The Guardian World News

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• Taliban call for joint Afghan deaths inquiry considered


• Mixed response to Blair's donation


• Doctor urges drug decriminalisation


• BAA airport workers' strike called off


• China's economy overtakes Japan


• Ex-Israeli soldier's photos spark row


• Colombian jet crash 'miracle'


• Disease fears for Pakistan children


• Lawyers' warning over legal aid cuts


• Gates announces plan to step down


• Troops before Trident, says Clegg


• In the name of the father?


• Why our children need to get outside


• Pop star accused over HIV infection


• 'Protect nature to secure economy'


• Russia launches seed bank inquiry


• Rwanda taps 'explosive' Lake Kivu


• Business vs maternity leave


• YouTube should let Iranians speak


• Scott 'invented English legends'


• New music: How to Dress Well

Taliban call for joint Afghan deaths inquiry considered Posted: 16 Aug 2010 10:17 AM PDT UN and Nato cautiously consider proposal, which follows reports of high levels of civilian deaths caused by insurgents Nato and the United Nations are cautiously considering a Taliban proposal to set up a joint commission to investigate allegations of civilians being killed and wounded in the conflict in Afghanistan, diplomats in Kabul have told the Guardian. The Taliban overture, which came in a statement posted on its website, will revive a divisive debate about whether to conduct any formal talks with insurgents who are responsible for the majority of civilian casualties in Afghanistan, and whose assassination campaign now kills one person a day on average. The Taliban statement called for the establishment of a body including members from the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, UN human rights investigators, Nato and the Taliban. "The stated committee should [be] given a free hand to survey the affected areas as well as people in order to collect the precise information and the facts and figures and disseminate its findings worldwide," the Taliban said. One human rights organisation has already thrown its support behind the joint commission plan, which echoes a similar idea floated four years ago. The UN and Nato are treading carefully, but western diplomats say the proposal is being carefully considered. One said that some senior officers at the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) were keen on the idea but that no steps could be taken until it was considered "at the highest political level". The attraction to Nato is that contacts with the Taliban might help improve a dire security situation that threatens to deteriorate. The Taliban statement also complained that data on civilian casualties were being used as "propaganda by the western media". A UN report last week showed that a 31% rise in civilian casualties was largely caused by insurgents, who have increasingly turned to homemade bombs and assassinations. The report also destroyed one of the Taliban's main propaganda claims: that foreign forces are responsible for most civilian deaths and injuries. In fact, the report showed "pro-government" forces were responsible for just 12%, while insurgents were responsible for 76%. A 30% drop in the number of casualties caused by foreign forces was put down to severe restrictions on the use of heavy weapons and air strikes. Today meanwhile it emerged that Taliban forces had resorted to another dark tactic barely used in recent years. A couple accused of adultery were stoned to death in the northern Kunduz province. Amnesty International said the killing underscored a basic fundamental: "That the Afghan government should not sacrifice human rights, particularly the rights of women and minorities, in the name of reconciliation with the Taliban and other insurgent groups." Today Afghanistan's president, Hamid Karzai, indicated that the private security industry that guards everything from Nato supplies to foreign embassies would be scrapped within four months and all security handed over to the Afghan police. The announcement appeared likely to widen the rift between Karzai and his western backers. The delicate balancing act for Nato is that the possible benefits of opening dialogue with insurgents must be weighted against the danger of simply giving them political legitimacy at a time when David Petraeus, the US commander of Nato forces, has ordered his communications department to cast the Taliban in the most negative light possible. Today Nato military spokesmen put out statements attacking the Taliban's record on civilian casualties, but refused to comment on whether the plan was being ruled out. Isaf said: "The Taliban clearly realise their vulnerability on the issue of civilian casualties, and are trying to devise a way to evade responsibility for them. But the facts are clear – the Taliban have caused the overwhelming majority of civilian casualties." A spokesman for the UN, which has for years had unofficial contacts with insurgents and sees itself as an independent arbitrator in the conflict, simply said: "We are aware of the statement and we are considering it." There are some concerns, shared by the UN, about whether the proposal, which was posted under the name of a Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, actually comes from the movement's leadership. "Although it was on their website and from their spokesman, this is actually low-level and there has been no other reach out," a diplomat said. And there are fears that the Taliban have not shown contrition for the huge number of people killed and injured by improvised explosive devices and their assassination campaign, which, according to last week's UN report, now runs at an average of one person killed a day. Afghanistan Rights Monitor, an organisation that investigates human rights abuses, said in a statement that it welcomed the Taliban's announcement, but issued a list of 12 provisos. They included a demand the Taliban provide safety guarantees to human rights investigators in areas under their control and an immediate stop to suicide attacks in areas where civilians are concentrated. Eric Gaston, a human rights lawyer and Afghanistan specialist at the Open Society Institute, said: "This offer would be more credible if the [Taliban] demonstrated a commitment to reducing civilian casualties itself by not attacking military targets indiscriminately, nor targeting and assassinating civilian officials and persons." Taliban Nato Afghanistan United Nations Jon Boone guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Mixed response to Blair's donation Posted: 16 Aug 2010 11:49 AM PDT Armed forces charity delighted to accept book proceeds but opponents of war say it will not change their views on former PM For the former prime minister it was "a way of marking the enormous sacrifice" of the UK's armed forces. For some others it was little more than an attempt to assuage a guilty conscience. Like so much else about Tony Blair, today's announcement that he will hand over several million pounds in proceeds from his forthcoming memoir to the Royal British Legion has divided opinion. Chris Simpkins, the director general of the armed forces charity, said he was delighted to accept the "very generous" offer – the largest in the organisation's history – which will help pay for a new rehabilitation centre for injured servicemen and women. But for some families who have lost loved ones in the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan the gift, including all of Blair's reported £4.6m advance, was greeted with suspicion. Rose Gentle, an anti-Iraq war campaigner whose 19-year-old son, Fusilier Gordon Campbell Gentle, was killed in Basra in 2004, said she was pleased injured troops would benefit but said it would not change the way she felt about Blair. "I have spoken to other parents and everyone is agreed that this doesn't make any difference. It is OK doing this now, but it was decisions Blair made when he was prime minister that got us into this situation. I still hold him responsible for the death of my son." In a co-ordinated press announcement between Blair's office and the Royal British Legion, a spokesman for the former prime minister said Blair had decided to donate the money when he left office in 2007. "In making this decision Tony Blair recognises the courage and sacrifice the armed forces demonstrate day in, day out," added the spokesman. "As prime minister he witnessed that for himself in Iraq, Afghanistan, Northern Ireland, Sierra Leone and Kosovo. This is his way of honouring their courage and sacrifice." Blair's decision to invade Iraq in 2003 prompted huge antiwar protests and led to splits within the Labour party amid claims the war was illegal. Although US and UK "combat troops" have set out plans to leave the country, there are renewed concerns about increasing levels of violence, and anti-war campaigners are planning to hold a demonstration at his book-signing in central London one week after the memoir is launched on 1 September. Lindsey German, from Stop The War Coalition, said: "It would have been much better for everyone if he hadn't taken us into these wars in the first place. Blair lied about the Iraq war, he refused to express any regret at the Chilcot inquiry and his attempt to save his conscience will be little comfort to those injured or who have lost their loved ones." The proceeds from the book will go to the Royal British Legion's Battle Back campaign, a project that will provide a new rehabilitation centre for seriously injured troops returning from the frontline. Simpkins said: "Mr Blair's generosity is much appreciated and will help us to make a real and lasting difference to the lives of hundreds of injured personnel." On internet forums and message boards soldiers appeared sceptical of Blair's motives although most agreed his donation was good news for injured troops. Adnan Sarwar, who lost two friends during tours of Iraq before leaving the army in 2007, said: "It may be a way of trying to say sorry for what he has done, a way of giving something back to the troops, but whatever the reason I think we should accept his money and say thanks very much … This does not change what happened or the decisions that were made. But there comes a time when you have to move on and, not forget or even forgive necessarily, but move on." Tony Blair Military Matthew Taylor guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Doctor urges drug decriminalisation Posted: 16 Aug 2010 11:59 AM PDT Former president of the Royal College of Physicians says blanket ban has failed to cut crime or improve health One of the UK's leading doctors said today the government should consider decriminalising drugs because the blanket ban has failed to cut crime or improve health. "I'm not saying we should make heroin available to everyone, but we should be treating it as a health issue rather than criminalising people," said Sir Ian Gilmore, former president of the Royal College of Physicians. Gilmore put his position on the record publicly today after telling fellows and members of the college last month in a statement that he felt like "finishing my presidency on a controversial note". He gave his backing to Nicholas Green, chairman of the Bar Council, who recently suggested individual use be decriminalised. "This could drastically reduce crime and improve health," said Gilmore, who added that drugs should still be regulated. He praised an article published on 13 July in the British Medical Journal by Stephen Rolles, senior policy analyst at the Transform Drug Policy Foundation, which, he said, clearly made the argument for decriminalisation. Rolles pointed out not only that criminalising drug use had exacerbated health problems such as HIV, which can be spread by the use of contaminated needles, but had created a much larger array of secondary harms, including "vast networks of organised crime, endemic violence related to the drug market, corruption of law enforcement and governments, militarised crop eradication programmes (environmental damage, food insecurity, and human displacement), and funding of terrorism and insurgency." Decriminalisation in Portugal in 2001, Rolles said, had led to a fall in drug use among young people. A study by the World Health Organisation, he added, has shown that countries taking tough action do not have lower levels of drug use than countries with liberal policies. The editor of the British Medical Journal, Dr Fiona Godlee, gave her personal support to Rolles' call for decriminalisation. "He says, and I agree, that we must regulate drug use, not criminalise it," she wrote in the journal. Danny Kushlik, head of external affairs at Transform, which campaigns for legalisation, said the intervention of senior medical professionals was significant. "Sir Ian's statement is yet another nail in prohibition's coffin," he said. "The Hippocratic oath says: 'First, do no harm'. Physicians are duty bound to speak out if the outcomes show that prohibition causes more harm than it reduces." He added: "With a prime minister and deputy prime minister both longstanding supporters of alternatives to the war on drugs, at the very least the government must initiate an impact assessment comparing prohibition with decriminalisation and strict legal regulation." Nicholas Green, chairman of the Bar Council, made his comments in a report in the profession's magazine, in which he said that drug-related crime costs the economy about £13bn a year. There was growing evidence that decriminalisation could free up police resources, reduce crime and recidivism and improve public health. Last month, Professor David Nutt, who was sacked as the Labour government's top drugs adviser after saying ecstasy was less harmful than alcohol, said the UK needed a radical new approach to drugs laws, which may include the regulated sale of some drugs. Drugs policy Drugs Health Health policy Sarah Boseley guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

