Monday, December 10, 2007

On Saturday night, anarchists reportedly hurled pieces of pavement through the windows of a Royal Bank location, demonstrating against their sponsorship of the Vancouver Olympics.

An anonymous posting Sunday evening to Infoshop News, an independent anarchist news website, reports that the Royal Bank of Canada branch at 1st and Commercial had its windows destroyed by “some exceptionally large pieces of pavement”.

The website describes the bank, a sponsor of the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games, as “bastards”.

It continues, by encouraging anarchists to participate—”you don’t have to wait until the 17 days of official events to begin competing, you can start right now!!!”

The anonymous posting on the anarchist website includes a list of thirteen branches of the bank in the city, and encourages fellow anarchists to destroy the property. The site even says “don’t forget a gold medal will be given for the most damage at a single location.”

There was no explanation on the site, as to why Royal Bank was targeted.

The bank has supported the Canadian Olympic Movement for 60 years. The RBC Olympians Program was created in 2002, and among the 35 athletes it has supported are diving bronze medalist Blythe Hartley, Jennifer Botterill from the gold-winning women’s ice hockey team, and athlete Perdita Felicien. This year, the program is sponsoring a total of 28 summer and winter athletes.

Opposition to the 2010 Olympics has focused on the $1.63 billion expense for taxpayers, destruction of natural habitat, and loss of low-income housing to support a fee-based recreational event.

Friday, April 3, 2009

A gunman attacked a downtown Binghamton, New York-based immigration services center today, killing up to 13 people before killing himself.

New York Governor David Paterson at a news conference indicated that 12 or 13 people were killed at the American Civic Association. It is unclear whether or not the attacker was included in the number of the deceased.

An anonymous law enforcement official indicated the presumed gunman’s body was found in an office of the immigration services center building. The attacker blocked the rear building door with his car and entered through the front door. He then opened fire.

The gunman held over 40 hostages, some in a closet and the rest in the boiler room. Police and EMS started arriving at 10:30 A.M (EDT). SWAT sharpshooters and the Endicott police bomb squad were called to the scene. Nearby residencies and businesses were evacuated, while a nursing home and the high school were placed on lockdown. FBI hostage negotiators and evidence response team were being sent to the scene. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents were headed to Binghamton. About noon, the shooter released ten hostages, then another ten out the back 40 minutes later. At 2:40 p.m., the local police said the standoff had ended and a SWAT team was checking the building for anyone remaining.

In Johnson City, Wilson Medical Center staff are treating three to five gunshot wounds, while Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Binghamton is treating a single such case. Both hospitals called in additional staff and cancelled all elective surgeries.

A national law enforcement source identified the shooter as 42-year-old Jiverly Voong. The police asked Broome Community College Assistant Professor Tuong Hung Nguyen, a fluent Vietnamese speaker, to translate for discussions between police and Voong.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Automobile manufacturing company BMW has announced that its sales increased by 7.6 per cent during the month of July. BMW reported that 129,094 units were sold during the month, consisting of the motor vehicle brands of BMW, Mini and Rolls-Royce Motor Cars.

In a statement, Ian Robertson, member of the Board of Management of BMW, told of the company reporting “the most successful July sales ever”, claiming that it is “well on [the] way to achieving our recently announced target of over 1.6 million vehicles in 2011, the best ever sales result for the BMW group”.

Demand increases were notable in the United States and China in particular. 21,409 vehicles were delivered by BMW in the United States in July, an increase of 11.7 per cent from July 2010. In China, 18,858 units were sold in the month, meaning a sales rise of 36.1 per cent on the same month last year, with the increased popularity being attributed to “substantial gains in many markets”, BMW said. Sales increases were also reported in South Korea, Russia, India and Brazil. BMW did admit to a decrease of sales by 0.8% in Germany, the country in which the company is based.

As a brand, BMW sales stood at 108,721 for July, 7.1% more than July 2010. In the year to date, BMW delivered 962,468 vehicles, a 17.9 per cent rise. According to Agence France-Presse (AFP), developing markets have become the cause of the substantial popularity of high quality automobile manufacturers. However, growth in this area may decline later on in the year, due to the difficulties facing the global economy, AFP claims.

Meanwhile, General Motors stated on Friday that its China sales decreased by 1.8 per cent in July this year compared to the same month in 2010. This was due to a lowered demand for commercial vehicles, AFP reported.

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Indonesian Health officials are concerned that a 9-year-old girl who died of the H5N1 Avian Flu virus, contracted the illness as a result of human to human transmission and officials say a team of experts are on the way to the area to determine if a cluster exists.

“The tests were positive. She died of bird flu. A team left this morning to check if there is a cluster or not,” said Bird Flu Information Center scientist, Nurdin.

Ai Siti Amanah who lived in Garut, located in West Java died on August 15 before health officials were able to determine that she had the deadly virus and only one day after arriving for treatment at the hospital.

It is believed that the girl had contact with a 17-year-old male named Umar Aup from the same town who is infected with the virus , but health officials say he is recovering at a local hospital. He was diagnosed with the illness on August 12. Another boy named Misbah, 20, cousin of Aup died earlier in August and was not tested for the disease but officials say he was exhibiting signs of the illness.

Supari Indonesia’s health minister stated that tests will be done on the two subjects to determine the origin and the “exact type of the virus.”

Three months ago, seven family members died when they contracted the virus through human to human transmission.

So far, 46 people have died from the virus in Indonesia.

