's deeply hierarchal society.

But, in recent years, members of low castes have achieved enormous political clout, which became evident when Mayawati took control of Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, in May 2007.

The Bahujan Samaj Party is a bitter rival of the Congress, which runs the federal government and some of India's 29 states.

After being arrested, Joshi said her comments were taken out of context.

Her speech was about the law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh and the increasing number of rapes in the state.

I regret what I said in a fit of anger. If it is being misconstrued, if it's being misinterpreted, it is being taken out of context, then I regret it.

Rita Bahuguna Joshi

Citing cases in which some women were paid 25,000 rupees (£313) after being raped, Joshi said simply compensating them with money was not enough.

Victims who are raped should "throw the money at Mayawati's face and tell her, 'You should also be raped and I will give you 10 million rupees (£125,000)

China and Australia trade warnings on Rio case

BEIJING (Reuters) – Australia and China traded warnings on Thursday over Rio Tinto employees detained for spying, as the United States urged Beijing to ensure transparency and fair treatment for staff of foreign companies.

Over a week after detaining an Australian Rio executive and three of his Chinese colleagues on allegations of stealing state secrets related to sensitive iron ore price negotiations, China's Foreign Ministry warned Australia against interference.

"We resolutely oppose anyone deliberately whipping up this case or trying to interfere in China's judicial independence," ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters. "This is not in Australia's interest."

Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said he did not expect relations to be harmed by the case, but warned: "China itself does need to think about whether its handling of this matter has any adverse implications for it."

Smith and Chinese officials met on Thursday on the sidelines of the Non-Aligned Movement summit in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, but both sides declined to comment on their talks.

The Rio detentions show how the general murkiness of state secret laws puts foreign investors at risk when dealing with state-owned entities and potentially sensitive economic information, a point U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke raised during a CNN interview.

"These are of course of great concern with respect to U.S. investors and multinational companies from around the world that have projects here," Locke said.

"We need to have transparency, we need to have assurances and confidence that people working for these multinational companies ... will be treated fairly."

Locke said he stressed to Chinese officials that they communicate with the Australian government on the case. He did not raise the issue during meetings with the Chinese premier.

STATE DATA OR STATE SECRETS?

Rio Tinto's China team managed operational details of term contracts for iron ore, a key ingredient in steel making, as well as tracking market information.

Information in China is often widely available before it is officially released. On Thursday, for example, a Chinese paper published the second quarter GDP data, citing an official who had given a speech the day before.

At the official press conference later that morning to release the second-quarter data, National Bureau of Statistics spokesman Li Xiaochao said the leak would be investigated but stopped short of saying it constituted a "state secret."

But in an op-ed in the Shanghai Securities News, a researcher from the Ministry of Commerce said that China's bottom line in iron ore talks was definitely a state secret.

The detentions have complicated annual negotiations to set the price at which mills import contracted iron ore.

This year's negotiations have been particularly fraught, since they coincided with the collapse of a deal by Chinese flagship aluminum firm, Chinalco, to increase its stake in Rio.

Instead, Rio and BHP plan to merge their iron ore operations in western Australia, although they say they will keep marketing separate. The Chinese steel industry fears the tie-up between the two Australian giants will allow them to keep prices higher.

In the absence of a formal settlement between the Chinese steel industry and Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton, major Chinese mills had agreed to pay 33 percent less than 2008 prices -- in line with settlements reached by Japanese and Korean mills, sources told Reuters.

The annual negotiations are "definitely not over," a China Iron and Steel Association negotiator told the Caijing news organization, but acknowledged some mills had agreed to a 33 percent cut.

Traditionally, all the mills accept a settlement reached between any mill and any of the three miners, BHP, Rio and Vale.

China's flagship steel mill, Baosteel, said that none of its employees had been detained or assisted in the investigation. Chinese media had earlier reported the lead negotiator for previous years' talks, from Baosteel, was among those investigated in the probe.

(Additional reporting by Doug Palmer and Ben Blanchard in Beijing and Michael Perry and Jim Regan in Sydney; Editing by Nick Macfie)

30 Rock leads the way for Emmys

Comedy 30 Rock, starring Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey, leads the nominations for this year's Emmy awards with 22.

In the best comedy category, which it has won for the past two years, it goes up against shows including The Office, Family Guy and Flight of the Conchords.

Briton Hugh Laurie is up for best drama actor for House while Kenneth Branagh is up for best actor in a mini-series or film for BBC One's Wallander.

The awards will take place on 20 September in Los Angeles.

Laurie, 50, has previously won two Golden Globes for playing Dr Gregory House.

