A million Chinese couples apply for second child

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BEIJING: Nearly a million Chinese couples have sought permission for a second child after China eased its controversial one-child policy last year to address demographic imbalances in the world's most populous nation.

 

The relaxation came as the world's second largest economy strives to address its declining labour force and ageing population.

 

China's current population of 1.3 billion would see a rise with the realxation in this three decade old family planning policy.

 

"The number of applications is in line with the estimate of less than two million annually by China's National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC)," Mao Qunan, spokesman with the commission said today.

 

"The commission will put more effort toward improving the population monitoring mechanism and will stipulate relevant policies," he said.

 

 Since China's one-child policy was eased in a pilot program in east China's Zhejiang Province in January 2014, couples nationwide may now have a second child if either parent is an only child.

 

"We will also collect public opinion on health care for pregnant women and children in a timely manner," Mao was quoted by the state-run Xinhua news agency.

 

The concession to have second child evoked poor response with fewer couples opting to exercise the option due to spiralling cost of rising children, media reports said.

 

Although 11 million couples have been granted a permit to have a second child since the country relaxed its family planning policy at the end of 2013 only seven lakhs of them have filed birth applications, according to the latest NHFPC statistics.

 

"This number really falls short of our expectations," official said.

 

According to 2013 official report, China had about 185  million people above the age of 60 and the figure is expected to surge to 221 million this year.

 

This will include 51 million 'empty nesters,'or elderly people whose children no longer live with them, which makes it incumbent on the part government to improve their social security management involving large amount of funds.

 

The old policy restricted most of the urban couples to have one child and most rural couples to two children, if the first child born was a girl. 

Oil attack: IAS Assn expresses displeasure in withdrawing case

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THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The IAS Association Monday expressed dissatisfaction in withdrawing the case of an oil attack by KSU activists towards Keshevendra Kumar IAS while serving as the higher secondary director in protest against the hike in plus two fees.

The association decided to meet the chief minister and express their protest against the decision of the home department to withdraw the case without consulting them. Kumar also said that he was not informed about the decision. KSU state president V S Joy said that he had not asked the home department to withdraw the case.

The Judicial First Class Magistrate Court (lll) will pronounce the verdict on prosecution deputy director’s withdrawal plea on February 5. The incident happened in February 2012.

Sippy Noorudeen, KSU district general secretary, activists Ajinaz, Anzar, Shameem, Sreelal, Vignesh, Shanawaz and Saddique were arrested in the case. Following the incident, Noorudeen was expelled from KSU. The activists were granted bail after paying an amount of Rs 5.5 lakhs. Sheen Tharayil, the then Thampanoor circle inspector had filed the charge sheet on March 13 in 2013.

Divers retrieve AirAsia jet's black box recorders from sea

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Jakarta/Singapore: Searchers today retrieved the black box recorders of ill-fated AirAsia plane that crashed into the Java Sea two weeks ago with 162 people on board, Indonesian officials said.

'I received information from the National Transport Safety Committee chief that at 07:11 am (local time), we have
managed to get part of black box or the flight data recorder (FDR),' Bambang Soelistyo, the chief of Indonesia's search and
rescue agency Basarnas, told reporters.

'What we have found and carried is the FDR' and we confirmed this as the object has a tag number and serial –
PN-2100-4043-02 and serial number SN-000556583, he said.

'Now we are trying to locate cockpit voice recorder,' he added.

The black box recorders are important because they should contain the pilots' final words and possibly various flight
data.

Indonesia AirAsia Flight QZ8501 lost contact with ground control on December 28, less than half way into a two-hour
flight from Indonesia to Singapore and crashed possibly due to bad weather.

In his last communication, the pilot of the Airbus A320-200 said he wanted to change course to avoid a storm.
Then all contact was lost.

Only 48 bodies, including at least two strapped to their seats, have been found in the choppy waters.

