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Iran's Khatami strikes back
The best news pictures of the day
Why women have a right to sex-selective abortion | Sarah Ditum
Professor James O'Connell obituary
Kronos Quartet/Kimmo Pohjonen/Samuli Kosminen – review
Eritrea gets underground newspaper 12 years after ban on private media
Meike Ziervogel: 'I could only write about Magda Goebbels in English'
Hollywood's trade body slams Google for failing to stop piracy
Global helium shortage in prospect as US reservoir in line to close next month
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China's stolen children: parents battle police indifference in search for young
China family planning officials levied £160m in fines in three years
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China's child slaves: 'It would be easier to escape if we were allowed shoes' – video
Parents of China's missing children face police indifference – video
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Posted: 20 Sep 2013 03:52 AM PDT

Over a decade ago, Iran's reformist president Mohammad Khatami delivered his famous UN speech. Iran's new president seems to be following in his footsteps.

Even before his presidency ended in 2005, Mohammad Khatami was dismissed as ineffective by both conservative and radical critics. Conservatives mocked his expensive leather shoes and stylish clerical cloak, while radicals said he had "sold out" on promises to reform the Islamic republic: both mocked his notion of a "dialogue between civilisations".

Some Iranians in shared taxis ridiculed him as Fariba, a girl's name meaning charming but mischievous.

Later, during unrest after the 2009 disputed presidential election, Khatami was derided as irrelevant by protestors who resented his lack of support. At the same time, conservative critics attacked him as an instigator of "sedition".

And yet, Khatami never retreated to his two foundations, the International Institute for Dialogue among Cultures & Civilizations and Baran (the Foundation for Freedom, Growth and Development of Iran). His work in wider politics was often discrete but he emerged this year during June's presidential election campaign alongside another former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, to back pragmatic conservative candidate, Hassan Rouhani.

Now, Rouhani's new cabinet has many faces from the Khatami administrations of 1997 to 2005. Among them, Bizhan Namdar Zanganeh returns to head the oil ministry. Mohammad Javad Zarif, the new foreign minister, was Iran's UN ambassador in the later years of Khatami's presidency. Massoumeh Ebtekar, one of Khatami's vice presidents and the first woman to hold such office in Iran, returns as vice president responsible for the environment.

In his ups and downs since his landslide victory in the 1997 presidential election, Khatami has never wavered from two core beliefs: in the desirability and possibility of reform under the Islamic republic, and in the desirability and possibility of dialogue between Iran and outside powers including the United States.

Those beliefs, tested many times since 1997, now face their greatest tests.

Born in 1943 in Ardakan, a small slow-paced central desert city, Khatami entered parliament in 1980 as a strong supporter of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the 1979 Islamic revolution. His liberal reputation developed from his gradual relaxation of censorship as culture minister between 1983 and 1992. As a seyed in the black clerical turban marking descent from the Prophet Mohammad, he proved an inspired reformist choice to run for president in 1997, trouncing his right-wing rival by 13 million votes.

As president, Khatami's cautious approach yielded change in introducing city council elections, expanding the range of newspapers, and reopening European embassies. But more radical reformers lost faith in 1999 when Khatami stayed aloof as right-wing vigilantes attacked students with clubs and knives after they protested at the judiciary closing reformist newspapers. Again and again, radical critics said he should challenge the leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who held real power.

Many Iranians just felt battles over social freedom did nothing for day-to-day problems like unemployment. Iranian politics slipped towards the right in 2003's local elections, 2004's parliamentary elections and then Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidential election victory in 2005.

In 2004, while still president, Khatami published a Letter for Tomorrow that read like a swansong. The Islamic revolution, he wrote, had veered from "freedom, independence and progress" towards "mental habits and prejudices" from Iran's tyrannical, monarchical past. For Khatami, outside threats strengthened authoritarianism within the country. "The war [of 1980-88 against Iraq] and the assassinations [of Islamic officials] forced the state to impose more restrictions," he wrote. "What is amazing is that, for some people, this situation... came to be seen as the rule."

Khatami linked Iran's domestic situation to the "dialogue among civilizations" he began to call for in 1998 in response to growing influence in the United States of Samuel Huntington's notion of a "Clash of Civilisations".

In September 2000, Khatami told a UN-sponsored conference in New York on "dialogue among civilisations": "Dialogue is not easy…A belief in dialogue paves the way for vivacious hope: the hope of living in a world permeated by virtue, humility and love, and not merely by the reign of economic indices and destructive weapons."

Khatami's presidency helped create the room for the 2003 "Grand Bargain" offer to the US of comprehensive talks, simply ignored by the Bush administration, and for talks in 2003-05 with the European Union over the nuclear programme, when Iran suspended all uranium enrichment. Those involved on all sides say Iran's approach had the backing of Ayatollah Khamenei.

Khatami wanted deeply to avoid confrontation in Iran as well as internationally. In 2004, when still president, he kept his distance from a sit-in of deputies and from a parliamentary election boycott by Mosharekat, the main reformist party, after the Guardian Council disqualified more than 3,000 mainly reformist candidates. I remember Mohammad Reza Khatami, the Mosharekat general-secretary, telling me of his older brother's fear of provoking serious unrest.

Within months of Ahmadinejad's election win in 2005, Khatami warned of a "fanatical" interpretation of Islam. The blacksmith's son was adept in addressing poorer Iranians – and had a better understanding of them than Khatami did – but his fiery rhetoric and undiluted evocations of the 12th Imam quickly alienated the US, Europe and the Arab Sunni establishment.

The roots of Khatami support for Rouhani go back to a coalition that emerged in 2006 in concern over both the radicalism of Ahmadinejad and growing US pressure focused on Tehran's nuclear programme. This coalition embraced moderate reformists, nationalist intellectuals and pragmatic conservatives, and resulted from a belief that Iran faced the most serious challenge in its modern history. It was led by Khatami, Rafsanjani and Mehdi Karroubi.

Many reformists detested Rafsanjani, but Khatami made tactical decisions in line with his convictions. In the 2009 presidential election, after being urged to run by many, he backed Mir Hossein Mousavi as someone more likely to win. By then, Khatami was not alone in realizing that the reformists' emphasis on social freedom had allowed conservatives, including Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to occupy the high ground on economic issues and to rally poorer Iranians against inequalities and alleged corruption. So Mousavi fought Ahmadinejad on the latter's chosen ground of "social justice" and the economy.

In the street protests after Ahmadinejad's disputed poll victory, Khatami again appeared irrelevant. Exiled groups proclaimed the looming overthrow of the Islamic revolution; the US tightened its approach in concern for human rights; arrests removed many reformists from active politics, with presidential candidates Mousavi and Karroubi put under house arrest.

But, again, Khatami held fast to his convictions. Last year, he faced criticism for voting in parliamentary elections after some reformists backed a boycott, and radical opponents continued to accuse him of silence over human rights abuses.

But Khatami was undeterred. While criticizing what in May he called the "suffocating security atmosphere" in Iran, he continued to work for unity with pragmatic conservatives like Rafsanjani in the run-up to the 2013 presidential election. Radical opponents and western "experts" said the poll would be won by a fundamentalist.

Now, Khatami is able to claim Rouhani's election win has reopened the door for incremental change. "We preferred for the reformist discourse to win even if reformists themselves were not the victors," he said. "Real reformism is compatible with rational moderation. The slogan of moderation [that is, Rouhani's slogan] is not outside the sphere of reformism. Today is the best opportunity for us to clean our hearts from grudges, for [political] prisoners to be released, for the house arrests to come to an end and for us all to stand together and work for our country in a spirit of brotherhood."