BAA airport workers' strike called off Posted: 16 Aug 2010 01:34 PM PDT The union Unite said that talks to resolve a row over pay involving more than 6,000 security staff, engineers and firefighters have resolved the dispute The threat of strike action by BAA airport workers has been called off tonight, the union Unite has said. Six airports, Heathrow, Stansted, Southampton, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen, faced closure if the stoppages had gone ahead. But peace talks between the union and the airports operator to resolve a row over pay involving more than 6,000 security staff, engineers and firefighters appear to have averted further woe for travellers. Unite's national officer Brian Boyd said the union was calling off the threat of strikes while workers vote on the new proposal in the next few weeks. Boyd, speaking outside the headquarters of conciliation service Acas, where the talks were held, said: "Unite came to these negotiations with a strong mandate for industrial action. "In today's negotiations between Unite and BAA, the assistance of Acas has been constructive and we are pleased to announce we are calling off strike action at BAA's six airports. "Unite's negotiating committee will recommend a much-improved offer from BAA. "Details of the agreement will be made public once BAA staff have been advised of the improved offer." The meeting, chaired by the conciliation service Acas, was held at an undisclosed location and followed a vote by Unite members in favour of industrial action in protest at a 1% pay offer. Unite said its members had accepted a wage freeze last year and co-operated with changes to their pension scheme, and so deserved a bigger pay rise. The Spanish owner of BAA, Grupo Ferrovial, offered an additional 0.5% but this was conditional on changes to the firm's sickness agreement, said the union. Around half of the 6,000 workers balloted by Unite voted, with 74.1% of those who did opting for strike action. Unite said the airports would close if strikes went ahead, which would have hit the travel plans of millions of passengers. The union would have to give no more than seven days' notice of any industrial action, meaning its members could walk out before the end of the school holidays. Meanwhile, thousands of British Airways check-in workers and other ground staff started voting today on whether to accept savings and job losses as part of the airline's plans to cut costs. The GMB and Unite reached agreement in principle with BA regarding staffing and working arrangements and are recommending that around 3,000 members accept the deal, which involves 500 voluntary job losses and a one-year pay freeze. The long-running BA cabin crew dispute remains deadlocked, with further talks expected this week. BAA Air transport Airline industry Trade unions Helen Pidd James Meikle guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

