Angry Protesters Want Death Penalty For Bloggers Who Insult Islam

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One person has been killed as hundreds of thousands of people continued protests in Bangladesh demanding that the government should introduce an anti-blasphemy law that would include the death penalty for bloggers who insult Islam.

A local leader of the Awami League, Nowsher Khan, was killed in Bhanga, a town south west of Dhaka on Saturday, when Hefazat-e-Islami party supporters clashed with Awami League supporters.  

The protest on Saturday, tagged the “long march”, with many travelling from remote villages, was sparked after a group of bloggers allegedly began criticising conservative religious parties that are widely popular despite Bangladesh’s secular constitution.

Insane? Woman ‘kills’ her whole family to take time off work

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A British social worker has been fired for lying to bosses about the deaths of her father, mother, uncle, aunt, brother and ex-husband to skip work.  Rachael Miles took 66 days off in two years to cope with six deaths she completely made up.

In her first claim in February 2010, less than two weeks after starting work for the council, she told bosses her father had been in a car crash, later reporting he had died. The following month Ms Miles claimed her mother had been sectioned under the Mental Health Act, and later that year that she had died during surgery.

In 2011, she told bosses her brother died, followed by her ex-husband. In November that year, Ms Miles asked for more time off after telling bosses her uncle and then her aunt died seven days apart. “I have no recollection of the events mentioned,” she wrote to a disciplinary panel, before they yanked her credentials.

No Money to pay rent, Couple commits suicide

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A once wealthy retired Italian couple committed suicide after the country's deep economic woes turned psychological.

Romeo Dionisi, 62, and Anna Maria Sopranzi, 68, hanged themselves in their home after Sopranzi's pension from her career as an artisan evaporated. Italy had raised the retirement age by five years.

Then, in an apparent fit of despair, her older brother Giuseppe tossed himself into the Adriatic Sea.

"They were people with great dignity," said Ivo Costamagna, the couple's neighbor in the previously prosperous town of Civitanova Marche.

"People like Romeo would not accept charity or social service aid," Costamagna told CNN. "Romeo just wanted a job."

But the jobs did not come, and the couple could not pay rent, reported Italian news agency ANSA. They wrote out their suicide note asking for forgiveness and directing neighbors to the room with their bodies.

Woman left her baby to freeze to death on the side of a road, gets Half a Century In Jail

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Katie Stockton, 32, faced up to 60 years in prison for the death of the infant, who became known as Baby Crystal around the Rock River Valley after her frozen remains were found. Winnebago County prosecutors dropped 11 remaining murder charges in exchange for her guilty plea in February to a single count of first-degree murder.

Before handing down the sentence, Winnebago County Judge John Truitt allowed testimony about skeletal remains of two other infants found years later in the trunk of Stockton’s car, the Rockford Register Star reported.

Stockton hid her pregnancy and gave birth to the baby in secret on Dec. 17, 2004. Afterward, she stuffed the baby and soiled clothing into an orange shopping bag and placed it along a dead-end road near her parents’ Rockton home.

Firstpost World Nigerian fuel tanker explosion kills at least 36

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LAGOS (Reuters) – At least 36 people were killed when a fuel tanker exploded after crashing into a crowded bus in southern Nigeria, officials said on Saturday. The Federal Road Safety Commisson said the crash happened on Friday on the Benin-Ore road linking the commercial hub of Lagos with southeast Nigeria. Three people were injured.

Traffic accidents are common in Nigeria, where roads are bad and safety standards poor.At least 95 people were killed in July last year in southern Nigeria when a petrol tanker crashed and caught fire as people crowded around it to scoop up the fuel.

(Reporting by Tim Cocks; editing by Andrew Roche)

3 Nigerian men caught with box of fake dollars in Lagos (Photos)

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The police at Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS, Ikeja, Lagos have arrested three suspected  fraudsters who dupe unsuspecting members of the public using fake dollars and a fake Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, certificate.

The suspects, Olasende Akinsiku, 40, Abiodun Akiniyi, 35, and Tajudeen Lasisi, 40, (pictured above) were arrested following a complaint by a retired Major General to Abba Kyari, the officer in charge of SARS, that he was swindled by the arrested suspects.


Akinsiku, who hails from Ondo state, said their victims that they stole the dollars from their place of work and wanted to convert it into naira  at a cheap rate so that the victims will not suspect that the dollar notes were fake.