Branagh, meanwhile, is up for his performances as the eponymous police chief in the TV adaptation of the Wallander novels, by Swedish author Henning Mankell.

The show's director Philip Martin is also nominated for an award.

Branagh is up against fellow Briton Sir Ian McKellen, 70, who is nominated for the film version of the Royal Shakespeare Company's King Lear - first shown in the UK on More4.

BBC period dramas Little Dorrit and The Tudors received 11 and five nods respectively.

Sir Tom Courtenay and Andy Serkis, who starred together in Charles Dickens adaption Little Dorrit, will compete in the best supporting actor in a mini-series or movie category.

No. This is some sort of trick fest The Big Bang Theory star Jim Parsons o his nomination

Entourage, How I Met Your Mother and Weeds complete the line-up of best comedy series contenders.

Grey's Anatomy star Chandra Wilson and The Big Bang Theory's Jim Parsons, who announced the awards together, were both featured on the list.

"No. This is some sort of trick fest," said Parsons when his nomination for best actor in a comedy series was announced.

Wilson is up for best actress in a mini-series or movie, for Accidental Friendship, and supporting actress for Grey's Anatomy.

"I'm going to the party," she said.

Best drama

TV movie Grey Gardens, starring Drew Barrymore, got the second most nominations with 17 awards.

Mad Men, which won the best drama prize last year, will compete against controversial polygamy series Big Love, Damages, Breaking Bad, Dexter, House and Lost in the same category this year.

The 1960s-set period drama is up for 15 other awards.

Glenn Close, who was named best actress in a drama for Damages last year, is up for the same award again.

She is up against Brothers and Sisters star Sally Field, Elisabeth Moss from Mad Men, Holly Hunter for Saving Grace, and Law and Order's Mariska Hargitay.

British actor Hugh Laurie, who stars in House, is up against nominees including Michael C Hall, for Dexter, and Mad Men's Jon Hamm in the best actor in a drama series category.

Hugh Laurie is up for best actor in a drama series

30 Rock is set behind the scenes on a fictional sketch show.

Its creator Tina Fey, who also writes and stars in the show, has again been nominated for best comedy actress.

The star - who scooped the award last year - will go up against actresses including Samantha Who? star Christina Applegate, Sarah Silverman for The Sarah Silverman Program, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus for The New Adventures of Old Christine.

Alec Baldwin - winner of last year's best comedy actor for 30 Rock - is up for the same award this year, competing against nominees including Parsons, Jemaine Clement for Flight of the Conchords, Steve Carell for The Office and Charlie Sheen for Two and a Half Men.

Weekly late-night sketch show Saturday Night Live features in 13 categories with sometime contributor Justin Timberlake nominated for best guest actor in a comedy series.

China GDP growth accelerates to 7.9%

China GDP growth accelerates to 7.9%

By Richard McGregor in Beijing

Published: July 16 2009 03:59 | Last updated: July 16 2009 11:49

Beijing is in reach of its 2009 growth target of 8 per cent after its economy accelerated significantly in the second quarter on the back of increased government spending and a surge in bank lending.

The economy expanded by 7.9 per cent in the three months to the end of June over the same period last year, the National Bureau of Statistics announced on Thursday, with investment, industrial production and retail sales all contributing to higher output.

Li Xiaochao, a spokesman for the NBS, said the economy “had stabilised with increasing positive changes” after dipping sharply at the end of last year and expanding by only 6.1 per cent in the first quarter, leading many economists to believe that the government would not be able to meet its year-long growth target of 8 per cent.

The high-speed growth, above analysts’ consensus forecasts, was driven by the government’s aggressively loose fiscal and monetary policies, funded largely by record lending by state banks.

But the government’s pump-priming has turned the economy around, prompting rapid revisions by many investment bank economists, and the World Bank, to upgrade China’s outlook.

“The Rmb1,530bn in new loans in June brought total new lending in the first half of the year to Rmb7,400bn, or almost one quarter of our estimated 2009 GDP,” said Wang Tao, of UBS, in Beijing.

“We now expect total new lending in 2009 to reach Rmb9,000bn, a speed of re-leveraging unprecedented in China’s history.”

The bank lending and fiscal spending has driven fixed asset investment, the prime engine of growth, up by 33.5 per cent in the first half of the year compared to the same period in 2008.

Government incentives for consumption, such as rebates on buying cars and white goods, helped support retail spending, which expanded by a healthy 15 per cent in the first six months of the year.

Inflation, the Chinese government’s biggest policy headache until the middle of last year, remained under control in the first half of the year, with the consumer price index falling by 1.1 per cent from a year ago and 1.7 per cent in June alone.