Indonesia's Transport Minister Ignasius Jonan assured the search to find the still untraced bodies would be funded by
the State budget and the efforts would continue no matter how long it would take. PTI

'Boyhood' wins Golden Globe for best picture, drama

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BEVERLY HILLS: “Boyhood” has won the Golden Globe for best picture, drama. The movie, directed by Richard Linklater, was filmed over 12 years, a much-acclaimed feat that provides a unique perspective on the evolution of a family. The film stars Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette.

"The Grand Budapest Hotel” has won the Golden Globe for best picture, musical or comedy. Directed by Wes Anderson, the film is a visually sumptuous concoction starring Ralph Fiennes displaying admirable comic chops as the pompous concierge of an Eastern European resort between the two world wars.

The other nominees were- “Birdman,” “Into the Woods,” “Pride,” and “St. Vincent.”

Julianne Moore gets Best Actress Drama for 'Still Alice'.

Eddie Redmayne wins award for best actor, movie drama, for "The Theory of Everything".

Michael Keaton has won the Golden Globe for best actor in a musical or comedy for “Birdman.” Keaton, in a career-topping performance, plays an aging movie actor trying to exorcise his superhero past and jumpstart his fading career by putting on a serious Broadway play.

The other nominees were- Ralph Fiennes, “The Grand Budapest Hotel“; Bill Murray, “St. Vincent“; Joaquin Phoenix, “Inherent Vice“; and Christoph Waltz, “Big Eyes.”

Amy Adams has won the Golden Globe for best actress in a musical or comedy for “Big Eyes.” Adams plays American painter Margaret Keane, whose unstable and deceptive husband takes credit for her highly popular artwork for years before she eventually proves at a dramatic trial that she was the true artist.

The other nominees Sunday were - Emily Blunt, “Into the Woods”; Helen Mirren, “The Hundred-foot Journey”; Julianne Moore, “Maps to the Stars”; and Quvenzhane Wallis, “Annie.”

List of winners for the Golden Globe Awards:
Motion Pictures

Actress, Musical or Comedy- Amy Adams, “Big Eyes.”

Supporting Actor- J.K. Simmons, “Whiplash.”

Supporting Actress- Patricia Arquette, “Boyhood.”
Foreign Language- “Leviathan.”

Animated Film- “How to Train Your Dragon 2.”

Screenplay- Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Nicolas Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Armando Bo, “Birdman.”

Original Score- Johann Johannsson, “The Theory of Everything.”

Original Song- “Glory” (music by John Legend, Common), “Selma.”

Television

Series, Musical or Comedy- “Transparent.”

Actress, Musical or Comedy- Gina Rodriguez, “Jane the Virgin.”

Actor, Musical or Comedy- Jeffrey Tambor, “Transparent.”

Movie- “Fargo.”

Actress, Miniseries or Movie- Maggie Gyllenhaal, “The Honorable Woman.”

Actor, Miniseries or Movie- Billy Bob Thornton, “Fargo.”

Supporting Actress, Series, Miniseries or Movie- Joanne Froggatt, “Downton Abbey.”

Supporting Actor, Series, Miniseries or Movie- Matt Bomer, “The Normal Heart.”

Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award- George Clooney.

Weeks after Taliban attack, Peshawar school reopens

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PESHAWAR: Pakistani children and staff were returning to a school in Peshawar where Taliban gunmen nearly a month ago killed 150 people almost all of them students. Students in green uniforms and their families were returning to the Army Public School in Peshawar on Monday as children across the country returned from an extended winter break. A ceremony was expected to be held at the school where gunmen slaughtered dozens of children. But classes were not expected to be held until later this week.

Rural broadband project will be commissioned in Kerala Monday

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New Delhi: Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad will on Monday commission India's first hi-speed rural broadband network in Kerala's Idukki district under the Digital India programme, an official statement said here Saturday.