Friday, September 14, 2007

Reports say that O.J. Simpson, a former American football player is a suspect in a robbery that took place on Thursday night at the Palace Station Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. Simpson was not immediately arrested and was later released. He was not a guest at the hotel.

Las Vegas Metropolitan Police (LVMPD) began to question Simpson and at least five other people, after they were accused of breaking into a room in the hotel, with at least one of the individuals holding a gun, but its not known if the room was a guest room.

Several sports memorabilia items, all previously belonging to Simpson, were reported to be stolen from the room, which was registered to sports memorabilia collector Alfred Beardsley, and reports say that when police found the items, Simpson claimed that they belonged to him. Among the items stolen is believed to be a suit that Simpson wore during his 1995 murder trial, an autographed item that had been signed by Joe Montana, and “never before released” version of Simpson’s book If I Did It. Simpson was found not guilty of the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.

“When they talked to him, Simpson made the comment that he believed the memorabilia was his. We’re getting conflicting stories from the two sides,” said Jose Montoya, a spokesman for the LVMPD.

Reports say that Beardsley was going to sell the items and made plans to meet with someone on Thursday night who was interested in purchasing them. The unnamed individual, along with OJ claimed to be police officers and ordered Beardsley to turn over his cellular phone, which he refused. He then claims one of the men “roughed him up” before stealing every collectible in the room.

Police are expected to release a statement to the media later today.

Friday, July 7, 2017

On Wednesday, automobile company Volvo announced all of its cars to be released in 2019 onwards are to use some form of battery-powered engine, leaving conventional petrol-only vehicles altogether. The decision comes after Volvo announced in May their intent to cease production of diesel vehicles.

The chief executive of Volvo Cars, Håkan Samuelsson, said, “People increasingly demand electrified cars”. Volvo aims to release five new electric vehicle models between 2019 and 2021. While little has yet been revealed about them, the company has stated two of them are to be high-performance electric vehicles, branded as Polestars.

Other car models from 2019 may be plug-in hybrid or 48-volt “mild hybrid” systems. Audi and Mercedes-Benz are also releasing mild hybrid cars for the European market.

“This announcement marks the end of the solely combustion engine-powered car. Volvo Cars has stated that it plans to have sold a total of 1m electrified cars by 2025. When we said it we meant it. This is how we are going to do it,” Samuelsson said. Volvo is owned by Chinese automotive giant Geely, and China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has said by 2025 they want new vehicle sales to be 20 percent “new energy vehicles”.

Monday, November 26, 2007

In the 18 months since Andrea Muizelaar was crowned winner of the reality TV series Canada’s Next Top Model, her life has been a complete whirlwind. From working in a dollar store in her hometown of Whitby, Ontario, to modeling haute couture in Toronto, she had reached her dream of becoming a true Top Model.

But at what cost? Unknown to casual television viewers, Muizelaar had been enveloped in the eating disorder anorexia nervosa, which inevitably became too much for her to bear. She gave up modeling and moved back to Whitby, where she sought treatment for her disorder, re-entered college, and now works at a bank. Where is she now? Happy and healthy, she says.

Recently Andrea Muizelaar sat down with Wikinews reporter Mike Halterman in a candid interview that stretched to nearly two hours, as she told all about her hopes and aspirations, her battle with anorexia, and just what really happened on Canada’s Next Top Model.

April 12, 2005

In what authorities call a terrible tragedy, a four-year-old boy was killed Sunday afternoon by the family dog. The Orange County, Virginia USA boy was playing in his back yard while their dog, a Rottweiler–German Shepherd mix, was chained to a stake.

The parents of the boy were home when the mauling occurred, but there were no direct eye witnesses to the attack that took place in the Placid Pines mobile home park. County Sheriff C.G. Feldman said, “We’ll probably never know what provoked the attack.” he told the Associated Press, “The boy had grown up with the dog.”

A CBS6 broadcast said investigators saw no signs of parental negligence, and the boy was their only child. No charges against the parents were filed. The dog was euthanised Monday.

Sheriff Feldman stressed there were no similarities or connection with an earlier case of an elderly woman killed in an attack by 3 pit bulls in the nearby county of Spotsylvania just over a month ago.

Saturday, March 26, 2005

The Mozilla Foundation released the second major security update this week for their flagship browser Firefox. The fix patches a serious flaw in the way Firefox handles animated GIF image files. Firefox browsers infected by malicious code could experience a buffer overflow, temporarily locking up or “freezing” a user’s computer, or even executing arbitrary code which could take over a user’s computer.

The flaw was discovered and reported by Internet Security Systems, Inc. The upgrade was the second major security fix in less than a month for the browser, which has grown in popularity to ten percent of the browser market in the United States.

Although there were no known exploits of the bug, Chris Hoffman, director of engineering at Mozilla, told reporters, “[because] Mozilla is committed to delivering the most secure product possible, we decided to quickly issue an update to patch the bug.”

The Mozilla Foundation did not offer any details about the issue of vulnerability, but a second major security overhaul in such a short time underscores challenges faced by the nonprofit foundation as it goes head-to-head with the market leading Internet Explorer browser by Microsoft.

The new release, Firefox version 1.0.2, “illustrates the dedication of the strong community of developers working on the product,” according to Hoffman. “…we’re able to turn around patches much faster than a traditional corporation,” he added.

Users can download the update at no charge, and can find additional information at the Mozilla website.