Many local economists believe that the central government will not begin to rein in the stimulus programme until inflation begins to pick up.

The absence of inflation will in the meantime encourage Beijing to maintain loose monetary policies.

At his press conference, Mr Li appeared to suggest that the government was not yet ready to apply the brakes to the economy.

Although momentum was clearly picking up, he said the recovery was “unbalanced” and there were still “uncertain and volatile factors” at work in the economy.

However, the faster-than-expected second quarter figures may strengthen the case already being argued internally by the central bank and the bank regulator for the stimulus to be reined in.

“We believe that the rapid recovery in growth, plus concerns about inflation and asset quality, will lead to a change in macro policy, and we look for policy consolidation in the months ahead,” said Ms Wang, of UBS..

Michael Jackson is Facebook's most popular

By Stephanie Busari
CNN news

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Michael Jackson has officially become the most popular person on Facebook, with more than 7 million fans on the social networking site.

The Michael Jackson Facebook page is now the most popular on the social networking site.

Previously, the most popular person on Facebook, with just over 6 million fans, was U.S. President Obama.

Over the past week, Jackson's page has grown from 80,000 fans to just over 7 million, generating the largest response on a Facebook page, the social networking site says.

He has continued to gain about 20 fans per second and even more during peak traffic hours, said social media commentator Nick O'Neill, founder of the Social Times Web site.

By comparison, actor Ashton Kutcher recently entered a race to beat CNN's Larry King to 1 million followers on Twitter. Kutcher won and remains the most popular person on Twitter -- but still has only 2.6 million followers.

During his memorial service at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California, all 10 trending topics on Twitter.com were Jackson-related.

Jackson's popularity and the viral nature of Facebook fan pages are the primary reasons for the huge fan base, O'Neill explained.

He said, "It's simply his popularity. Also, as users become fans, the page gets recommended to others, driving the viral growth of the page.

"Michael Jackson is simply the largest celebrity in the world. While he was a controversial figure, he clearly attracts the attention of the global media," he continued.

The Facebook page has become an online memorial to Jackson, with thousands of comments from around the world; dozens appear every minute.

Free virtual versions of Jackson's famous glove are the most popular gift on the site, with more than 800,000 sent to members.

The huge following leaves the singer's heirs (and his record label) with a massive network to communicate with fans and continue the massive resurgence of interest in Jackson's music, O'Neill said.

"While Sony has not heavily engaged the fan base on Michael Jackson's page, they at least have a presence. If your fans are there, you should be there.

"This also provided an ongoing promotional channel for any future products that are released. It's simply not an option and will become a component of all marketing strategies."

There have been 2.6 million downloads of Jackson's music since his death. He has the top two albums on iTunes, as well as three of the top 10 singles.

In the United Kingdom, Jackson held 11 of the top 200 album positions and 43 of the top 200 singles, based on sales monitored by the Official Charts Co. for the week ended June 27.

His "Number Ones" album topped the OCC album chart after selling 46,400 physical copies and 10,000 downloads.

The surge for demand in Jackson's music looks likely to continue for several months: The fan page has a music player with some of Jackson's hits and an option to buy them through Amazon.

Jackson Hair Horror 'Sparked Pill Addiction'

A harrowing accident that happened while Michael Jackson was filming a commercial may have fuelled his addiction to painkillers, it has been claimed.

Jackson's head was badly burned during the TV ad. Pic Usmagazine.com

Shocking new video footage has revealed the star was severely injured when his hair caught fire after a special effects explosion.

The singer was filming a TV ad for Pepsi in the Los Angeles Auditorium in January 27, 1984 when things went horribly wrong.

Usmagazine.com's clip shows Jackson dancing on stage in a glittering suit while pyrotechnic displays explode around him, as planned.

Video: Jackson's Hair Catches Fire

But during the sixth take the fireworks go off too early and Jackson's hair catches fire.

At first Jackson is apparently unaware his head is on fire and continues dancing for several seconds until the crew descends on him to douse the flames.

The pop star suffered second and third-degree burns on his scalp, face and body - for which he had to have surgery.

To relieve his injuries, the star was prescribed several medications, which kicked off his addiction to painkillers and obsession with plastic surgery, Usmagazine.com says.

Michael Jackson

See more stories, video and picture galleries on our special Michael Jackson page.

Sources close to Jackson have claimed he was never the same after the accident, the website adds.

Powerful painkillers were found in Jackson's body after he died from a suspected cardiac arrest on June 25, aged 50.

Reports have said Jackson regularly took a cocktail of up to eight painkillers to help him deal wit