With the 15th anniversary of the original idea of "Dialogue among Civilizations" approaching, there are also suggestions of a new public role.

The parliamentary deputy, Elaheh Kulai, told Etemad that Rouhani should make Khatami a roving good-will ambassador to help "overcome the serious threats against our country and the region". Kulai cited Syria and Saudi Arabia as urgent diplomatic priorities, and likewise Sadegh Kharrazi, former UN and Paris ambassador, has suggested Khatami might take an initiative over Syria.

Time will tell how far, and in what way, the Rouhani government can and will go in the direction Khatami wants, at home and abroad.

Already, the conditions of house arrests for Mousavi and Karroubi, both in their 70s and with medical complaints, have eased. Karroubi's son, Mohammad Taghi, has said Ayatollah Khamenei has agreed their case will be decided by the Supreme National Security Council, where Rouhani recently appointed Ali Shamkhani, defence minister under Khatami, to replace Saeed Jalili, the defeated fundamentalist presidential candidate.

Ayatollah Khamenei has made clear "flexibility" in talks with the US are possible in what he compared to a wrestling match.

But one reform-minded analyst in Tehran told me that the US should not make the mistake of thinking Rouhani and his team, with or without Khatami's backing, will be a pushover.

"Yes, this will be a kinder, friendlier administration," he said, "but it will still have teeth."

The best news pictures of the day

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:57 AM PDT

The Guardian's award-winning picture team rounds up the most eye-catching images

Steven Bloor

Fiona Shields

Why women have a right to sex-selective abortion | Sarah Ditum

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:40 AM PDT

As far as I'm concerned, it doesn't matter why any woman wants to end her pregnancy. If it's to select for sex, that's her choice

When you talk about being pro-choice, sex selective abortion is often slung at you as the triumphant gotcha. "You love women so much you want them to be in charge of what grows inside their bodies, but what about the women who are aborted, have a go at answering that? ZING!"

The answer is actually remarkably simple, and it's this: it doesn't matter whether what's growing inside you is liable to end up as a man or a woman. What matters is whether the person it's growing inside – the person who is going to have to deliver the resulting baby, at not inconsiderable personal peril – actually wants to be pregnant and give birth to this child. In a world where it's possible to end a pregnancy safely and legally, it seems like rank brutality to force anyone to carry to term against her will.

And as far as I'm concerned, it doesn't matter why any woman wants to end her pregnancy. As the conscious and legally competent entity in the conception set-up, it's the woman's say that counts, and even the most terrible reason for having an abortion holds more sway than the best imaginable reason for compelling a woman to carry to term.

In this, I probably sound like a radical. Perhaps more of a radical than Ann Furedi of BPAS, who has won outraged headlines simply by saying that abortion on the grounds of sex selection may be within the terms of the 1967 Abortion Act – which, on a scrupulous reading of the act, it may well be. The act doesn't lay out foetal sex explicitly as a grounds for abortion, but as Furedi points out, it also doesn't lay out rape, incest, poverty, relationship breakdown or being underage as legal grounds for abortion. All those things are nevertheless accepted as legitimate causes for termination.

What the act does say is that an abortion is legal when two doctors agree that "the continuance of the pregnancy would involve risk, greater than if the pregnancy were terminated, to the physical or mental health of the woman or any existing children of her family". And that rubric is reasonably understood to comprehend the risks of continuing a pregnancy resulting from rape, from incest, one that would extend a woman beyond her means to support a child, or one that would stop her from completing her education and establishing herself as an independent adult.

What's the difference with sex selection? The most obvious objection is that it doesn't matter what sex a baby is: the UK is an equal society, or at least a society that pretends to equality, and no prospective parent has any reason to prefer a son over a daughter or vice versa. And this is true. It's so true that there is no demographic evidence of women practising sex selective abortion in Britain: this whole scandal is based on a totally fictive set-up.

But what about when a pregnant woman lives in a society that gives her real and considerable reason to fear having a girl? The kind of society where dowry systems mean an inconveniently gendered child could bankrupt a family, or one where a livid patriarch deprived of a male heir could turn his fury on both mother and daughter? In those situations, a woman wouldn't just be justified in seeking sex selective abortion; she'd be thoroughly rational to do so.

Ultimately, if you believe strongly that girls have as much right to be born as boys, then you should also believe that women have the right to decide what happens within the bounds of their own bodies. Sex-selective abortion is a negligible issue in Britain. In the countries where it is a serious concern, it's a symptom of brute misogyny. And the answer to such misogyny is never to deny women power over their own bodies.

Sarah Ditum

Professor James O'Connell obituary

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:39 AM PDT

Missionary and head of peace studies department at Bradford University during difficult years under the Thatcher government

Professor James O'Connell, who has died aged 87 after a short illness, saw the department of peace studies at Bradford University through a period of intense attacks from Margaret Thatcher's government in the early 1980s.

Such was the extent of the political dislike for "appeasement studies" during the cold war that it was the only department in any British university to be investigated by the University Grants Committee (UGC), after considerable pressure from the then education secretary, Sir Keith Joseph. But the resulting assessment was positive, and during his 15 years as head (1978-93), James saw the department treble in size while establishing a worldwide reputation.

He was born in Cork, where his mother, Agnes (nee Harrington), kept a public house. His father, also James, was away at sea for much of the time, but returned to run the pub when Agnes died in 1935.

In November 1942, during the second world war, he was one of 33 crew who were lost when the merchant ship Irish Pine disappeared without trace. Many years later it was determined that the vessel had been torpedoed by U-608, even though Ireland was a neutral state.

James was taught in Gaelic until the age of 16, took his BA and MA degrees at University College Galway and then joined the Society of African Missions, studying at Dromantine College near Newry before being ordained as a Catholic priest in 1952.

After further study in Belgium, in 1957 he was awarded a doctorate on the work of the American philosopher and mathematician Charles S Pierce and spent the next 18 years in Nigeria. James left the priesthood in 1973 but stayed on in Nigeria as professor of government at Ahmadu Bello University.

By playing a significant role in redrawing the Nigerian constitution in the aftermath of the the Biafran war of the late 1960s, James fell foul of some leading political figures and in 1975 was deported at 24 hours' notice.

Earlier that year he had married Rosemary Khawaja, nee Harris, from a Belfast Protestant family, and on returning to Britain they settled in Belfast, where James was dean of arts at the Northern Ireland Polytechnic.

In 1978 he was appointed to the chair of peace studies at Bradford, taking over a small department that had been founded as a Quaker initiative and headed initially by Adam Curle. Adam was a remarkable figure with a guru-like quality, but his aim of running a centre with minimal academic assessment and unusual freedom had not proved easy in a conventional university environment.

Though he had taken early retirement through ill health, Adam happily maintained connections with the department for many years, and to James fell the task of combining critical and independent interdisciplinary study and research with the demands of a university environment.

James saw the true activism of university work as scholarship, but he argued strongly that scholars should also provide support for campaigners, politicians and policymakers. It was partly Bradford's independent and knowledgeable research on the nuclear arms race that incurred the wrath of the Thatcher government, and matters came to a head in 1985 when the UGC's head, Sir Peter Swinnerton-Dyer, sought the agreement of the Bradford vice-chancellor, Professor John West, to inspect the department.