'With the commissioning of Idukki, the district, which is relatively inaccessible and has a large tribal and rural population, will become the first district in the country to have all its gram panchayats connected through NOFN (National Optical Fibre Network),' the statement said.

'It is expected that the establishment of NOFN would open up new avenues for access service providers like mobile operators, cable TV operators etc. to launch next generation services, and spur creation of local employment opportunities encompassing e-commerce, IT outsourcing etc. as well as services such as e-banking, e-health and e-education for inclusive growth,' it added.

Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy will be the guest of honour at the event.

NOFN is the world's largest rural connectivity project. It seeks to link each of India's 2.5 lakh gram panchayats through a broadband optical fibre network. On its completion, NOFN is expected to facilitate broadband connectivity for over 600 million rural citizens.

NOFN, which is being funded by the Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF), Department of Telecom, is envisaged as a non-discriminatory telecom infrastructure that will bridge the gap in rural telecom access.

NOFN will enable 100 Mbps of bandwidth in each gram panchayat.

In the first phase, NOFN will cover 50,000 gram panchayats, with the balance 200,000 panchayats expected to be covered in a phased manner by 2016. The project is being implemented by three central PSUs - BSNL, PGCIL and Railtel in the phase first.

German Paper attacked over Charlie Hebdo Cartoons: Police

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Berlin: A German newspaper in the northern port city of Hamburg that reprinted Prophet Mohammed cartoons from the French satirical paper Charlie Hebdo was the target of an arson attack early Sunday, police said.

No one was hurt.

'Rocks and then a burning object were thrown through the window,' a police spokesman told AFP. 'Two rooms on lower floors were damaged but the fire was put out quickly.'

The regional daily, the Hamburger Morgenpost, had splashed three Charlie Hebdo cartoons on its front page after the massacre at the Paris publication, running the headline 'This much freedom must be possible!'

Police said the attack occurred at about 0120 GMT and that two people had been detained, while state security had opened an investigation.

Whether there was a connection between the Charlie Hebdo cartoons and the attack was the 'key question', the police spokesman said, adding that it was 'too soon' to know for certain.

Police declined to provide further information about the suspects.

Two Islamic jihadists stormed the offices of Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday, killing a total of 12 people including some of France's best-loved satirists.

Both men were killed Friday in a standoff with police.

Bild am Sonntag newspaper reported earlier Sunday that the bloodshed in France could signal the start of a wave of attacks in Europe, citing communications by Islamic State leaders intercepted by US intelligence.

Shortly after the bloodbath in Paris, the US National Security Agency had intercepted communications in which leaders of the jihadist group announced the next wave of attacks, the tabloid said, citing unnamed sources in the US intelligence services.AFP

40 world leaders join huge crowds for unity march in Paris

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Paris: Forty world leaders, including the Palestinian president and the Israeli prime minister, marched arm in arm in the vanguard of as many as 1 million people in Paris on Sunday in a somber display of solidarity and defiance after a shattering series of terrorist attacks. (See Pics: More Than a Million People Take Part in the Unity Rally in Paris)

The march began shortly after 3 pm at the Place de la Republique, clogging the broad streets with a mass of humanity who turned out to share their grief and anger at last week's attacks, which killed 17 people, including three police officers. Families of the victims walked grim-faced, some wearing Charlie Hebdo headbands to commemorate the journalists murdered Wednesday at a satirical newspaper that repeatedly lampooned the Prophet Muhammad and drew the rage of Islamic extremists.

The French government mobilized hundreds of military forces, police and anti-terrorism squads to provide security at the rally. Snipers looked down from rooftops, plainclothes officers mixed in with the crowd and security officers were seen checking sewers for explosives. Numerous subway stops and streets were closed because of the immense throng. (See Pics: World Leaders Take Part in March for Paris Attack Victims)

At the Place de la Republique, demonstrators waved French flags and several climbed the imposing Statue of the Republic, a symbol of the French Revolution, and wielded an inflated pencil, symbolizing solidarity with the fallen cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo.