China's economy overtakes Japan Posted: 16 Aug 2010 10:06 AM PDT • Japanese economy grew by just 0.1% in second quarter • Figures seen as 'symbolic' shift in world power China overtook Japan as the world's second-largest economy during the second quarter of this year, marking another milestone in the country's transformation from impoverished communist state to economic superpower. With its red-hot economy growing at around 9% a year, some experts now expect China to outstrip the United States as soon as 2030, its financial strength carrying broad political implications. Official data published today showed a faltering Japanese economy growing by just 0.1% in the three months to June, with GDP of $1.28tn (£826bn) eclipsed by China, which had economic output of $1.33tn.Although it is not the first time China has outpaced Japan in a single quarter, most economists now expect the emergent economy to end the year firmly ahead. China's spectacular growth since Deng Xiaoping began to introduce free-market reforms three decades ago has seen it bounding up the world league of economic powers. Just 10 years ago, it was the sixth-largest in the world but has since outstripped Britain and France in 2005 and Germany in 2007. It overtook Germany as the world's largest exporter last year and also became the largest car market. John Hawksworth, chief economist at PricewaterhouseCoopers, described the figures as a "symbolic" shift. He said: "Clearly it was inevitable, it was a just a question of when it would happen – just as it is pretty inevitable in the long run that it will be bigger than the US as well, because it has four times the population." For now, China remains a distant second behind the US. The International Monetary Fund expects China's GDP to reach $5.36tn this year, while the US is expected to hit $14.79tn. The UK projection is $2.22tn. Japan is expected to have GDP of $5.27tn. Nick Parsons, head of research at National Australia Bank, said the global financial crisis, which pitched more developed economies into recession, has underlined the shifting world power. "The Chinese economy has more than doubled in size in the past 10 years and will double in size again in the next 10 and I don't think the financial crisis has accelerated that change as much as it has cemented it," he added. For Japan, the figures reflect the continued decline of a nation that has held the second spot since 1968, when it overtook West Germany, the result of a remarkable rise as a manufacturing and financial giant in the wake of the second world war. But the "economic miracle" came to a juddering halt at the beginning of the 1990s when a property bubble burst. What followed was a lost decade in the doldrums and the country has never fully recovered. Today, it faces deflation, an ageing and shrinking population and only minimal growth. Economists also cited the figures as evidence that the global recovery was still facing strong headwinds. China's breakneck growth has not come without cost, causing huge social upheaval, including large-scale migration from the countryside to cities, which are growing at an unprecedented rate. Consultancy firm McKinsey reckons that China's urban population will almost double by 2025, when it will have 221 cities with populations of more than 1 million, compared with 35 in Europe. China has continued growing through the recession, in part owing to a $586bn stimulus package. The headline growth figures also mask huge disparities of income in China, which has a population of 1.3 billion; the UN estimates that 300 million have been lifted from poverty since the reforms began, but while luxury boutiques spring up in Shanghai and Beijing, hundreds of millions still live in severe hardship, particularly in rural areas. Japan's people are still among the richest in the world, with GDP per capita of $39,700, compared with $46,400 in the US and just $3,600 in  China. The rapid advances in China have also led to environmental problems: in 2006, the country overtook the US as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases. This month, Beijing ordered more than 2,000 highly polluting, unsafe or energy inefficient plants to shut down within two months, underlining how the one-party regime can direct sudden change. The growth of China has made it hungry for natural resources and energy, driving up the cost of commodities and raising the potential for conflict. It has been busy doing trade deals in Africa, Latin America and Asia, without the kind of human rights and reform demands often attached by the west. The US has already blocked an attempted takeover of an American oil firm by a Chinese state-controlled rival while Australia has prevented the Chinese buying mineral firms. There are also concerns that the global economy has become unbalanced, with huge trade deficits between China and the developed world. China is said to make four-fifths of the world's toys and almost three-fifths of its clothing. Developed economies are hopeful that China will become a market for their goods and services as its consumer market grows, but at present it accounts for just 2% of UK exports. Critics in the US and Europe argue that China is benefiting unfairly because it keeps its currency, the yuan, artificially low, benefiting its exporters. According to a different measure, using purchasing power instead of current exchange rates, China had already overtaken Japan. Hawksworth said China's growth will begin to slow progressively to around 3.5% to 4% in 20 years' time. This is in part because of an ageing population, due to its one-child policy, as well as increasing pressures on wages and a growing reliance on domestic demand as exports slow. There have recently been a series of high-profile strikes at Honda and other factories in southern China, as workers demand better wages and conditions, while a series of suicides at Foxconn, which makes iPhones and other Apple products, has raised concern and led to higher pay. But Hawksworth said the increasing political power that has come with China's economic growth was already apparent: "It is evident in a whole series of forums from Copenhagen and climate talks to the G20, that you can't really come to a sensible solution without giving considerable weight to China." Global economy China Japan Financial crisis David Teather guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Ex-Israeli soldier's photos spark row Posted: 16 Aug 2010 11:54 AM PDT Young woman condemned for posting images of herself posing next to handcuffed and blindfolded detainees A former Israeli soldier's Facebook page has provoked outrage after she posted pictures of herself on duty posing next to handcuffed, blindfolded Palestinians. The photographs are part of a Facebook photo album entitled: The Army – the best years of my life, posted by a young woman named Eden, from Ashdod, who completed compulsory military service last year. The pictures, swiftly circulated by Israeli bloggers, include one in which Eden sits on concrete blocks next to a blindfolded Palestinian detainee. A comment posted beneath the picture by one of Eden's friends, notes: "You look sexiest here," to which the former soldier replies: "Yeah I know … I wonder if he's got Facebook! I have to tag him in the picture!" The Israeli army issued a statement describing Eden's Facebook posts as "shameful behaviour". Israel Defence Forces (IDF) spokesperson, captain Arye Shalicar added: "It was just something very foolish and stupid – and I hoped there wouldn't be any media interest." Ishai Menuchin, executive director of human rights group The Public Committee against Torture in Israel, said: "These cruel pictures reflect Israel's ongoing objectification of Palestinians and complete disregard of their humanity and of their human rights, and especially their right to privacy." Menuchin ascribes Eden's behaviour to "an Israeli military culture that brings young Israelis to systematically violate the basic rights of Palestinians". Shalicar notes that, as Eden has been discharged and the pictures do not contain information of a sensitive military nature it is unlikely that action will be taken against her. Eden has changed her Facebook privacy settings, so that her page can now only be viewed by friends. However, thanks to bloggers who captured a screen image of the page, the photographs can still be viewed online. Israel Palestinian territories Facebook Middle East Rachel Shabi guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Colombian jet crash 'miracle' Posted: 16 Aug 2010 05:45 PM PDT • Plane carrying 127 people lands short of runway • Only fatality is passenger who had a heart attack A Boeing 737 passenger jet crashed and broke into three pieces upon landing during a storm at a Colombian island yesterday, but the only fatality was a passenger who died from an apparent heart attack. The plane, carrying 121 passengers and six crew members, was about 80 metres from the San Andres island runway when a suspected lightning strike caused it to land short and slide onto the runway, crumpling the fuselage. The Caribbean island's governor, Pedro Gallardo, said it was extraordinary that almost everyone survived, and joined a chorus calling it a miracle. "We have to give thanks to God," he said. The sole fatality, Amar Fernandez de Barreto, 68, died of a suspected heart attack on the way to hospital. Dozens more were taken to the hospital for evaluation, with five in serious condition. "It's incredible. For the dimension [of the accident] there should be more," said hospital director, Robert Sanchez. The plane, owned by private company Aires, left Bogotá shortly after midnight and was descending into San Andres, a Caribbean resort off Nicaragua's coast, at 1.49am when the accident happened. "It's a miracle," said Orlando Paez, a national police general. "The skill of the pilot kept the plane from sliding off the runway. The engines of the aircraft shut down on impact." Passengers said that despite a storm all appeared normal as they descended. "The plane was going perfectly, we were practically going to land, everything was under control," Ricardo Ramirez, a civil engineer who was going on holiday, told Caracol Radio. The plane hit short of the runway and slid on its belly as the fuselage fractured and bits of landing gear and at least one engine were ripped off. "When we fell, we wound up on the pavement still in the seats," said Ramirez, who struggled to free himself and his wife from their safety belts. "We tried to get out of the plane because it was starting to shoot flames. In a few minutes, a police patrol arrived and helped us." Survival, said Ramirez, was "a miracle of God". Another passenger, Heriberto Rua, said he was also on his way to San Andres for a holiday with his wife and five daughters: "I felt an impact. My seat was knocked loose, but I was able to unbuckle myself and get two of my daughters out." Firefighters doused the beginnings of a fire on a wing, while police officers who were waiting to catch the plane's return leg to Bogotá helped evacuate passengers. In addition to Colombians those aboard included Americans, French, Brazilians, Costa Ricans and Germans. The plane's owner, Aerovias de Integracion Regional SA, said via Twitter that it was working with authorities to confirm the cause of the crash. A police report said a downward draft as the plane descended may have been responsible, but the pilot and island authorities blamed lightning. CNN's weather centre reported multiple lightning strikes around the airport. Analysis of data from the World Wide Lightning Location Network indicated 11 strikes within 6 miles of the runway in a five-minute span around the crash. "We are inspecting the remains of the plane to try to establish what the damages were and what caused the accident," said Donald Tascon, deputy director of Colombia's aeronautics authority. The airport was closed to commercial traffic to allow investigators to inspect the site, but bad weather prevented officials from landing. Passenger jets are designed to withstand lightning strikes, but they remain vulnerable if struck in certain areas. In recent years lightning has been blamed for plane crashes in China, Cameroon and France. Against the odds: survival stories 22 May 2010 Eight people, including three infants, survives when an Air India Express 737-800 from Dubai overshot the runway at Mangalore. 12 May 2010 Nine-year-old Dutch boy Ruben van Assouw is sole survivor when 103 people die after an Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A330-200 plunges into the desert near Tripoli airport, Libya. 30 July 2009 A 12-year-old girl is found clinging to the wreckage of an Airbus 310-324 13 hours after it crashed into the sea en route from Sana'a, Yemen, to the Comoros Islands, killing the other 152 passengers and crew. 15 January 2009 "The Miracle on the Hudson" when US Airways flight ditches in the river after taking off from La Guardia airport, New York City. All 155 passengers and crew are rescued from the sinking Airbus 320 which had been disabled by a bird strike. 17 January 2008 BA flight from Beijing to Heathrow lands short of the runway; 136 passengers and 16 crew survive. 