West was willing to do so only if O'Connell and his staff agreed, which they did. Swinnerton-Dyer and a colleague visited to conduct what was in effect an academic audit – virtually unknown then if common enough now. They reported favourably to the university council, to the reported anger of Thatcher and Joseph.

Peace studies at Bradford is an enduring legacy of a remarkable person and, after he retired, James remained an active scholar and lecturer as well as being a strong supporter of peace groups. As well as developing a range of undergraduate and postgraduate courses, the department had, by 1993, laid the foundations for extensive work in mediation and conflict resolution, arms-control research and the risk of international conflicts stemming from deepening socio-economic divisions and environmental constraints.

James's own scholarly work over the past 20 years was principally on contemporary philosophy and theological issues, and he served as president of the Partnership for Theological Education, Manchester, now Luther King House Theological College.

James was highly critical of the structures of the Roman Catholic church but retained his faith to the end. He is survived by Rosemary, his daughters Sanjida, Sheila and Dee, his son Patrick and three granddaughters.

• James O'Connell, peace studies scholar, born 22 October 1925; died 8 September 2013

Paul Rogers

Kronos Quartet/Kimmo Pohjonen/Samuli Kosminen – review

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:38 AM PDT

Barbican, London
The UK premiere of a dazzling electro-folk collaboration between Kronos and two Finnish musicians was a thrilling blitz of sound

Even by Kronos Quartet standards, this was a exhilarating performance. The adventurous Americans have constantly pushed forward the musical boundaries for a string quartet, collaborating with artists from across the globe, while reworking anything from jazz and world music to the avant-garde. Nine years ago, in Helsinki, they gave the world premiere of a work that they had commissioned two Finnish musicians to write, and now, at last, it received its first performance in the UK. Uniko was a constantly shifting kaleidoscope of avant-garde electronica, global folk styles and classical influences, with surround-sound and visual effects added in. It was an extraordinary piece of music.

On stage the Kronos members, playing violins, viola and cello, were flanked by the Finns. To one side was the wild-looking figure of Kimmo Pohjonen, adding accordion and with a barrage of pedals at his feet to alter the sound, and on the other was Samuli Kosminen, adding samples and effects and tapping out electronic percussion. They started gently, with a wash of effects that echoed anything from breathing to the sea, then moved on to a sturdy lyrical string theme, an upbeat section with echoes of the Middle East, then switched back to the quietly lyrical before exploding into a furious burst of discordant noise, with sounds now coming from all around the hall and Pohjonen adding treated vocal effects to his furious accordion work.

The changes kept coming. The second section began with electro-percussion, switched to a melodic strings-and-accordion work-out that suddenly gave way to a gentle blitz of buzzing electronics and a grand, galloping theme that would have made a glorious film soundtrack. This was adventurous, atmospheric music that entertained and constantly surprised. The only disappointments were the screen projections, often reminiscent of an early Pink Floyd light show. Cutting-edge music required cutting-edge visuals.

• Did you catch this gig – or any other recently? Tell us about it using #GdnGig

Rating: 5/5

Robin Denselow

Eritrea gets underground newspaper 12 years after ban on private media

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:37 AM PDT

On anniversary of press curbs and journalist arrests, reform group Freedom Friday Movement launches illicit publication

An underground newspaper was circulated on the streets of Asmara yesterday, 12 years after the Eritrean government banned all privately owned media and arrested journalists and proprietors, Freedom Friday Movement (Arbi Harnet) has announced.

MeqaleH Forto, which means Echoes of Forto, is said to have been inspired by the attempted coup on 21 January this year. The paper is produced by a small team both inside Eritrea and in the diaspora, and is distributed using informal links and networks.

Freedom Friday activists say that while their pilot circulations have been limited, there is plenty of room for expansion.

In its inaugural edition, MeqaleH Forto included Tigrigna and Arabic articles about Freedom Friday and the other diaspora based resistance movements, in line with the objectives of the movement to link the resistance inside the country to those in the diaspora.

The paper is financed by supporters of the movement, who have are mainly been mobilised via Facebook and other social media platforms.

"The date is significant for us as the very last editions of Eritrea's fledgling private newspapers ran last 12 years ago today," the team said. "While we are aware that one underground newsletter with extremely limited circulation isn't the answer to freedom of press in a secretive country such as Eritrea, it is our contribution to keeping that hope alive for us and others to build on."

Initial reactions to the inaugural issue were said to be generally positive and Freedom Friday is now looking for media professionals and those with links and networks inside the country to support in the production and distribution of subsequent issues.

Meike Ziervogel: 'I could only write about Magda Goebbels in English'

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:36 AM PDT

The German novelist and Not the Booker nominee explains why some subjects are still taboo in her native country

My father was six when a soldier knocked on his door, and told his mother that they had an hour to pack and leave. All women and children would be evacuated. The Red Army was approaching fast.

This was Stargard in Pomerania in the winter of 1945. My grandmother and her sons joined a huge column of people fleeing the ransacking Russians through ice and snow.

But before they did, my grandmother cleaned their flat. After all, she was an efficient housewife and no one – not even an invading army – should have cause to doubt it. My father still remembers the smell of the burnt fields they crossed on their flight afterwards, and then a crowded train station where they heard that the war was over. My grandmother, with many others, decided to head back east, back home. Why not? They believed the nightmare was over; normal life could resume. That of course was a mistake. They headed straight into the arms of Russian soldiers. But my father only remembers that he was fast asleep in the loft of a barn.

When my father recounts these memory snippets, he always shrugs his shoulders and laughs like a little boy, as if telling a joke that doesn't matter. As if these stories didn't signify the collapse of his childhood.

My grandmother and her sons never made it back home. Instead they eventually found lodging in a camp for displaced people.

My parents belong to the generation of Germans who were born just before or during the war. My father was born in 1939 and my mother in February 1945. They were too young to learn a language that could address and hold the horrors they were experiencing and witnessing. And as they grew older, the devastation that their parents' generation had inflicted on others was so enormous that their own traumas had no right to find expression.

My maternal grandfather joined the Nazi party to save his electrical shop. My mother's mother claimed she had never been interested in politics. On my father's side, my grandfather served as a logistics officer in the army. He was eventually released from Russian captivity in 1949 and was reunited with his family in the north of Germany through the Red Cross.

Like many German families, my grandparents never spoke about the war, but psychological traumas that aren't dealt with in one generation are simply passed on to the next.

"To clear away the psychological ruins, that is the task of the grandchildren," wrote the journalist Merle Hilbk in a recent essay in Der Spiegel. The grandchildren – that is my generation, and especially those born between 1960 and 1975. I was born in 1967. Our generation has now come of age. We have lived long enough to observe our emotions and realise that our fears are distorted and don't correspond to the present. We have enough psychological insight to comprehend that these feelings belong to our parents and grandparents. And for the first time there is a generation mature enough – and far enough removed from the actual events – to look for ways to express the inexpressible.

By writing Magda, about the life and death of Magda Goebbels, I allowed myself to look at my own German history critically but with understanding. I wanted to access the mind of an intelligent woman who became a Nazi, in order to comprehend my own cultural background.

I went to the British Library and read books by Nazis, including Hitler's Mein Kampf. Then I looked at the literature that came a generation earlier and influenced Nazi thought, such as Houston Stewart Chamberlain's The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century. I also examined the highly romanticised language that the Nazis employed, and immersed myself in the work of 19th-century German philosophers such as Fichte and Nietzsche, and German Romantic writers including Tieck and Novalis.