People displayed flags from across Europe and many held signs saying, 'I am Charlie.' Others held up caricatures from the magazine.

The attacks have spread alarm among the Jewish community in France, which was already reeling from a spate of anti-Semitic attacks in the country, including on synagogues and Jewish shops at the time of an Israeli incursion in Gaza last year. On Sunday, President Francois Hollande, who has called the attack at a kosher supermarket Friday that left four Jewish shoppers dead a horrific act of anti-Semitism, said he would meet with Jewish leaders at a rally after the main march. (France's Jews Consider Migration to Israel Over Rising Anti-Semitic Attacks)

In a meeting Sunday with Roger Cukierman, president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France, Hollande said that the government would protect Jewish schools and synagogues with army troops if necessary, and that it was committed to the security of the country's 500,000 Jews. (Bodies of French Jews killed in Paris Grocery Store to Be Buried in Israel: Benjamin Netanyahu)

Hollande was expected to go to the Great Synagogue of Paris, also known as the Synagogue de la Victoire, after the unity march to convey his support for the Jewish community.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls declared on Saturday that France was at 'war' with radical Islam after the harrowing attacks. Three gunmen who said they were acting on behalf of al-Qaida and other radical Islamist groups were killed by the police Friday in two separate raids. One gunman had taken hostages at a Jewish supermarket in Paris, and the two others had holed themselves up in a print shop in Dammartin-en-Goele, northeast of the French capital.

'Indignation. Resistance. Solidarity. I am Charlie' read an invitation to the event that was circulating on social media. The organizers said the rally was to show support for freedom of the press and freedom of speech, and to reinforce the message that France and the French would not be cowed by terrorists.

Officials from across Europe and elsewhere, including Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu of Turkey, were in Paris to attend the rally.

In a rare display of unity, the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel also participated.

Security officials in France and across Europe remained on high alert for copycat attacks, even as a French prosecutor said that five people detained in the wake of the terrorist attacks had been released.

Early Sunday, a German newspaper that had reprinted cartoons from the French weekly Charlie Hebdo lampooning the Prophet Muhammad was the target of an apparent arson attack, the newspaper reported on its website. It said there were no injuries. (Firebombing at German Paper That Ran Charlie Hebdo Cartoons)

The daily, the Hamburger Morgenpost, had published three cartoons that had been previously published by Charlie Hebdo, whose offices were attacked Wednesday in Paris.

'This much freedom must be possible!' the headline read.

The Associated Press, citing police sources, said that the police in Germany had detained two men in connection with the Hamburger Morgenpost attack.

Several other national and local German newspapers published the cartoons and were placed under police protection, the news agency reported.

On Sunday, the French Interior Ministry held what it described as a security summit meeting, bringing together top intelligence and law enforcement officials from across Europe and North America to discuss ways to combat and contain terrorism. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. was among those attending. ('Urgent Need' to Share European Air Passenger Information, Say Ministers)

After the meeting, Bernard Cazeneuve, the French interior minister, said that the current European legislation aimed at fighting terrorism 'wasn't enough,' and called for a better European system for tracking potential jihadists and terrorists. (Spain Wants to Change Schengen Rules to Thwart Islamist Returnees)

He also said the European ministers had agreed on a need for better cooperation with Internet companies to monitor, detect and remove any 'illicit' material that could encourage terrorism.

Holder announced that the White House would convene an international forum on Feb. 18 to discuss new means of countering terrorism. The White House, in a statement, said the meeting would address domestic and international measures 'to prevent violent extremists and their supporters from radicalizing, recruiting, or inspiring individuals or groups in the United States and abroad to commit acts of violence.'

The challenges raised by the attacks - including the threats of foreign fighters and the challenges of violent extremism - figured prominently at the meeting. On Saturday, French Cabinet ministers held an emergency meeting in Paris to discuss measures to prevent other attacks.