14 September 1999 245 passengers and crew on a Britannia Airways flight from Cardiff escape when fuselage of Boeing 757 is ripped apart at Girona, Spain. James Meikle Colombia Airline industry Air transport Rory Carroll guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Disease fears for Pakistan children Posted: 16 Aug 2010 06:28 AM PDT Shortage of clean water raises health fears as fresh protests erupt over slow delivery of aid The UN said today that 3.5 million children in Pakistan are at risk from deadly waterborne diseases, as fresh protests erupted over the slow delivery of aid in the flood-ravaged country. The warning comes a day after the UN reported the first case of cholera and its secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, urged the world to speed up aid efforts to tackle what he said was the worst natural disaster he had ever seen. The UN has appealed for an initial £295m to provide relief, but only 25% of that has so far been given. Maurizio Giuliano, a spokesman for the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told the AFP news agency: "Up to 3.5 million children are at high risk of deadly waterborne diseases, such as watery diarrhoea and dysentery. Water during the flood has been contaminated badly. There is a shortage of clean water." Delays in aid delivery and the continuing threat of further floods have resulted in widespread public anger that could bring political trouble for an unpopular government overwhelmed by the disaster, which has disrupted the lives of at least one-tenth of Pakistan's 170 million people. Hundreds of villages across Pakistan in an area roughly the size of Italy have been marooned, roads have been cut in half and thousands of homeless people have been forced to set up tarpaulin tents along the side of roads. Dozens of men and a few women tried to block five lanes of traffic outside Sukkur, in the southern province of Sindh, today. Villagers set fire to straw and threatened approaching motorists with sticks. "We left our homes with nothing and now we're here with no clothes, no food and our children are living beside the road," said one protester, Gul Hasan. Last night, hundreds of villagers in the Punjab, the country's most populous and worst-hit province, burned tyres and chanted "down with the government". "We are dying of hunger here. No one has showed up to comfort us," said Hafiz Shabbir, a protester in Kot Addu. Neva Khan, Oxfam's country director in Pakistan, said: "The speed with which the situation is deteriorating is frightening. Communities desperately need clean water, latrines and hygiene supplies, but the resources currently available cover only a fraction of what is required." A brief respite in rain has been forecast today. Water levels in the Indus river feeding Pakistan's plains have fallen in the Punjab, although floodwaters could stay high where embankments were breached and flooding could worsen in Sindh province. "In Punjab, the water level in the river is falling and in the next 4-5 days … there will be scattered rains, but they are not flood-producing," Qamar-uz-Zaman Chaudhry, director general of the meteorological department, told Reuters. Despite a possible break in heavy rains, many families had little hope of returning to their homes. "We only hear that the water is receding but there is still more and more water in our village," said Mansha Bozdar, 45, whose village borders the town of Sanawan, in southern Punjab. "It seems if it will never stop." Pakistan Natural disasters and extreme weather United Nations Sam Jones guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Lawyers' warning over legal aid cuts Posted: 16 Aug 2010 04:05 PM PDT Critics of shake-up say changes are devastating for smaller practices, where specialists in family law are often found Thousands of the most vulnerable people risk being denied emergency access to free advice from lawyers following major changes to the way legal aid is delivered, family law experts warn today. Ninety per cent of family lawyers surveyed by Resolution, the family lawyers' association, say they believe access to justice is seriously under threat after the recent shake-up of the tendering process across all civil legal work which now revolves around bidding for three-year contracts. The survey reflects fears that legal aid is going to take the biggest hit following last week's announcement that the Ministry of Justice will cut its £9bn budget by £2bn. Justice secretary Kenneth Clarke said in a recent interview that legal aid, which has a budget of £2bn, was one area "where our cuts can come from". Previously firms were paid for work on a case-by-case basis, or for a set of cases, and critics of the changes say they favour bigger firms and are devastating for smaller practices, among which specialists in family law are often found. According to the Legal Services Commission (LSC), which runs the legal aid system in England and Wales, only 1,300 of the 2,400 family law firms previously doing legal aid work have won new contracts, which start in October. Of those which responded to Resolution's survey published today, 86% said they will be appealing the LSC's decision. Last night Steve Hynes, director of the Legal Action Group, said: "The big concern with family law is the reduction in outlets, which has been dramatic. It seems pretty obvious that if you reduce the number of outlets on the high street by 1,300 then there will be members of the public missing out on getting access to legal aid." The LSC insists the new system, in which firms have to competitively bid for legal aid contracts in blocks and meet a set of assessment criteria, works well. It says that because all categories were oversubscribed it is simply a case of a smaller number of providers doing broadly the same amount of work, and that in the family law sector a minimum of five providers will remain in each procurement area to ensure against any conflict of interest. But one respondent to the survey said the changes would have a particularly "devastating" impact on the family law sector, which deals with cases including children in care, domestic violence, forced marriage, divorce and adoption. The survey found: • Family lawyers overwhelmingly believe vulnerable people most in need of emergency legal aid, such as domestic violence and forced marriage victims, will be unable to find the advice they need after a number of key specialists in these areas lost their bids. • Patchy nationwide provision, especially in rural areas, will result in "advice deserts", including in Cornwall, Dorset, Bedfordshire and Lincolnshire. • The reduced number of firms will lead to potential conflicts of interest – or clients having to travel significantly further to access a different lawyer – if a single firm is forced to take on more than one client party to the same dispute. • The government's proposed closure of magistrates and county courts will further seriously impede access to justice. • There will be more than 500 redundancies in the family legal aid sector, with one firm saying it was likely to lose up to 30 staff members, and six firms saying they may have to close their offices entirely. "Our survey has painted a very worrying picture for the future of legal aid provision," said David Allison, chair of Resolution. "We have written to the Ministry of Justice and the LSC and are calling on them to immediately and publicly set out the steps they will take and the practical measures they will introduce to meet any emerging access to justice issues." Hugh Barrett, executive director of the LSC, admitted that it "did not intend that there should be a significant reduction in the number of firms that were doing family legal aid work". He said: "We are only part way through a process of allocating the work. We have a process of appeals and we will further look at whether in any particular parts of the country there are issues with access to justice." Firms specialising in domestic violence services seem to have been particularly hit. The new system requires that lawyers are on a specialist domestic violence panel in order to qualify for contracts. However, the Guardian has spoken to several family law firms who say they were not given enough time to join the panel and that as a result the LSC has not awarded contracts to those who are actually doing the complex, specialist work on domestic violence. Stamps Family Solicitors in Hull, which provides family legal aid services as well as a free 24/7 domestic violence hotline and confidential crisis counselling, said it did not know membership of the panel was obligatory. "This is extremely serious," said chief executive Oliver Hudson. "We're not just a law firm – we're a community service as well. Where else can people in Hull now go for legal advice about domestic violence at 3am on a Sunday morning?" Women's Aid says it is "exceedingly concerned" that the problems arising from the tender process will leave domestic violence victims and their children at risk. "Domestic violence victims already have difficulty finding law practices that will take on legally-aided family law and immigration matters," said Deborah McIlveen, Women's Aid policy and services manager. "It is crucial that the LSC carries out a gender impact assessment on any proposals and policies to ensure that women are not disproportionately disadvantaged by this process or the forthcoming comprehensive spending review." Russell Conway, senior partner at Oliver Fisher Solicitors in Kensington and Chelsea, said despite being awarded the legal aid work it bid for, his is the only firm in the area doing matrimonial work and as a result is being inundated with requests for cases it cannot take on. "My firm has been swamped with enquiries recently and we are turning away large volumes of work. Take on extra staff you will say – but what happens in October when the government cuts are announced. Why should I take on extra staff if I do not know if I can afford to pay them come October? "The customers are hurting the most and they are the most vulnerable. If the government really does have an agenda of getting rid of legal aid it is certainly succeeding. We once had a system that was the envy of the world. It is now slowly perishing." The survey was sent to all Resolution legal aid lawyers, representing 1,355 firms; 597 responded, and 561 of those had bid for a family contract. Legal aid Natalie Hanman guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Gates announces plan to step down Posted: 16 Aug 2010 02:49 PM PDT Veteran politician who performed same role under George Bush will retire next year despite sense of crisis in Afghanistan The US defence secretary, Robert Gates, who served under George Bush before performing the same job for President Barack Obama, is planning to stand down next year despite the mounting sense of crisis in Afghanistan. In an interview with the Washington-based Foreign Policy magazine, Gates stopped short of giving a date when he would step down, but said that with another presidential election due in 2012, he would not make life difficult for Obama by staying on too long. "I think it would be a mistake to wait until January 2012," he said. "This is not the kind of job you want to fill in the spring of an election year." The defence secretary, who will be 67 next month, was appointed by Bush in December 2006 to replace Donald Rumsfeld and was asked to remain by Obama, who wanted to demonstrate that he was not politically partisan in making appointments. White House insiders, such as the chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, have said that Obama trusts his judgment. But a retirement next year will come at a sensitive time with the US scheduled to begin withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan in July. Gates insisted yesterday the withdrawal would go ahead as planned. The US commander in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, has been more cautious. Gates has made no secret of his plans to retire to his home in the Pacific north-west. He tried to step down under Bush but then agreed to stay on under Obama. "Don't get carried away," his press secretary, Geoff Morrell, told Reuters. "This is not Bob Gates announcing he is stepping down. This is somebody who has been a failure at retirement, musing about when it would make sense to try again." Gates has presided over the Pentagon at a time when the focus switched from Iraq under Bush to Afghanistan under Obama. With the Afghanistan war going badly, he last year sacked the then US commander, David McKiernan, and replaced him with General Stanley McChrystal, who was forced to resign in July after disparaging comments about his bosses. Gates was initially ambivalent about a request by the US military last year to increase the number of troops in Afghanistan by 30,000. He eventually came around but, like Obama, insisted that troop withdrawal would begin in July next year. Any such withdrawal is likely to be mainly symbolic, with the US, Britain and other allies now focused on withdrawal of sizeable numbers of troops by 2014. Gates, in an interview with the Los Angeles Times published today, offered an upbeat assessment of Afghanistan, saying that training of Afghan forces was ahead of schedule. "There is no question in anybody's mind that we are going to begin drawing down troops in July 2011," he said. He added: "The pace and the number are going to depend on the conditions on the ground." Petraeus, interviewed on television on Sunday, refused to rule out the possibility that even a modest withdrawal of troops next year might have to be delayed. McChrystal, having left the military, is to switch to an academic life, teaching a course at Yale University on "how dramatic changes in globalisation have increased the complexity of modern leadership". US military United States US politics Afghanistan Ewen MacAskill guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Troops before Trident, says Clegg Posted: 16 Aug 2010 09:00 AM PDT Deputy prime minister reveals tensions within coalition government over the nuclear weapons system Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, today exposed tensions within the coalition over the £20bn replacement of the Trident nuclear weapons system. He said at a time of "huge pressure" on the defence budget money should be directed towards troops on the frontline in Afghanistan. The Liberal Democrat leader, who has become the public face of the government while David Cameron is on holiday, claimed the public would find it hard to understand why money was being spent on a full replacement of the Trident system at a time of belt-tightening in Whitehall. Clegg went into the general election opposing a like-for-like replacement of the missile system that uses four submarines to maintain a permanent capability. Speaking at a Q&A event at the London headquarters of Microsoft, Clegg said: "My views on Trident are well known. I can't try to hide them now that I've got into a coalition government. "I think there is huge pressure on the defence budget, I think that much is obvious, as there is on all budgets. "It's going to be an extraordinarily difficult thing for all the armed services to get this right because of the massive amounts that are involved and the huge procurement contracts that invariably seem to go over time and over budget. "I think the priority within the defence budget should be absolutely to make sure that our brave troops, our brave servicemen and servicewomen, particularly now on the frontline in Afghanistan, have what they need. "I think we need to constantly ask ourselves what kind of challenges are we going to face? What kind of wars are we going to face? What kind of conflicts are we going to have to confront in the future? "My own view is that the kind of technology and hardware that we acquired as a country in the past, in an era of cold war conflict ... the role has changed and it's changing very fast and that needs to be reflected in the kinds of things that we spend money on. "Not to mention that fact that, of course, it's going to be difficult for someone who is going to receive less housing benefit because of the changes we are introducing to understand why, at the same time, we should spend huge, huge amounts of money in a hurry on replacing Trident in full. "But all these things are still being discussed, all will become clear in the comprehensive spending round in October." The coalition agreement thrashed out between his party and Cameron's Conservatives committed the government to renewing Trident, but agreed that it should be scrutinised to ensure it offers value for money. The deal allows the Lib Dems to "continue to make the case for alternatives". The problem of funding Trident has become more acute since the chancellor, George Osborne, indicated the cost would be covered by the defence budget rather than out of the Treasury's. Trident Nuclear weapons Nick Clegg Liberal-Conservative coalition Liberal Democrats Conservatives David Cameron guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