However, when I finally sat down to write Magda, I tried to forget everything I had ever researched in order to access the subject emotionally. I was haunted by a recurring image: a long, pitch-dark shaft, at the top of which I was hovering. I knew that I had to get down there, deep inside myself, to access a historical truth.

One of the most challenging parts to write was the scene in which Magda Goebbels kills her children. I depict the crime from the point of view of the eldest child, Helga. The scene came to me from that angle: it wasn't a deliberate choice. Only when I had completed the chapter did I understand why I had to write it in such a painful way. Helga symbolises my parents' generation. They were silenced as children and often deprived of the chance to grow beyond those early childhood experiences.

Since the beginning of this century there has been an increasing interest in German trauma research, but we still have a long way to go. It doesn't surprise me that Magda has yet to find a German publisher. In my novel, she is portrayed as a human. For Germans she is a monster. Moreover, I portray maternal love as a destructive power. Since the 19th century, the figure of the mother in Germany has been an untouchable icon.

Even I, a German living in the 21st century, could only write this story in English. In the first draft, some scenes were written in my first language, but they took the form of a stream of consciousness. Transferring them into English helped me gain the necessary distance to tackle a very sensitive subject.

My father has another memory. As they walked for days on end, he used to worry that "my little legs are too tired to carry me any further". When my son turned six a few years ago, I often thought about my father and his "little legs", and how lucky my son is that he didn't need to experience what his grandfather went through.

Hollywood's trade body slams Google for failing to stop piracy

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:34 AM PDT

More than half of people who looked at copyright-infringing content used search terms that suggested innocent intent

Alex Hern

Global helium shortage in prospect as US reservoir in line to close next month

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:34 AM PDT

Makers of medical equipment and electronics face rising prices and supply disruptions if Federal Helium Reserve in Texas shuts

A 90-year-old helium reservoir in Texas could shut down next month, disrupting supplies and raising costs for makers of high-tech products and threatening medical treatments and research.

Helium is needed by the aerospace and defence industries as well as by makers of smartphones, flatscreen TVs, medical equipment and deep-sea diving tanks.

The gas, which is the second most abundant element in the universe, is difficult to capture and store, making the US reservoir a vital source.

The US Federal Helium Reserve has been providing around a third of global crude helium and 40% of US supply. But this will be turned off after 7 October unless the US Congress acts to extend its life.

The reserve, near Amarillo in Texas, was opened in 1925 as a supply of helium for airships. It then provided helium in the cold war and the space race.

A $1.4bn (£900m) debt is due to finish being repaid to the US treasury by the end of this month and under current law, federal funding will then stop, terminating operations.

Congress would have to amend the law or pass new legislation to keep the reserve going.

Helium refiners have already been raising prices in anticipation of its closure. GE Healthcare, which uses helium to make MRI scanners, told Reuters the spot price of liquid helium had jumped to $25-30 a litre from $8 last year.

Some university research projects in Britain were put on hold and brain-scanning equipment was shut down last year because of a helium shortage.

Helium is a byproduct of natural gas production but once it is released into the atmosphere it cannot be captured. Demand for helium has risen, driven particularly by Asia's booming manufacturing industry.

Annual global production of helium was nearly 175m cubic metres in 2012, according to the US Geological Survey, but demand is forecast to pass 300m cubic metres by 2030.

Markets surge after Fed delays taper; Greek PM calls for calm - live

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:27 AM PDT

World stock markets are racing ahead following the US Federal Reserve's decision not to begin slowing its stimulus package, with the FTSE 100 jumping 81 points

Graeme Wearden

Why have the Spaniards stopped eating later than the rest of us?

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:27 AM PDT

Spain has always been the place where you would have a siesta in the afternoon, eat late and then dance the night away. But now, a once-sacred custom is being abandoned

It's dark in Alicante's Teatre club, the music is loud and the air conditioning is on at full blast. Stepping outside to join the people using the excuse of their nicotine addiction to escape the racket, though, the brightness of the sun hits you like a welcome slap. It's 5.30pm, still almost 30C in the shade and there are tourists walking past in swimming costumes.

What has happened to the Spanish social timetable? This is the country where they famously take a siesta in the afternoons, eat late, go out drinking after midnight and dance until well beyond dawn. In Alicante and certain other Spanish towns, though, things are changing. The traditional Saturday night out now often takes place on Saturday afternoon. They call it el tardeo, a portmanteau of tarde – afternoon – and tapeo to go for tapas.

I started my "night out" at just before 2pm at a terrace bar, La Rotonda, behind the modernist arch of the city´s Mercado Central. Most people aren't eating yet but the waiters are still practically running to keep up with the demand for trays of cañas, small glasses of beer, from the dozens of tables. My next stop is a nearby cafe called Damasol, for another caña and then a bowl of tangy salpicón de pulpo (octopus in a kind of vinaigrette), followed by a firm chunk of bacalao, salt cod, topped with tomato. At about 4pm the meal is finished off with a "gintonic" on Calle Castaños, a street almost entirely made up of terrace bars, with barely a table vacant. After that, the choice can only be a club such as Teatre or its unfortunately named rival, the Clap. For people who actually like the music they play in clubs, it's then time to dance, before going to bed at around 11pm.

This was all given the official seal of approval in the summer, with a promotional video produced by the town hall, complete with a video soundtrack from a local indie band. On YouTube, inevitably, you can read indignant comments from residents of Murcia and Albacete insisting that they've had their own version of el tardeo for years. In fact, it's not any kind of official, town-hall-directed phenomenon. According to Manu Garrote, one of the members of Gimnástica, the band on the promo video, it was just a realisation by older twentysomethings that they probably shouldn't be dancing till 8am. Gradually, both older and younger people started to join them until now, unlike many Spanish towns, Alicante is livelier at 4.30pm on a Saturday than it is at 4.30am.

This is a startling transformation for anyone who is used to sleepy afternoons in Spain. Changes such as this always seem like a big deal because of how closely the social timetable is linked to national identity. Just look at the furore about the liberalisation of licensing laws in the UK. Those changes, which often amounted to little more than some pubs closing at 12am instead of 11pm, have been cited either as our adoption of sophisticated, continental drinking patterns, or as contributory factors in "broken Britain".

Arguably, though, the hour at which you eat is a stronger social signifier. In the UK, insisting on having a full meal called "supper" at 8pm will still mark you out as irredeemably posh. And it's noticeable that, underneath the superficial changes to the Alicante timetable, you'll find a reassuring structure - they're still eating between two and four. Lunch is still the backbone of Spanish society and that's as true in San Sebastian and Barcelona as it is in Madrid or Alicante.

In the UK, in contrast, we try to ignore lunch and order our evening meal according to social class: first tea, then dinner, then supper. Would we be happier if we all sat down for a big meal in the middle of the day? Maybe so. In Spain, dancing at 5pm may be possible but, as Manu Garrote puts it: "Gastronomy never changes its timetable. Lunch is sacred."

Trevor Baker

China's stolen children: parents battle police indifference in search for young

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:25 AM PDT

Tens of thousands of children are snatched and sold into slavery every year, but parents say they get little help with their search

"Back then, they just told me to keep looking," said Yuan Cheng, punctuating the sentence with a lengthy drag on his cigarette. Sitting in his mud-floored home in Hebei province, a few hours north of Beijing, the farmer is talking about the lack of interest from the police when his 15-year-old son, Xueyu, went missing from a construction site in Zhengzhou in 2007.