11 Killed As Gunmen Attack Adamawa Deputy Governor’s Residence

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At least 11 people have been killed in an early morning attack on Midlu village in Adamawa state, while staging an attack on the residence of the state’s Deputy Governor.

The Deputy Governor’s country home where he normally spends his weekend was alleged attacked by the gunmen who murdered two police guards attached to his house before setting the building ablaze. The raid reportedly lasted over two hours.

The Police Public Relations Officer in the state, Mohammed Ibrahim, confirmed the attack stating that unidentified gunmen raided Midlu village, in Madagali local government area of the state, and attacked the home of the state deputy governor, Bala Ngalari.

Funmilayo Olayinka: Ekiti State deputy governor dies of cancer at 52 - R.I.P

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The Deputy Governor of Ekiti State, Mrs Funmilayo Olayinka, has died of cancer. The 52 year old banker turned politician lost her battle with cancer today in Lagos. She's survived by her husband and three kids. May her soul rest in peace

Police force drunken University students to crawl back to their rooms or be arrested

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Police officers stopped four Southwestern Oklahoma University students who were on their way home at 1:30 am after drinking at a house,one hundred yards away. 

The police officers gave the students the option of crawling back to their apartment or be arrested for public intoxication.

Three students chose to crawl the remaining twenty yards to their apartment in order to get the police officers off their backs, but the fourth man 22-year-old Dylan Frizzell refused to crawl so police officers handcuffed Frizzell and arrested him.

After Saying Abacha Never Stole, Buhari Embarrassed as More Abacha Loot is Uncovered

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Former military Head of State, Muhammadu Buhari, who served Abacha as Executive Chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF) has come under some embarrassment over his comments in 2008 that Abacha never stole as new Abacha loot has been traced.

Buhari, in 2007, described the allegations of looting against Abacha as “baseless”, because according to him, “ten years after Abacha, those allegations remain unproven because of lack of facts”.

However, fresh facts emerged that the previous estimate of what Abacha stole which stood at $5 Billion may be wrong.

Top Navy Chief arrested for Cocain smuggling

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A former navy chief of the small West African nation of Guinea-Bissau who is suspected of being a kingpin in the international cocaine trade has been brought to the U.S. and is being held by authorities in New York City following his arrest at sea by federal drug agents, a law enforcement official said Friday.

Four other men apprehended in the operation also were being held by authorities in New York City, according to the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Public television in the Cape Verde Islands reported that Rear Adm. Jose Americo Bubo Na Tchuto and four other Guinea-Bissau nationals were taken into custody aboard a yacht in international waters in the eastern Atlantic Ocean. It said authorities took the five into nearby Cape Verde, a former Portuguese colony, and that Na Tchuto was flown from there to the United States.

‘Anti-Rape’ Underwear invented by Indian Student which gives Attackers Electric Shock ( see Photo)

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Considering the astronomical rape incidents in India, I am not shocked this underwear is coming out of India.

Women must do whatever it takes to protect our dignity as human, even if it involves shocking or killing attackers. Yeah, that is how I feel as a woman when it comes to rape. You try me, I will kill you with my last breath.

The UK Sun Reports;

THREE engineering students have come up with “anti-rape” underwear that gives an electric shock to attackers AND alerts cops.

The trio designed a camisole underwired with a technology that can deliver up to 82 electric shocks.

The garment has pressure sensors sewn in around the bust area that detect groping hands and send out the shock – which has the strength of a stun gun.

The product also sends a message to police as well as to the family of the victim.

The undergarment – dubbed Society Harnessing Equipment or SHE – was created by trainee automobile engineers from Chennai, India after the fatal gang rape of a 23-year-old physiotherapy student on a New Delhi bus last December. See Another Picture After The Break

My Own Share Was Just N45.5m – Airport Robbery Suspect

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Lagos State Police Command has arrested members of a gang that allegedly robbed Murtala Muhammed International Airport on March 13, 2013.

The police on Tuesday said the gang was also behind another operation at the same airport in 2012.

One of the suspects, Atoba Adeniyi, who confessed to being part of the two operations, however, said his share was only N45.5m –N45m in the first and N500,000 in the second. Adeniyi spoke while being paraded alongside six others involved in the robberies at the headquarters of the state command in Ikeja.

The suspects had stormed the airport on March 13 and carted away millions of naira and foreign currencies after killing two police inspectors.