In the name of the father? Posted: 16 Aug 2010 05:19 PM PDT It is estimated that 1,000 people in Britain and Ireland are the children of Catholic priests Stephen was eight years old when he first heard his father disown him. The two were out for the day together when Stephen fell into a game of cricket with some local children, and another parent asked whose child he was. Stephen's father swiftly denied he was his. The child was "the son of one of my parishioners", said the dog-collared priest – a description that was truthful as far as it went, but omitted a vital detail. To Stephen, it felt like an outright dismissal. More than 30 years later, being the half-acknowledged son of a Roman Catholic priest has cast an enduring shadow over his life. Stephen (not his real name) is now in his 40s and has never approached his paternal family, has never reached out to cousins and other relatives, for fear of shaming his parents. "I didn't have a [close friendship] with my father," he says, "and I have not found personal relationships that easy since then. None of his family in Ireland knew I existed, so you could argue I have been denied another family." His experience is far from unique. It's been estimated that there are at least 1,000 people in Britain and Ireland whose fathers were priests at the time of their conception. And in May this year, dozens of Italian women who have had relationships with Roman Catholic priests or lay monks sent an open letter to the Pope calling for the abolition of the celibacy rule. The letter argued that a priest "needs to live with his fellow human beings, experience feelings, love and be loved". It also pleaded for sympathy for those who "live out in secrecy those few moments the priest manages to grant [us], and experience on a daily basis the doubts, fears and insecurities of our men". This group of women aren't the only ones questioning enforced priestly celibacy. The issue has been central to recent debate in the Catholic church, after a wave of clerical abuse scandals that have sometimes seen critics link sexual frustration to paedophilia. There has also been debate about the origins of celibacy in the early Christian church. In the face of these questions, Pope Benedict XVI, who is due to tour the UK in September, has defended the status quo. Celibacy "is made possible by the grace of God . . . who asks us to transcend ourselves," he has said; he has also argued that forgoing matrimony helps demonstrate a commitment to the priesthood. For the reclusive partners and offspring of Catholic priests, lack of financial support and recognition is a longstanding complaint. The few support groups that have sprung up have made little headway in their efforts to alter church attitudes. And although Stephen has never felt inspired to confront church authorities or seek financial recompense, he says that his past has left him with an "undertow of regret and sadness" at his parents' renounced love. "I don't know of any picture of my mother and father together," he says, showing me a black-and white photograph of the man he knew as "Dad". A handsome young priest stares out of the frame. The photo was taken in the 1950s, when his father was about to depart from his home in Ireland to minister to a large parish in Yorkshire. He brings out a letter on presbytery notepaper, addressed to him and signed "Love, Dad", and another addressed to his mother, which begins "My Darling". This accompanied a bottle of perfume sent to celebrate her 25th birthday. These candid letters suggest that, even if only subconsciously, his father might have been somewhat relieved to have been discovered and defrocked. Stephen's parents met through the parish, where his mother's family were regular churchgoers. "He would have been a junior priest," says Stephen. "It was very risky. My mother was very guarded about it." Their long relationship culminated in Stephen being born in 1967. "By then, she was already 28," he says, "so she wasn't a gymslip mum. It looks like they had had a relationship for some time, and I suspect from the intensity of the [affair] that I was a wanted child rather than a mistake. But it appears that once my mother became pregnant she backed away from my father. "I have it on reliable sources that he indicated his willingness to leave the priesthood, but she asked him not to. In some of his letters he talks about [the fact that] if she's pregnant it would be a good thing. Then afterwards he was very bitter that she kept him from his child. So it seems she ensured he stayed in the church." Stephen's grandmother and maternal aunt knew the truth about his paternity, but the men in the family were never told. From the age of three or four, Stephen would be taken over to see his father most Saturdays, and initially, he says, "I didn't realise he was a priest, but one day, when I was eight or nine years old, I picked up his post in the hallway and it said 'Reverend . . .' My mother saw I was looking at the address and she broke down as she told me." Pat Buckley, an excommunicated gay priest, has run what he calls an "independent ministry to disaffected and alienated Catholics and Christians" in Larne, Northern Ireland, since the mid-1980s. He runs a support group, Bethany, for women who are in relationships with priests. "These problems have been hidden for centuries," he says, "but there's been so much in the news that people are getting a bit more courage to come forward." In 1992, for instance, there was uproar at the case of Eamon Casey, the then-Bishop of Galway, when it emerged that he had used diocesan funds to pay maintenance to the American mother of his love child; in the years since then, the church has been racked with controversy. "There are three common Irish names," Buckley continues, "McEntaggart, McAnespie and McNab, that translate as 'son of the priest', 'son of the Bishop' and 'son of the Abbot', so it's been around for some time." Buckley believes that the Vatican wants to "hang on to celibacy for reasons of power and control. St Paul said in one of his letters that a bishop should be the husband of one woman. If a man does not have the experience of running a human family how can he run a church? Celibacy was unusual during the first 12 centuries of the Catholic Church. It was introduced [in the Middle Ages]. It's often very sad for the women and children in these relationships. A lot of them want some form of resolution, to sort out the baggage. Anybody who is abandoned by a parent suffers a very large injustice." There are, of course, many who defend celibacy, including Father Stephen Wang, dean of studies at Allen Hall seminary in London. In a blog post earlier this year, he wrote that "there are practical aspects to celibacy. You've got more time for other people, and more time for prayer. You can get up at three in the morning to visit someone in hospital without worrying about how this will affect your marriage . . . But celibacy is something much deeper as well. There is a place in your heart, in your very being, that you have given to Christ and to the people you meet as a priest." For Stephen, his relationship with his father never really blossomed. He was provided with occasional financial support, small gifts of money, while his father carried on being a priest. He died in his 60s. "I saw him shortly before his death," says Stephen, "and spoke to him. He was in a pretty bad way . . . My mother went to visit him in hospital regularly and insisted she should be the one looking after him. I don't think she ever stopped loving him. When he died she was devastated. "I was denied a father, my mother was denied a partner and my father was denied a son . . . My father and mother loved each other intensely, and she never recovered from it. My mother dedicated her life to me and her work. She never fell in love with anyone else. She started to drink and . . . that was another measure of the burden." She died four years ago. Stephen is not a practising Catholic, but says there is no residual bitterness towards his father. "Some people might say he deceived the church, but I don't think he was a bad man." He can still recall an afternoon playing in the presbytery's garden, around the same time that his father denied his paternity. "It was large and overgrown, and I would go down this path that led to the church and there was a statue of an angel. That day I bumped into a nun who was coming in at the gate. 'What are you up to?' she asked. 'What are you doing in a priest's garden?' I said I was visiting my father. She assumed I was going to visit the church and had meant to say 'Holy Father'. It's amazing what you can get away with." Catholicism Ireland Family Owen Bowcott guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Why our children need to get outside Posted: 16 Aug 2010 01:00 PM PDT More and more children today have less and less contact with the natural world. And this is having a huge impact on their health and development Cows hibernate in winter, grey squirrels are native to this country, conkers come from oak (or maybe beech, or is it fir?) trees, and of course there's no such thing as a leaf that can soothe a nettle sting. Or so, according to a new survey, believe between a quarter and a half of all British children. You can't really blame them: if, like 64% of kids today, you played outside less than once a week, or were one of the 28% who haven't been on a country walk in the last year, the 21% who've never been to a farm and the 20% who have never once climbed a tree, you wouldn't know much about nature either. The survey, of 2,000 eight-to-12-year-olds for the TV channel Eden, is the latest in a string of similar studies over the last couple of years: more children can identify a Dalek than an owl; a big majority play indoors more often than out. The distance our kids stray from home on their own has shrunk by 90% since the 70s; 43% of adults think a child shouldn't play outdoors unsupervised until the age of 14. More children are now admitted to British hospitals for injuries incurred falling out of bed than falling out of trees. Does any of this matter? In an age of cable TV, Nintendos, Facebook and YouTube, is it actually important to be able to tell catkins from cow parsley, or jackdaws from jays? Well, it obviously can't do any harm to know a bit about the natural world beyond the screen and the front door. And if, as a result of that, you develop a love for nature, you may care something for its survival, which is probably no bad thing. But a growing body of evidence is starting to show that it's not so much what children know about nature that's important, as what happens to them when they are in nature (and not just in it, but in it by themselves, without grownups). Respectable scientists – doctors, mental health experts, educationalists, sociologists – are beginning to suggest that when kids stop going out into the natural world to play, it can affect not just