Six years on, Yuan says the police have finally admitted to him that there was a string of child abductions in the area around the time his son disappeared. But when he went to them, two days after Xueyu went missing, the police said: "Keep looking on your own and we'll talk about it again in a couple of days."

Tens of thousands of children are kidnapped in China each year for sale into adoption, street life, forced labour and prostitution.

The horror faced by parents whose children are stolen is highlighted in Chinese and international media whenever there is a particularly disturbing case. Recently police arrested a hospital doctor in Shaanxi province over her alleged role in stealing newborn babies and selling them. The police investigation managed to track down some of the missing babies and reunite them with their parents.

But that is an unusually happy ending in a country where parents say they are battling police indifference as well as traffickers in the hunt to find missing children.

In 2011, Chinese police rescued 8,660 abducted children, but it is likely that at least double that number were kidnapped. China does not release official figures relating to child trafficking, so estimates are based on the numbers of missing-child reports posted by parents online and of children reported rescued each year.

Estimates range from 10,000 kidnapped per year to as high as 70,000. Most parents who lose children stand very little chance of seeing them again.

At the national level, China takes child abduction very seriously. It has a national anti-kidnapping taskforce that investigates and infiltrates trafficking rings, and there are frequent anti-kidnapping campaigns that encourage citizens to report anything suspicious. But at local level, where the first, crucial reports will be made when a child goes missing, parents say the police just don't seem to care.

"The evening we reported it they went out and patrolled a bit, after that we never saw them looking [for her] again," said Zhu Cuifang, whose 12-year-old daughter, Lei Xiaoxia, went missing in 2011. The police also failed to check surveillance tapes at her school or interview any of her classmates.

Critics say that the slow reaction of local police plays into the hands of the traffickers. The involvement of organised rings means a kidnapped child could be taken thousands of miles and passed between numerous handlers over the first couple of days.

Pi Yijun, a professor at the Institute for Criminal Justice at the China University of Political Science and Law, says: "An important problem is that when a child is lost, the parents go and talk to the police, and the police need to judge whether the kid has got lost or has been kidnapped.

"At present, in Chinese law, they need to be missing for 24 hours to be listed as a missing person or as kidnapped, but that 24 hours is also the most crucial time – so there is a major conflict there. How can you judge quickly whether the child has got lost or is being hidden as a prank or really has been kidnapped? That's a serious problem."

Often, it is a problem that is never fully resolved. In rural areas and the outskirts of cities where migrant workers live, children aren't too difficult to acquire, adds Pi.

China's one child policy has created an environment where finding a buyer for a boy is rarely difficult; there are always parents somewhere who want a son to support them in their old age but don't want to pay the fines for additional children just to end up with more daughters.

Child kidnapping is so prevalent in China that even when a stolen child tells people what has happened, sometimes nothing is done.

Wang Qingshun was kidnapped and sold to "adoptive" parents in the 1980s. The couple who bought him already had two daughters and thought it would be easier to buy a son than keep trying to have one naturally.

While he was growing up, Wang told his neighbours that he had been kidnapped and that the people he lived with were not really his parents. But they didn't report this to the police until a decade later.

While individual stories of stolen children make the headlines briefly and then fade, parents never stop looking. Many say they are spending thousands of dollars searching, unsupported, for their children, fighting to raise awareness of cases that will never be solved.

In the six years that Yuan Cheng has been searching for his son, he has helped rescue other children who had been kidnapped and sold into forced labour, but he hasn't found Xueyu yet.

Zhu Cuifang and her husband, Lei Yong, haven't found Xiaoxia either. Still, they press on, because as Zhu put it, "if we can't find our daughter, life is meaningless".

China family planning officials levied £160m in fines in three years

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:24 AM PDT

Chinese audit reinforces suspicions that officials reaped financial gains from China's one-child policy

Chinese family planning officials illegally levied more than £160m in fines between 2009 and 2012, Chinese auditors have revealed, reinforcing widespread suspicions that government officials have reaped financial gains from the country's one-child policy.

The controversial policy, introduced in 1979 to keep population growth in check, has been relaxed in recent years – while most Chinese people are still only allowed to have one child, some groups, including ethnic minorities and only-child couples, are allowed to have two.

Violating the policy can incur heavy fines – officially called "social compensation fees" – which, even for impoverished farmers, can amount to thousands of pounds.

An investigation by China's National Audit Office covering 45 counties in nine provinces from early 2009 through to May, 2012 identified 1.6 billion yuan (£162m) in "misappropriated" family planning fees, state media reported on Thursday. In response, the country's National Health and Family Planning Commission has "vowed to clamp down on birth control fines" reported Xinhua, China's state newswire.

"The office revealed various problems in the handling of fines, including inaccurate reports relating to the number of extra children parents had, fees not successfully collected and local officials handing out higher fines than what they should have," Xinhua reported. Central government regulations require the funds to be allocated towards public services. Yet the state-run broadcaster China Radio International said that some were used as "hospitality expenditures" and "allowance paid for government staff".

"Maybe curbing these abuses would be one way of progressively relaxing the system," said Nicholas Bequelin, a Hong Kong-based senior researcher at Human Rights Watch. "Because this is the hard edge of population planning – it's not constructive to say the least, it's a factor of social unrest, it's deeply unpopular, and deeply unequal, because it disproportionately targets people in the countryside and migrant women in cities."

In July, a lawyer in Zhejiang province shed light on the family planning system's notoriously opaque finances when he obtained records from family planning offices in 17 provinces. In 2012, the offices collectively levied 16.5b yuan (£1.7b) in fines, he found. None detailed how the money was spent.

Critics have called the one-child policy archaic and cruel. They say it has fueled a rise in sex-selective abortions, as many rural families prefer boys to girls, and a latent demographic crunch, whereby only children must financially support a large cohort of ageing relatives.

It has also engendered a host of human rights violations. Abductions, forced abortions, and extra-legal detentions are still common in rural areas where family planning officials wield enormous power.

"I think there is a perception that population planning doesn't really matter anymore in China – that people don't really care, and that people who do care can just pay the fines," said Bequelin. "I think this is a mistaken view. It might be true for the majority of the urban population, but it's certainly not true for a large part of the rural population, especially in the poorest parts of the country."

Jonathan Kaiman

Mexico floods carry crocodiles onto Acapulco streets - video

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:24 AM PDT

Residents in Acapulco look on as a crocodile thrashes around on a pavement in the city's centre

China's child slaves: 'It would be easier to escape if we were allowed shoes' – video

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:20 AM PDT

Tens of thousands of children go missing in China every year, many of whom are forced to work in brick kilns. Former child slaves share their plight

Parents of China's missing children face police indifference – video

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:19 AM PDT

Tens of thousands of children are kidnapped in China each year for sale into adoption, street life, forced labour and prostitution

Nintendo ex-president Hiroshi Yamauchi dies at 85

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:19 AM PDT

The businessman who transformed Nintendo from a playing card manufacturer to a global video game leader has passed away

Hiroshi Yamauchi, the president of Nintendo from 1949 to 2002, has died at the age of 85. In a short statement released to the press today, the company wrote, "Nintendo is in mourning today from the sad loss of the former Nintendo president Mr Hiroshi Yamauchi, who sadly passed away this morning."