Why Boko Haram targets Lagos

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More facts emerged yesterday on the plot by Boko Haram to bomb Lagos. The main reason for the planned attack on Lagos, the “commercial nerve centre of Nigeria,” is its booming economy. The motive is simple: Attack Lagos and Nigeria grinds to a halt. One of the service chiefs reportedly confirmed at the Executive Session held with the Senate last Wednesday on the state of insecurity in the country that the threat to bomb Lagos was real.

He listed five reasons for the plot. The sect, it was gathered, reckons that the economy of the North is already in ruins with the incessant bombing of its major commercial cities including Kano, Kaduna and Maiduguri in Borno State. Kano is no longer the thriving commercial nerve centre of the North, while the Joint Task Force (JTF) occupies every 10 kilometres in Maiduguri, making commercial activities difficult.

FG raises inter-ministerial panel on flooding

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In its bid to prevent the kind of flood recorded in most parts of the country last year and its adverse loss, the Federal Government on Friday inaugurated an inter-ministerial committee saddled with the responsibility of producing a national framework for the application of climate services.

The committee headed  by the Minister of National Planning, Dr. Shamshudeen Usman, has  Ministers of Aviation; Agriculture and Rural Development; Environment, Water Resources, Health, Works, Science and Technology as well as Transport as members, while the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation will provide the secretariat.

While inaugurating the committee on behalf of the government, Vice President Namadi Sambo said the panel was constituted by President Goodluck Jonathan based on the early weather warning memorandum premised on last year’s rainy season’s flood disaster that has caused great losses to the nation as presented to the President by  the Minister of Aviation, Stella, Oduah.

“They certainly deserve better than this” – NLC state position on pension crisis

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We find it necessary to address you today on the shameful and painful circumstances in which our retired workers who are pensioners have found themselves.

PREAMBLE

For quite some time now, the administration of pension funds has been enmeshed in unprecedented corruption with some public officers, institutions of government and banks generously helping themselves to the said funds, and in the process, deny pensioners their pension. This has thrown pensioners, majority of whom are our members into penury, with some dying in queues of protracted and unending verification exercises that yield little or no result.

FOR REAL ? In Nigeria, 1 in Every 13 Women Die During Childbirth

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The United Nations has 1,000 days left to achieve its Millenium Development Goals, which include targets to reduce poverty, increase education and improve health. In Nigeria, the U.N.’s World Health Organization says one in every 13 women die during childbirth, making it the country with the second highest rate of maternal mortality in the world. The government is making an effort to reduce the problem sending hundreds of trained midwives to different parts of the country.

Nigeria juniors reveal a glimpse of the future

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File Photo: Team Nigeria on arrival for the Africa Youth
Athletics Championships ( AYAC), Warri 2013. Photo: Henry Unini

Delta State was usually busy through last week. The epicenter was the Warri City Stadium where the maiden Africa Youth Athletics Championships ran its full course.

There weren’t any untoward developments for the cynics to celebrate. But rather those who are  genuinely concerned about athletics development in Africa and Nigeria in particular thumped their chests for a job well done. Though organisation was not anywhere near perfect, there is a note book full of misidentifies, but  it was more like “all is well that ends well”.

Nigeria: Northern Elders Insist On Amnesty for Boko Haram

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The Northern Elders' Forum has called on President Goodluck Jonathan to consider granting amnesty to insurgent groups in Northern Nigeria in order to overcome security challenges in the country.

The main insurgent group in the North, Boko Haram, has claimed responsibility for or is suspected of masterminding several attacks

across the northern states causing the death of hundreds of people.

The Elders' Forum made its position known on Wednesday at a closed-door late night meeting held with the President at the State

Nigeria: FG Resuscitates Open Heart Surgery

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A decade after the federal government suspended the operations of open heart surgeries in the country, the open heart surgery unit at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu, has been resuscitated to avail Nigerians the opportunity of getting the service at a subsidised rate of N500,000.

The unit was suspended a decade ago following the movement of the UNTH from the old site within the Enugu metropolis to its permanent site at Ituku-Ozala.

Briefing journalists at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting yesterday, the Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku, said his Ministry of Health counterpart, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, briefed the council on the issue, indicating that with the development, Nigerians now have the chance to have the operation within the country without having to travel abroad.

Just last month, Chukwu inaugurated the heart surgery unit at the UNTH, noting that it was in line with the transformation programme of the President Goodluck Jonathan-led administration.

According to him, the resuscitation became necessary in order to forestall the current trend whereby "Nigerians are flown abroad for medical missions which is not the best for us."