their development as individuals, but society as a whole. "There's a paradox," says Stephen Moss, naturalist, broadcaster and author. "More kids today are interested in the natural world than ever before; they watch it on the telly, they may well visit a nature reserve or a National Trust site with their families. But far fewer are experiencing it directly, on their own or with their friends, and that's what counts: this is about more than nature." The American writer Richard Louv, author of the bestseller Last Child in the Woods, has defined the phenomenon as "nature deficit disorder". Something "very profound" has happened to children's relationship with nature over the last couple of decades, he says, for a number of reasons. Technology, obviously, is one: a recent report from the Kaiser Family Foundation in the US found that the average eight-to-18-year-old American now spends more than 53 hours a week "using entertainment media". Then there's the fact that children's time is much more pressured than it once was. Spare time must be spent constructively: after-school activities, coaching, organised sports – no time for kicking your heels outdoors. Except kids never did really kick their heels. "I was out on my own and with my friends all the time, from the age of about eight," says Moss, now 50. "Climbing trees, building dens, collecting birds' eggs and frogspawn. Today, parents don't even want their kids to get dirty." But the biggest obstacles to today's children being allowed out in this way (or even to the nearest park or patch of wasteground) stem more from anxiety than squeamishness. "Stranger danger", the fear of abduction by an unknown adult, is why most parents won't allow kids out unsupervised. Blanket media coverage of the few such incidents that do occur may have contributed to this; in fact, there is a risk but it's minimal – the chance of a child being killed by a stranger in Britain is, literally, one in a million, and has been since the 70s. "A far more serious issue, a massive issue in fact, is traffic," says Moss. "That has grown exponentially, and it's a very real problem." It's a problem we need to address, because the consequences of failing to allow our children to play independently outside are beginning to make themselves felt. On the website childrenandnature.org, Louv cites a lengthening list of scientific studies indicating that time spent in free play in the natural world – a free-range childhood, perhaps – has a huge impact on health. Obesity is perhaps the most visible symptom of the lack of such play, but literally dozens of studies from around the world show regular time outdoors produces significant improvements in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, learning ability, creativity and mental, psychological and emotional wellbeing. Just five minutes' "green exercise" can produce rapid improvements in mental wellbeing and self-esteem, with the greatest benefits experienced by the young, according to a study this year at the University of Essex. Free and unstructured play in the outdoors boosts problem-solving skills, focus and self-discipline. Socially, it improves cooperation, flexibility, and self-awareness. Emotional benefits include reduced aggression and increased happiness. "Children will be smarter, better able to get along with others, healthier and happier when they have regular opportunities for free and unstructured play in the out-of-doors," concluded one authoritative study published by the American Medical Association in 2005. "Nature is a tool," says Moss, "to get children to experience not just the wider world, but themselves." So climbing a tree, he says, is about "learning how to take responsibility for yourself, and how – crucially – to measure risk for yourself. Falling out of a tree is a very good lesson in risk and reward." Ask anyone over 40 to recount their most treasured memories of childhood play, and few will be indoors. Fewer still will involve an adult. Independent play, outdoors and far from grown-up eyes, is what we remember. As things stand, today's children will be unlikely to treasure memories like that: 21% of today's kids regularly play outside, compared with 71% of their parents. The picture isn't entirely bleak, though. In the US, nature deficit disorder is big news: Louv is delivering the keynote speech at the American Academy of Pediatrics' annual conference; city parks departments are joining with local health services to prescribe "outdoor time" for problem children. Here, organisations such as the RSPB, National Trust and Natural England are "moving mountains" to get families outdoors, Moss says. Often, though, this remains what he calls a "mediated experience" – dictated by adults. One project, in Somerset, could show the way ahead. Two years ago the Somerset Play and Participation Service, a voluntary sector scheme run by children's charity Barnardo's in collaboration with a local authorities and a number of natural environment agencies, began putting time and money into encouraging children to play independently outdoors. Part of the scheme is a website, somersetoutdoorplay.org.uk, detailing more than 30 sites across the county, from hilltops to forests and headlands to beaches, where kids can play unsupervised. "We aim for children to experience true free play," says Kristen Lambert, who runs the scheme's PlayRanger service. "Play that's not set up according to an adult agenda – in forests and open spaces, not designated play areas. There are no specific activities, no fixed equipment; there are tree branches and muddy slopes. The spaces themselves are inspiring. Children set their own challenges, assess their own risks, take their own responsibility, have their own adventures, and learn from them. And what they learn can't be taught. You should see them." Health & wellbeing Parents and parenting Family Children Jon Henley guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Pop star accused over HIV infection Posted: 16 Aug 2010 04:10 AM PDT Nadja Benaissa of No Angels tells German court she did not mean to harm, having been advised passing on virus unlikely The lead singer of Germany's best-selling girl band wept today as she apologised to her former sexual partners for failing to disclose to them that she was carrying the HIV virus. Nadja Benaissa, 28, of the group No Angels, told the court in Darmstadt that she had failed to tell her partners about her condition. "In those days I was careless," she said, adding: "I'm sorry from the bottom of my heart." She is appearing before a juvenile court because the alleged crimes began when she was just 17, the age at which she discovered she was HIV positive. The singer, who is accused of grievous bodily harm and attempted aggravated assault, said she had not meant to cause any of the men injury, having been advised that it was highly unlikely that she would transfer the virus to anyone with whom she had sex. "I never wanted this to happen to any one of my partners," she said. In a statement by the singer, read to court by her lawyer, Oliver Wallasch, she added: "I'd been told the likelihood of infecting someone or that I would develop the illness [Aids] was more or less zero. For that reason I kept the news even from my close group of friends [as] I didn't want my daughter to be stigmatised. I told the band members because I trusted them but I never made it public because I feared that it would mean the end of the band." She added that while she could not recall "all the details of my private life over the last decade", it was "possible" that all the accusations against her were true. Benaissa is accused of having had sex with three men around five times between 2000 and 2004 without informing them of her HIV status. One of the men subsequently became infected with HIV. Giving evidence to the court, the unidentified man said: "We had sex between five and seven times, about three of those were unprotected." He said he had only found out that Nadja was HIV positive after being told by her aunt. "I went to the doctor, and after a few hours he called me and said I should go to see him. It was then I knew I was positive," he said. Turning to the accused, the 34-year-old man added: "You have unleashed a lot of misery into the world." The five-day trial is due to hear from Professor Josef Eberle of Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich, who is expected to testify that the man may have been infected by someone else. Benaissa, whose HIV status was discovered a decade ago during a pregnancy test, was arrested in April 2009 just before No Angels were due to appear on stage at a Frankfurt nightclub, after one of her sexual partners pressed charges against her. She was handcuffed by plainclothes police and driven away in front of fans, before being held in custody for 10 days. Campaigners for the rights of victims of HIV and Aids were highly critical of the public manner in which the arrest was made, calling it a "modern witch-hunt", and have accused prosecutors of a grave breach of privacy after they made public the fact that Benaissa had HIV. Under German law the crime of failing to disclose you have HIV to someone before having sex with them carries a prison sentence of between six months and 10 years. If the victim dies as a result of infection the sentence can extend to life imprisonment. Benaissa's is the first trial of its kind in Germany in which a celebrity is in the dock. Following the disclosure of her illness the singer has often talked publicly about it, including in a prominent speech to the Berlin Aids Gala last November, in which she said: "I thought my life was destroyed, as well as that of my nine-year old, infection-free daughter." But she has stressed that thanks to modern medicine "I am a completely healthy person, even if I'm HIV positive. I have a perfectly normal life expectancy." No Angels, an all-girl band with four members, was discovered 10 years ago during a TV talent show when they beat 4,500 other hopefuls for the top prize. They went on to become Germany's most successful female band, often compared to Girls Aloud. Between 2000 and 2003 they sold 5 million records, including three No 1 albums and four No 1 singles, among them their most famous hit, Daylight in Your Eyes. The band broke up but reunited to take part in the Eurovision song contest in 2008, in which they came 23rd. They released a new album last summer. Witnesses in the trial, which has attracted scores of No Angels fans, are expected to include Benaissa's fellow band members, Sandy Mölling, Jessica Wahls, and Lucy Diakovska. A verdict is due on 26 August. The band's manager, Khalid Schröder, refused to comment on rumours that Benaissa is no longer a member of the group. "We are sure to issue a statement after the close of the trial," he said. Sexual health Health HIV infection Germany Health & wellbeing Kate Connolly guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