Yamauchi, who took over as president after his grandfather suffered a stroke, transformed Nintendo from a little-known manufacturer of playing cards into the most powerful force in the global video game industry. It was Yamauchi who spotted talented engineer Gunpei Yokoi at one of the company's factories – Yokoi-san had built a robotic arm for his own amusement, but Yamauchi saw its potential as a product, ordered its manufacture and so kickstarted Nintendo's expansion into the toy and gadget market. Yokoi would go on to invent the hugely successful Game Boy handheld console.

Noticing the boom in the video game market, Yamauchi later tasked young artist Shigeru Miyamoto with creating an arcade machine that could attract the growing global audience. The result was Donkey Kong, a massive success in its own right, and the origin of the legendary Mario character.

The long-standing president would go on to oversee the company's entry into the home console market, which it soon utterly dominated with the Famicom and Super Famicom consoles released in the eighties and early nineties. At its height, Nintendo enjoyed a 90% share of the console hardware sector. Importantly, in the wake of the video game crash in 1983, where a glut of mediocre third-party releases for consoles such as the Atari VCS effectively devalued the whole industry, Yamauchi oversaw the introduction of Nintendo's "Seal of Quality" programme, which restricted the numbers of developers that could release games on its systems.

Although Yamauchi stepped down in 2002 to be replaced by current president Satoru Iwata, he remained a major shareholder and retained an advisory role at Nintendo.

Keith Stuart

Do the police act at the behest of the UK's rich and powerful? | George Monbiot

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:18 AM PDT

An encounter with badger protesters highlights a deference to power that is part of a pattern pre-dating formal police forces

Who runs this country? It's a question every voter should ask themselves. Look at the revelations about the mass surveillance of citizens by GCHQ and the US National Security Agency; the exposure of the intimate relationships between Rupert Murdoch's companies, the police and the government; the failure to rein in the excesses of the City; the unreformed political funding system and the freedom with which industrial lobbyists bend politicians to their will, and it becomes pretty clear that the government's role has been reduced to that of a middleman.

Our elected representatives look increasingly marginalised. Unable or unwilling to assert themselves against corporate power, media magnates and spies, they have been reduced to a class of managers, doing as they are told by their sponsors and lobbyists, seeking to persuade their constituents that what is good for big business and unelected agencies is good for everyone.

I've been following these issues for much of my working life, and I thought I'd seen it all. But the recording of a conversation between police officers and a group called We Are Change Gloucestershire, which is campaigning against the badger cull, has amazed me.

As I've suggested in a couple of recent articles, the National Farmers Union (NFU), which tends to be dominated by big landowners, possesses an inordinate share of power in Britain. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Deathra) gives the NFU everything it asks for: resisting European attempts to cap the amount of subsidies a landowner can receive, scrapping the Agricultural Wages Board, trying to prevent a partial ban on neonicotinoid pesticides, commissioning a badger cull that flies in the face of scientific evidence.

Large landowners still throng the benches of the House of Lords and are over-represented in the Commons. They still tend to dominate local government in the countryside. But until now I hadn't realised that the police might act at the NFU's behest.

The conversation, recorded on 6 September, involves a number of officers from two (or possibly three) police forces and a group of men and women monitoring the badger cull. By the time it begins, part of the group (but not the man who made the recording) have been detained by the police but not arrested, on suspicion of aggravated trespass. They deny the charge, insisting that they had stayed on a public footpath. Here are some excerpts from the recording. The man with the recorder asks the police why the cull monitors are being detained:

Officer: "The NFU are coming down to give them an official warning because they committed aggravated trespass."

A few seconds later a different officer explains: "The suspicion is that you've committed aggravated trespass. It's a suspicion at this stage and we're detaining you under 117 of Pace [the Police and Criminal Evidence Act] … It's suspicion, reasonable suspicion. OK? So what we've got to do, someone from the National Farmers Union is coming down –"

Questioner: "So are you acting on their behalf? Are you acting on behalf of the National Farmers Union?"

Officer: "No, I'm acting on behalf of our Silver Commander."

Various other issues are raised, then the police return to the point:

Officer: "Someone from the NFU could speak to them, OK, ascertain what's happening, take the details – "

Questioner: "Will they be allowed to move on when the NFU have spoken with them?

Officer: "That's up to whatever the NFU's got to say."

Questioner: "So it's up to the NFU whether they get arrested or not?"

Officer: "No, it's up to what the NFU – [drowned out by other voices]"

Again there are various distractions, then the conversation resumes:

Officer: "We're waiting for somebody to come along to give you an official warning – "

Questioner: "To give them."

Officer: "OK, them. An official warning –"

Questioner: "From the NFU."

Officer: "From the NFU. Yeah."

Eventually, after arguing with the police for a while, the people were released before the NFU arrived.

I've checked the relevant acts, and can find nothing in them that empowers the NFU, or any other such body, to issue official warnings and to decide whether or not people detained by the police can be released.

Though the detention took place in Gloucestershire, most of the officers involved appeared to belong to the Warwickshire police, so I wrote to that force. I asked:

• What the legal grounds might be for detaining people until the members of a trade body can come and speak to them.

• What legal standing the NFU has to issue people with an official warning.

• Whether this was the only occasion on which activists have been detained pending a warning from the NFU.

• Who is responsible for the policy of referring detained activists to the NFU.

My questions were passed by the Warwickshore police to the West Mercia police, who "are dealing with badger cull media queries". Here's what they said:

"In order to establish if the offence had taken place, police engaged not only with the group concerned but also with the NFU – who are acting on behalf of the landowner.

"We accept that communication between our officers and the group could have been clearer and that there was some confusion articulated over the role of the NFU. What officers were seeking to achieve was confirmation from the NFU as to whether lawful culling was taking place at the time that the group had been seen in the area.

"The short period in which the group were engaged allowed us to quickly establish the facts and the group soon went on their way.

"Specifically in relation to your questions, there is no policy of referring activists to the NFU, who have no powers to issue 'official warnings'. Officers cannot detain people for this purpose and this is the only incident of this nature we have been made aware of."

Hmm. "Some confusion articulated over the role of the NFU." That looks like something of an understatement. It is hard to understand how police could have made a mistake of this magnitude, unless they had come, subconsciously perhaps, to see the NFU as the authority to whom they deferred.

This hints, I think, at a wider problem with policing in the United Kingdom. As both a journalist and a protester, I've been struck by the way in which the police often appear to ally themselves with those who possess power, regardless of what the law says.

For example, while protesting against a road being built through the flank of Solsbury Hill in 1994, I was attacked by two security guards working for the construction company, who threw me onto a staggered pile of spiked fencing panels. One of the spikes missed my jugular vein by a few millimetres; another went through the top of my foot, shattering the middle bone. I was one of 11 protesters hospitalised by the guards that day.

The operation to reconstruct the bone was delayed, so, while I waited, I asked some friends to carry me into the local police station. I told the desk sergeant what had happened and asked to make a statement. He looked straight through me as if I didn't exist, then returned to his paperwork. I kept trying, but he kept working as if no one was speaking to him.

After an hour of being ignored, I did the only thing I could think of: I removed the bandage and then the dressings. Blood started pouring over the floor, at which point he leapt up and said, "All right, we'll take your fucking statement." Even then, no investigation began until Amnesty International became involved.