'Protect nature to secure economy' Posted: 16 Aug 2010 09:21 AM PDT Ahmed Djoghlaf says nations risk economic collapse and loss of culture if it does not protect the natural world • 'Crown jewels' of Britain's landscape could be sold off • Plan to sell off nature reserves risks 'austerity countryside' Britain and other countries face a collapse of their economies and loss of culture if they do not protect the environment better, the world's leading champion of nature has warned. "What we are seeing today is a total disaster," said Ahmed Djoghlaf, the secretary-general of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. "No country has met its targets to protect nature. We are losing biodiversity at an unprecedented rate. If current levels [of destruction] go on we will reach a tipping point very soon. The future of the planet now depends on governments taking action in the next few years." Industrialisation, population growth, the spread of cities and farms and climate change are all now threatening the fundamentals of life itself, said Djoghlaf, in London before a key UN meeting where governments are expected to sign up to a more ambitious agreement to protect nature. "Many plans were developed in the 1990s to protect biodiversity but they are still sitting on the shelves of ministries. Countries were legally obliged to act, but only 140 have even submitted plans and only 16 have revised their plans since 1993. Governments must now put their houses in order," he said. According to the UN Environment Programme, the Earth is in the midst of a mass extinction of life. Scientists estimate that 150-200 species of plant, insect, bird and mammal become extinct every 24 hours. This is nearly 1,000 times the "natural" or "background" rate and, say many biologists, is greater than anything the world has experienced since the vanishing of the dinosaurs nearly 65m years ago. Around 15% of mammal species and 11% of bird species are classified as threatened with extinction. Djoghlaf warned Britain and other countries not to cut nature protection in the recession. In a reference to expected 40% cuts to Britain's department of the environment spending, he said: "It would be very short-sighted to cut biodiversity spending. You may well save a few pounds now but you will lose billions later. Biodiversity is your natural asset. The more you lose it, the more you lose your cultural assets too." He urged governments to invest in nature. "If you do not, you will pay very heavily later. You will be out of business if you miss the green train." Mounting losses of ecosystems, species and genetic biodiversity is now threatening all life, said Djoghlaf. In immediate danger, he said, were the 300 million people who depended on forests and the more than 1 billion who lived off sea fishing. "Cut your forests down, or over-fish, and these people will not survive. Destroying biodiversity only increases economic insecurity. The more you lose it, the more you lose the chance to grow. "The loss of biodiversity compounds poverty. Destroy your nature and you increase poverty and insecurity. Biodiversity is fundamental to social life, education and aesthetics. It's a human right to live in a healthy environment." Djoghlaf lambasted countries for separating action on climate change from protecting biodiversity. "These are the two great challenges. But the loss of biodiversity exacerbates climate change. It is handled by the poorest ministries in government, it has not been mainstreamed or prioritised by governments. Climate change cannot be solved without action on biodiversity, and vice versa." The UN chief said that children were losing contact with nature. "We are moving to a more virtual world. Children today haven't a clue about nature. Children have not seen apple trees. In Algeria, children are growing up who have never seen olive trees. How can you protect nature if you do not know it?" A major UN report in the impacts of biodiversity loss that will be launched in October is expected to say that the economic case for global action to stop the destruction of the natural world is even more powerful than the argument for tackling climate change. It will say that saving biodiversity is remarkably cost-effective and the benefits from saving "natural goods and services", such as pollination, medicines, fertile soils, clean air and water, are between 10 and 100 times the cost of saving the habitats and species that provide them. • You can watch Ahmed Djoghlaf speaking in a panel discussion at Kew Gardens on biodiversity loss on CNN on 25th August. Biodiversity Conservation Wildlife Endangered habitats Endangered species United Nations John Vidal guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Russia launches seed bank inquiry Posted: 16 Aug 2010 09:03 AM PDT President Dmitry Medvedev orders immediate inquiry into potential destruction of world's oldest seed bank • Pavlovsk seed bank faces destruction The Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, has ordered an immediate inquiry into the potential destruction of the world's oldest seed bank following a court case and a Twitter campaign by Guardian readers and others. The fate of the station appeared to be sealed last week when a court ruled in favour of the Pavlovsk research station and its surrounding farmland being turned into private housing. It holds the world's largest fruit collections and was protected by 12 Russian scientists during the second world war who chose to starve to death rather than eat the unique collection of seeds and plants which they were guarding during the 900-day siege of Leningrad. More than 90% of the plants are found in no other research collection or seed bank. Its seeds and berries are thought to posess traits that could be crucial to maintaining productive fruit harvests in many parts of the world as climate change and a rising tide of disease, pests and drought weaken the varieties farmers now grow. At stake, say campaigners for the station, are more than 5,000 varieties of seeds and berries from dozens of countries, including more than 100 varieties each of gooseberries and raspberries. As it is predominantly a field collection, Pavlovsk cannot be moved. Experts estimate that even if another site were available nearby, it would take many years to relocate the plants. The court ruling was instantly appealed, giving the station one month before development plans for a housing estate that would destroy the station can move forward. This judgment means the order can only be revoked through a direct command of the president or rime minister, Vladimir Putin. The Civic Chamber, a Russian state institution with a remit to monitor parliament and the government, then sent a telegram to Medvedev to request a formal appeal to protect the collection. And numerous supporters of the research station have made their feelings felt on Twitter (using the #pavlovsk hashtag). On Friday, following a week of lobbying Medvedev tweeted back: "Received the Civic Chamber's appeal over the Pavlov Experimental Station. Gave the instruction for this issue to be scrutinised." The campaign may have already achieved more than the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation which last year appealed unsuccessfully to the Russian government to include Pavlovsk in the global network of gene banks. However, the ongoing heatwave is thought to have also put pressure on the government. Russian agricultural minister, Elena Borisovna Skrynnik, had fought for the station to be saved on the grounds that its heritage was crucial for food security as climate change grew more serious. Much of the Russian wheat harvest has been destroyed in the last month by the heatwave, which has been linked to climate change. Yesterday, the Crop Diversity Trust, which has been leading western attempts to save the station, urged people to continue to petition the Russian authorities. A statement on the trust's website said: "Over the next four weeks, we will continue our fight to save Pavlovsk, and we need your help. We need to persuade the political authorities of the importance of the irreplaceable crop diversity growing at Pavlovsk station, and request that the judgment be revoked." Biodiversity Russia Twitter Dmitry Medvedev Plants Conservation Endangered species John Vidal guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Rwanda taps 'explosive' Lake Kivu Posted: 16 Aug 2010 06:50 AM PDT Project could power Rwanda for decades, while reducing risk of disaster for 2 million people living alongside 'exploding lake' It's dusk on Lake Kivu and the fishermen sing while paddling out in their catamarans, three canoes secured together with long wooden poles. As the twin volcanoes on the far shore disappear into the darkness the men spark kerosene lamps to attract the sambaza sardines into their nets. Across the vast lake their lanterns offer the only tiny sequins of light. At least that is how it used to be. Now, near the northern shore, the bright fluorescent bulbs illuminating a tall barge can be seen from miles away. It is the start of a project that could light up the whole of Rwanda for decades, while also reducing the risk of disaster for the two million people living alongside this rare "exploding lake". In a world first, the barge is extracting gases that are trapped deep in Lake Kivu's waters like the fizz in a champagne bottle. Methane, the main constituent of natural gas used for household cooking and heating, is then separated out and piped back to the rugged shore where it fires three large generators. The state-owned Kibuye Power plant is already producing 3.6MW of electricity, more than 4% of the country's entire supply. But the success of the pilot project, and the huge unmet demand for power in Rwanda — only one in 14 homes have access to electricity — has encouraged local and foreign investors to commit hundreds of millions of dollars to new methane plants along the lakeshore. Within two years, the government hopes to be getting a third of its power from Lake Kivu, and eventually aims to produce so much energy from methane to be able to export it to neighbouring countries. "Our grandfathers knew there was gas in this lake but now have we proved that it can be exploited," said Alexis Kabuto, the Rwandan engineer who runs the $20m Kibuye project. "It's a cheap, clean resource that could last us 100 years." Historically, Lake Kivu's gas has been a killer. Deaths attributed to invisible pockets of carbon dioxide rising from vents along the shoreline, known as mazukus, or "evil winds", are frequently reported, especially on the Congo side. But it is the gas dissolved in the water that may present a far greater threat. Some scientists say that the ever-expanding volumes of carbon dioxide and methane in Lake Kivu, coupled with the nearby volcanic activity, make a limnic eruption (also referred to as a lake overturn, in which CO2 suddenly erupts from the lake) highly likely at some stage in the future unless degassing occurs. This has now begun with the extraction of some of the 60bn cubic metres of methane in the water. The world's only two other known "exploding lakes", Monoun and Nyos, both in Cameroon, overturned in the 1980s. The clouds of carbon dioxide that burst through from the deep water left about 1,800 people dead from asphyxiation. But Lake Kivu is nearly 2,000 times larger than Lake Nyos, and is in a far more densely populated area. Cindy Ebinger, a professor of earth sciences at the University of Rochester in the US, who co-authored a study earlier this year that described Kivu as possibly "one of the most dangerous lakes in the world", said: "You don't even want to think about the scale of the devastation that could occur." The lake's potential to both enhance and destroy lives stems from its geography. Nestled on the border between Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo, it sits at the highest point of the western arm of the Great Rift Valley. On the Congolese side, Mount Nyiragongo and Mount Nyamulagira have erupted in recent years, the former sending scalding tongues of lava into the lake in 2002. The seismic activity around the lake is responsible for the steady injection of volcanic gas into the water, where it settles in a dense saline layer more than 260 metres beneath the surface. To harvest the methane, heavy water is sucked up through a pipe to the barge, where the liquid and gases are separated. The gas then enters a "scrubber" that separates the methane and carbon dioxide. Ebinger said reducing the overall concentration of gas in the water was a positive move, but warned that more studies were urgently needed to assess the potential environmental impact, especially relating to the unused water and carbon dioxide pumped back into Lake Kivu from the barges. "With so many projects, if you don't understand everything, you can solve one problem and create three more," she said. Regardless, Rwanda is proceeding at great speed. Kibuye Power aims to increase its output to 50MW within a few years. A private Rwandan firm is testing the technology on its own barge nearby and has a license to produce a similar amount. And a US company, Contour Global, last year signed a $325m deal with Rwanda to produce 100MW of power from methane. Talks are also under way with Congo, which has rights to half the natural gas in the lake, about building a joint 200MW plant. Energy Rwanda Democratic Republic of the Congo Gas Gas Energy Xan Rice guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Business vs maternity leave Posted: 16 Aug 2010 12:00 PM PDT A new survey suggests that motherhood and high-flying careers are still mutually exclusive. How mad Do you fancy having a baby and holding down a job? How retro! According to a survey by InterExec, a confidential agency for high salaried execs, headhunters believe that women who want to get the top jobs in business should steer well clear of motherhood. Some 53% of those questioned said that women who want a big business post should give up all thoughts of maternity leave – or what they prefer to call a "career break". So unless you can see yourself taking just a day or two out to give birth to, nurture and raise a child (do it in your lunch hour, perhaps?), then don't even think of combining being a boardroom high-flyer with passing on your genes. Doing so will apparently be judged on a par with taking a year off to learn skydiving or spending the winter in Kyrgyzstan. You may not have equated bringing up the next generation of human beings with taking an optional breather, but it seems the headhunters of the business world do. And semantics are all: if maternity leave is little more than a "career break", then the conclusion the headhunters have reached is that it's a choice women simply shouldn't make – not if they want to go places professionally. But, as one chief executive told the Observer, many have at last seen sense. "Women are starting to realise they can't have it all, and are making clear careers-or-babies decisions," he said, adding that in the US this was leading to many more choosing the boardroom over the nursery. More women, perhaps – but not more mothers. Hasn't the world of big business realised over these past few years, that it can't do without our input, because it needs top-level, well-rounded representation? That both men and women who give up career time to bring up babies return to the workplace with new and impressive life skills. Fathers have managed to hold down top-level business posts for generations; mothers can do just the same. The world of 21st-century big business, for either a mother or a father, simply has to be flexible enough to embrace the needs of real families. Work-life balance Women Work & careers Joanna Moorhead guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