It's a pattern I've seen repeatedly, and my perception of partial, pro-corporate policing has been horribly reinforced by the Guardian's revelations about the undercover police officers used to penetrate the lives – and bodies – of law-abiding protesters, while perverting the course of justice, acting as agents provocateurs and destroying the trust and happiness of innocent people.

Too often in this country, policing appears to be conducted for the benefit of in-groups at the expense of out-groups: victims of racism, the homeless, gypsies and travellers, activists and protesters.

While I can, perhaps, accept that the officers involved in the incident on 6 September were confused, their deference to the NFU is part of a pattern that long pre-dates the establishment of formal police forces in this country. For most of our history, the law has been both made and enforced by local or national strongmen, who have used it as an instrument for imposing and sustaining their power, against the common interest. Policing was conducted by their own thugs, who sometimes sported various kinds of fancy dress and fancy titles.

The establishment of official police forces, whose purpose was to enforce laws passed by parliament, was supposed to have replaced the doctrine of might with the doctrine of right. But the psychological legacy persists. The police often appear to work for those with money and power, protecting commercial interests from peaceful and legitimate protests, while failing to investigate crimes committed by corporations, executives and landowners.

Becoming a police officer does not protect you from the urge to appease, to take the side of the powerful against the powerless, to defer to those who possess great fortunes even if they acquired them through great crimes. Becoming a senior police officer places you among the elite, and it must be difficult not to absorb the demands and perspectives of other people of that class.

The only defence the rest of us possess is to be perpetually vigilant in reporting and confronting such abuses, and to demand that the police who are supposed to defend all of us, impartially, are held to account.

monbiot.com

George Monbiot

Future of Japan depends on stopping Fukushima leaks, PM tells workers

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:15 AM PDT

Shinzo Abe visits stricken site amid rising doubts about plant operator's ability to conduct cleanup operation alone

Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has told workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant that "the future of Japan" depends on their ongoing struggle to contain leaks of highly radioactive water at the site.

Abe's brief visit to the stricken plant on Thursday – his second since he became prime minister last December – comes weeks after he reassured the world that the situation at the facility was under control, amid reports that large quantities of contaminated water were seeping into the Pacific ocean.

Abe's reassurances are thought to have helped Tokyo's successful bid to host the 2020 Olympics, but were later challenged by a senior official at the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power [Tepco].

On Thursday, Abe and his entourage, dressed in protective suits, masks and helmets, heard Tepco officials explain how they planned to prevent additional leaks from tanks that have been hastily built to store water that becomes contaminated after it comes into contact with melted nuclear fuel in damaged reactor basements.

He also visited a water decontamination facility and a chemical dam being built along the coastline to contain leaks of groundwater into the Pacific ocean.

The visit was designed to calm fears at home and overseas about safety at the plant, amid rising doubts about Tepco's ability to conduct the cleanup operation alone.

This week it emerged that US experts had urged Japanese authorities to take immediate steps to prevent groundwater contamination two years ago, but their advice been ignored.

Tepco reportedly lobbied against the proposed construction of a barrier – a measure that will now be taken with government funding – because it feared the high cost would spook investors and push the firm closer to insolvency.

Charles Casto, a representative of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said discussions about a barrier had begun within weeks of the meltdown.

"It was obvious to us that there was great deal of groundwater intrusion into the plant, and we shared that with the Japanese government," he told Reuters. "At the time, they didn't believe there was a significant amount of groundwater getting into the plant."

Abe told some of the thousands of workers at the plant that the government would continue to support the utility during a long potentially hazardous decommissioning operation that is expected to last four decades.

"The future of Japan is on your shoulders," he said during a visit to the plant's command centre. "The government will step forward and take concrete measures. I am counting on you to do your best."

Later, he said he had told Tepco officials, including the firm's president, Naomi Hirose, to decommission reactors 5 and 6, which were not in operation when the plant was wrecked by a powerful earthquake and tsunami on 11 March 2011.

Hirose said Tepco, which is hoping to restart some nuclear reactors to help repair its tattered finances, would make a decision on the two reactors by the end of the year. Reactors 1 to 4 have already been earmarked for decommissioning.

Abe stood by his recent claim, made before members of the International Olympic Committee in Buenos Aires earlier this month, that contaminated water had been prevented from flowing beyond the plant's harbour, and that the water crisis was under control.

"One of the main purposes of this visit was to see the situation for myself, having made those remarks on how the contaminated water is being been handled," he said, adding that the government believed the water issue would be resolved by the time the Games are held in 2020.

"As I stated in Buenos Aires, I am convinced that the contaminated water leaks have been confined to an area of 0.3 sq km within the cove next to the plant.

"In light of that, I will work hard to counter rumours questioning the safety of the Fukushima plant."

Earlier this week, however, Kazuhiko Yamashita, a senior Tepco official, said the water leaks were not under control.

"Predictable risks are under control, but what cannot be predicted is happening," Japanese media quoted Yamashita as telling opposition MPs.

"We believe that the current conditions show that [the radioactive water problem] is not under control."

Abe, accompanied by Tepco officials, was shown a water treatment facility that can remove radioactive materials from contaminated water. The equipment failed during an earlier a trial run and is now under repair. The plant's manager, Akira Ono, said it would be tested again later this year.

Abe later inspected a water tank that last month leaked 300 tonnes of water, sending radiation levels in the immediate vicinity soaring.

Ono said 90 Tepco workers were patrolling the plant's 1,000 water tanks four times a day, adding that gauges would soon be installed to monitor water levels in the tanks.

Tepco hopes to replace suspect tanks with more reliable welded versions by the end of the year, he added.

Justin McCurry

Ireland officially exits recession

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:09 AM PDT

GDP, which includes the multinational sector, grew 0.4% in the second quarter – although the domestic economy shrank 0.4%

The recession in Ireland has officially ended.

After a downturn hit the country at the end of last year and the first few months of this year, the widest measure of the economy has now revealed a slight upturn.

According to estimates from the Central Statistics Office, gross domestic product, which includes the multinational sector, increased in the three months to June by 0.4% compared with the first three months of the year.

The figures will be a boost for the government as it prepares for the 2014 budget, which is to be announced on 15 October.

But despite one set of good figures, the domestic economy is suffering as it contracted by 0.4% in the same period.

Among the good returns for the country, there were signs of growth and improvement in shattered building and construction businesses.

The sector has reported growth of 4.2% from March to June.

The revival will go some way towards alleviating the impact of massive unemployment caused by the 170,000 builders who lost jobs in the wake of the property collapse from 2007.

Other improvements which have helped spark another recovery include a €1.5bn increase in exports and people spending more – up 0.7% on the first three months of the year.

Businesses involved in distribution, transport, software and communication increased by 1.4%.

Iraqi children find 10 blindfolded corpses

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:02 AM PDT

Unidentified young men were apparently killed by gunshots to the head, police in Baghdad say

Children in eastern Bagdad have discovered the handcuffed and blindfolded corpses of 10 unidentified young men, apparently killed by gunshots to the head, Iraqi police said.

Residents told police that unusual vehicle movements to and from an abandoned building in the area had caught the attention of the children, who waited until the cars had left to investigate.

"Several kids climbed over the wall of the building to enter and they found the 10 bodies inside one of its rooms," a police officer involved in the investigation said on Thursday.

It was not clear who was behind the killings.

The civil war in neighbouring Syria, which has brought sectarian tensions to the boil across the Middle East, has boosted Sunni insurgents in Iraq who are also exploiting general discontent in the minority Sunni population.