YouTube should let Iranians speak Posted: 16 Aug 2010 07:00 AM PDT The video-sharing website is wrong to bar Iranians from its documentary experiment, Life in a Day, because of US sanctions On 6 July 2010, YouTube announced the launch of Life in a Day, an experimental documentary incorporating footage submitted by YouTube users, calling for "thousands of people everywhere in the world … on a single day, which is the 24 July this year, to film some aspect of their day and then post it onto YouTube so that we can use it to make a film that is a record of what it's like to be alive on that one day". For the many active Iranian YouTube members, this was a sensational opportunity to finally contribute, participate and share in a non-political world community project through a medium they knew well. After all, it was the 2009 elections that inspired citizen filming in Iran, with YouTube serving as the main channel to the outside world. Clips of the brutality on the streets of Iran catapulted YouTube into newsrooms and signalled it as a potent news source. It came as a slap in the face, then, to read the FAQ on the Life in a Day website: "Anyone over 13 years old can submit footage, except for residents and nationals of Iran, Syria, Cuba, Sudan, North Korea and Myanmar (Burma), and/or any other persons and entities restricted by US export controls and sanctions programmes." The "story of a single day on earth … One world, 24 hours, 6 billion perspectives" is actively boycotting 1.5 billion of the 6 billion perspectives it pursues. Wouldn't it be great to have included these countries – to have seen something of daily life rather than the usual imagery? Surely that would have been more in step with the spirit of the project, especially given that most of the submissions will naturally end up on the cutting-room floor. Instead, this decision is meanspirited, hasty and compromises the integrity of a project intended to be truly universal, when it is in fact not open to all. YouTube has been described as "a speakers' corner that both embodies and promotes democracy". A valid appraisal. So why the concern and involvement with political sanctions? Even if the film were funded by the US government, the boycott wouldn't have made sense: the US senate has allocated $50m to the Victims of Iranian Censorship Act (Voice) to help Iranians evade government censorship of the internet and to put pressure on foreign companies not to help Iran in its repressive measures. Life in a Day is due to be screened at the 2011 Sundance film festival – and the Sundance institute apparently prides itself on providing a forum for filmmakers "to explore their stories free from commercial and political pressures". Even Korean electronics giant LG partnering the project says: "Using video footage to bring people together to share their diverse perspectives and experiences helps enrich all our lives. Life in a Day is a perfect fit with our core values: humanity, pleasure, curiosity, and an optimistic energy". The film's multinational footage will be directed by Kevin MacDonald, who made One Day in September and Touching the Void, both provocative films that don't succumb to public expectation. Life in a Day's executive producer Ridley Scott, acclaimed director of Blade Runner and Gladiator, has come under attack on Iranian internet forums. An accomplished group of Iranian filmmakers in Amsterdam are now creating their own Iranian version of the Life in a Day concept in retaliation. It was Scott who directed the campaign that launched Apple Mac computers in 1984. In this Orwellian depiction of the Big Brother state of Nineteen Eighty-Four, Macs are coming to save man from conformity, with the strapline "with Macintosh … 1984 will not be 1984". This feared dystopian society is characterised by a large military-like police force, repressive social control systems and an absence of individual freedoms. All now rather too familiar for comfort. YouTube Iran Censorship Protest Freedom of speech Middle East Negar Esfandiary guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Scott 'invented English legends' Posted: 16 Aug 2010 09:21 AM PDT Author claims unfashionable novelist first wrote some of the famous exploits of Robin Hood and Sir Walter Raleigh The novels of Sir Walter Scott are now – in England, at least – almost unread. It is hard to imagine an author simultaneously so famous and so unfashionable, his novels frequently written off as prolix and unbearably dense. However, according to one writer and critic, the author of Ivanhoe and the Waverley novels was not only crucial in creating the idea of Scotland as it persists today, but also "invented England". Speaking at the Edinburgh international book festival, Stuart Kelly argued that Scott invented a raft of English national stereotypes. That quintessentially English hero, Robin Hood, for example, owes some of his most famous exploits to the author. The notion of Robin's arrow splitting that of the Sheriff of Nottingham – which appears in the Disney cartoon – comes direct from Ivanhoe, in which Scott's character Wilfrid performs the deed. The detail, said Kelly, was then incorporated into later versions of the Robin Hood story. Scott was also, said Kelly, the first person to coin the phrase "the Wars of the Roses" to describe the conflict between the houses of York and Lancaster, while the incident in which Sir Walter Raleigh laid his cloak before Elizabeth I to protect the royal footstep from a muddy puddle comes from Scott's novel Kenilworth. He was key in making "medievalism the centre of English experience", said Kelly. Without Scott, "there would probably have been a neo-classical houses of parliament rather than a neo-gothic houses of parliament". Scott, by way of novels such as Ivanhoe, popularised the notion of the centrality of the medieval period to the extent that its architecture was adopted as "the national style" when the new Palace of Westminster came to be built in 1835. Kelly also pointed out that the former prime minister Tony Blair chose Ivanhoe as his favourite novel when he appeared on the radio show Desert Island Discs in 1996. According to Kelly, in his new book Scotland: The Man Who Invented A Nation: "It was a canny choice. Blair chose a novel that ostentatiously lauded a national unity. It featured a leader committed to progressive reconciliation – in its synthesis of Norman, Saxon and even Jewish elements – as an allegory of a multicultural Britain." In terms of his effect on the reputation of his native Scotland, Kelly said Scott "invented a great simulacrum of Scotland; he invented the image of the country". Eighteenth-century accounts of the Highlands characterised them as "treacherous, poor, a hotbed of villains, and barren". Samuel Johnson's A Journey To The Western Islands of Scotland (1775) was "an anthropological exercise to see what backwardness looked like". By contrast, post-Scott the Highlands were seen as "picturesque, romantic, loyal and a hive of industry and inventiveness," said Kelly. Scott's novels were the "fulcrum" around which Scotland's reputation turned: "The fact that we still have a national identity of any kind is down to Scott." Scott organised the visit to Edinburgh of George IV in 1822 – the first visit to Scotland by a royal who was not arriving at the head of an army since James I. The king wore a kilt and silk stockings, sparking off a rage for tartan that has lasted to this day. Scott is also, said Kelly, "vastly underrated as a novelist. He is self-aware, exuberant and experimental." He described Scott as postmodern, and even put up an argument for his being an inventor of "cyber-literature". He said: "In the preface to The Betrothed he imagines a steam-powered novel engine producing books by machinery rather than inspiration." Although he wrote some "hasty things" and some "mad things", Scott's books "incarnate a deeply humane vision of the world", said Kelly. "None of his lower-class characters is a caricature. To that extent, he makes Dickens seem regressive. He also creates some of the earliest sympathetic portraits of Jewish and Hindu characters. It should be celebrated as a cosmopolitan, enlightened and humane writer. His Toryism was so close to Fabianism you can't put a credit card between them. "No one else tried to deal in fiction with the entirety of a country – its geography, politics, class structure, religion – not Eliot, and not Dickens. Had he been alive today I think he would have taken on the new multicultural Scotland. He believed you were not necessarily born Scottish, but could become Scottish – as does Edward Waverley." The writer Joan McAlpine argued that Scott's influence was far from wholly benign. As an arch-conservative, stolidly pro-union, he "perverted and emasculated" the image of Scotland, she said. Edinburgh international book festival British identity and society Charlotte Higgins guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

New music: How to Dress Well Posted: 16 Aug 2010 04:25 AM PDT A soppy Michael Jackson ballad is transformed into a funky – and ghostly – paean to the joys of class A drugs The appallingly named How to Dress Well, aka Tom Krell, makes haunted, lo-fi R&B jams that usually feature strange interpretations of classic pop hits. Recent single Can't See My Own Face uses part of the melody from Beyoncé's Crazy in Love to create a ghostly, vapour-thin slice of indie pop, while this current single finds Krell duetting with a certain Michael Jackson from beyond the grave. Over a looped sample of MJ singing "and we can share this ecstasy" from Baby Be Mine, Krell re-frames the love song into something that more than alludes to the partaking of class As. It's not big and it's not clever, but there's something about Krell's way with a downbeat melody that makes him one to keep an eye on. Ecstasy With Jojo can be downloaded for free here Pop and rock Dance music Urban music Michael Cragg guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

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