Iraq has recently witnessed several incidents suggesting that Shia militias, which have so far stayed out of the violence, may once again be getting involved.

Around 800 Iraqis were killed in acts of violence in August, with Baghdad the worst affected governorate, according to the United Nations.

David Baddiel criticises David Cameron's support of Spurs' 'Yid army' chant - video

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:01 AM PDT

Comedian David Baddiel says David Cameron's support of the term 'Yid', when chanted by Tottenham Hotspur fans, is wrong

Are some people born creative? | David Cox

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 04:00 AM PDT

New research suggests that the extent to which creativity is heritable may be greater than previously thought

Since the evolution of Homo sapiens, our world has been driven by flashes of inspiration, the process we call creativity. But while creativity may appear to be a spontaneous burst of new ideas, it is really the art of deriving the new from the old – the relentless reassembly of information we already possess.

The enduring question with creativity has always been whether the defining factors come from nature or nurture. Everyone can learn to be creative to some degree, but new research has revealed that the extent to which we're born creative may be greater than previously thought.

Two years ago Kenneth Heilman and his team at the Department of Neurology and Neuroscience at Cornell University discovered that the brains of artistically creative individuals have a particular characteristic that may enhance creativity.

The brain is divided into two halves, or hemispheres, that are joined by a bundle of fibres called the corpus callosum. Writers, artists and musicians were found to have a smaller corpus callosum, which may augment their creativity by allowing each side of their brain to develop its own specialisation. The authors suggest that this "benefits the incubation of ideas that are critical for the divergent-thinking component of creativity".

This does not tell the full story, however. Creativity is not only about divergent thinking but also generating endless associations. Recent findings suggest that the secret to this lies in our DNA.

"Creativity is related to the connectivity of large-scale brain networks," says Szabolcs Keri of the National Institute of Psychiatry and Addictions in Budapest. "How brain areas talk to each other is critical when it comes to originality, fluency and flexibility."

In highly creative individuals this connectivity is thought to be especially widespread in the brain, which may be down to genes that play a role in the development of pathways between different areas. These genes reduce inhibition of emotions and memory, meaning that more information reaches the level of consciousness.

In a study published in PLoS ONE earlier this year, researchers from the University of Helsinki assessed people's musical creativity based on their ability to judge pitch and time as well as skills such as composing, improvisation and arranging. They found that the presence of one particular cluster of genes correlated with musical creativity. Crucially, this cluster belongs to a gene family known to be involved in the plasticity of the brain: its ability to reorganise itself by breaking and forming new connections between cells.

The team also observed increased creativity in participants with duplicate DNA strands containing a gene that affects the processing of a key neurotransmitter called serotonin. This finding has been backed up by a newly published neuroimaging study which found that elevating serotonin levels in the brain increases connectivity in one of its most important "hubs" – an area called the posterior cingulate cortex.

The result is particularly interesting because while serotonin is widely known for regulatingsleep, body temperature and libido, the varying levels of this chemical have been implicated in neuropsychiatric disorders such as bipolar depression.

Over the past 40 years, Swedish scientists at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm have been conducting one of the largest population-based studies on individuals with mental illnesses and their siblings. They found that while severe forms of disorders such as schizophrenia tended to be detrimental for cognition and creativity, individuals with bipolar disorder often ended up in professions where creativity was crucial.

"The finding that bipolar is associated with creativity is not surprising," Keri said. "It is totally in accordance with life histories of famous people like Churchill, Beethoven and Hemingway who have all shown bipolar-like patterns. In bipolar mania, you have an excessive fast and divergent thinking, increased self-esteem, and never-ending energy and motivation, often to create.

"In severe schizophrenia, however, there is a marked impairment of attention and memory, loss of interest, and general slowness. These negative symptoms, absent in typical bipolar patients during 'up' states, have a negative effect on creative output."

But even more intriguingly, the relatives of patients with neuropsychiatric disorders also tended to be more creative. Even though they don't share the illness, they have much in common genetically, suggesting that it is the underlying gene mechanisms, rather than the disorder itself, that is the source of the creative ability.

However, while the discovery of such "creativity genes" indicates that certain people may have a natural propensity for divergent thinking, this does not tell the whole story. A lot depends on how your genes are expressed and this is where the environment can play a defining role.

"We found that many individuals with artistic creativity suffered from severe traumas in life, whether it be psychological or physical abuse, neglect, hostility or rejection," Keri said. "At the biological level, we and several other researchers documented that trauma is associated with functional alteration of the brain, and it also affects the expression of genes that have an impact on brain structure, maybe in the same large-scale networks that participate in creativity."

So, are we born creative or not? While factors such as upbringing play a crucial role in your brain's development, the work done by scientists in Scandinavia, Germany and the US has shown that having the right genetic makeup can make your brain more inclined towards creative thinking. The rest of us have to "learn" to be creative.

The association between creativity and some neuropsychiatric disorders may well help us uncover more of the genes responsible for unlocking our inner creative spirit. But there are many different shades of creativity and the genes that enhance musical ability may not enhance ability in the visual arts. One thing's for certain, we have a lot more to learn about the nature of humans' wonderful creativity.

David Cox

Richard Serra's dark magic descends on the Courtauld

Posted: 19 Sep 2013 03:57 AM PDT

The American's most recent drawings have invaded the gallery's delicate environment like a black sun swallowing up the sky

London's Courtauld Gallery is a happy place. People row boats on glittering rivers, dry themselves after a nice bath or meditatively powder their faces. For this is one of the world's great collections of impressionist and post-impressionist art, and the light of Monet, Cezanne and their contemporaries suffuses its rooms with stardust.

The US artist Richard Serra has just invaded this delicate environment like a black sun swallowing up the sky. Serra is renowned for making austere and intimidating abstract sculptures. His walls and elliptical labyrinths of steel confront and surround awestruck audiences. But Mr Serra also likes to draw. His latest works on paper have been made for the Courtauld and they strike up a powerful if disturbing dialogue with its fine collection.

A lot has happened since Toulouse-Lautrec portrayed Jane Avril leaving the Moulin Rouge in one of the Courtauld Gallery's most compelling masterpieces. The 19th century saw its wars and revolutions but on the whole the light of the impressionists is the light of a prosperous, expanding, optimistic world. Richard Serra's drawings are like messengers knocking at Monet's door, telling of the violence and disasters to come.

Blackness descends. Serra is a magician of the dark. His necromantic pictures are multilayered and rich in texture. Made by printing black litho crayon on to transparent mylar sheets, his works at the Courtauld create fascinating three-dimensional effects. Their depths and shadows remind me of the optical recesses of Monet's waterlily paintings. There is a subtletly here that more than justifies his visit among the masters. But the richness is that of ash. The subtlety is that of death.

Serra's message to Monet is that the century of the Holocaust made it impossible for a serious artist to paint happy river scenes any more. He has reduced the world's colours to a mighty black, a black that is gorgeous yet terrible. Vortices of black swirl in space, mountains of black are heaped up.

One of the first works I ever saw by Serra was a homage to the Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi. His new drawings, seen against the beauty of the Courtauld's 19th-century paintings, are tragic testaments to what art must be in our brutal age. The reason Serra is one the great artists of our time is that in a world of shallow cultural consumerism he bites at the hand that feeds him and forces a tragic sensibility on we who would rather fool ourselves. To tell that truth he blocks out the Courtauld's lovely light.

Jonathan Jones