The mass rally has created a major security headache for the French authorities, two days after security forces killed Amedy Coulibaly, a heavily armed gunman who is suspected of shooting and killing four hostages at a kosher supermarket near Porte de Vincennes in eastern Paris, and two brothers, Said and Cherif Kouachi, who are suspected of killing 12 people on Wednesday at the offices of Charlie Hebdo.

On Sunday, counterterrorism officials in France said they were continuing to investigate links between Coulibaly and the Kouachi brothers, the source of their funding and weapons, and whether the suspects were part of a dormant sleeper cell that had been activated.

The investigation is a challenge for French law enforcement officials, who are already grappling with the more than 1,000 French citizens who last year went or planned to join jihadists in Syria and Iraq. The events of the past week appear to confirm fears that some could return to wage attacks on French soil.

The attacks fanned anxieties across France and Europe and raised questions about why the authorities had failed to thwart an attack by suspects who were known to the French security services.

While the rally Sunday was intended to help unite the country, it has fanned some divisions. Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Front, who was not invited, urged her followers to stay away, saying that the demonstration had been usurped for political ends 'by parties which represent what the French hate: partisan spirit, electioneering and indecent polemic.'

On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of people marched in Paris, Toulouse, Nice and other cities in a show of solidarity, and rallies were held in places as far away as Athens, Madrid, Madagascar, Tel Aviv and Bangui, Central African Republic.

In Germany on Saturday, an estimated 35,000 people demonstrated in Dresden in support of tolerance and an open society, nearly double the number that attended the protests of a local group, Pegida, against what it called the 'Islamization' of German society. Demonstrators on Saturday held a moment of silence for the victims of last week's attacks in Paris, and many carried signs in support of the slain satirists from Charlie Hebdo.

In her weekly podcast, Merkel called for renewed efforts at unity among the European Union's 28 members.

'We are only strong and convincing when we stand together,' she said. Leaders of Germany's Jewish and Muslim communities, backed by leading political parties, have called for Germans to attend rallies in support of tolerance on Monday in more than 20 cities across the country.

Thousands of Jews left France last year for Israel amid concerns about security, and in recent days Israeli officials have said that the recent attacks could prompt a new wave of French Jews arriving in the country. On Saturday, Netanyahu said that Israel was the home of French Jews, and on Sunday morning, as he was leaving Israel for the march in Paris, he repeated his invitation to French Jews to move to Israel.

'I am going to Paris in order to participate in the rally, along with world leaders, for a renewed struggle against the Islamic terrorism that is threatening all of humanity, which I have been calling for years,' the Israeli leader said.

Netanyahu said that he would attend a second rally, of Paris's Jewish community, in the evening.

'I will say there that any Jew who wants to immigrate to Israel will be received here with open arms,' he said.

Netanyahu's office announced on Twitter that the prime minister would bring the bodies of the Jewish victims of the kosher supermarket siege to Jerusalem for burial. The funerals are tentatively planned for Tuesday.

The French National Assembly is to hold a debate and vote Tuesday on whether France should continue participating in US-led airstrikes in Iraq against the Islamic State.

France joined the campaign in September, and Islamic State militants have asked their supporters to attack Europeans in retaliation for the strikes. In September, a group aligned with the Islamic State beheaded Herve Gourdel, a 55-year-old mountaineering guide from the French city of Nice, who had been kidnapped by fighters in Algeria.

New York Times

NASA finds most accurate position of Saturn, its moons

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Washington: NASA researchers have pinpointed the exact position of Saturn and its family of moons to within about four km - a feat that will improve astronomers' knowledge of Saturn's orbit and benefits spacecraft navigation and basic physics research.

They paired NASA's Cassini spacecraft with the National Science Foundation's Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) radio-telescope system to achieve this.

The measurement is some 50 times more precise than those provided by ground-based optical telescopes, the US space agency said in a statement.

"This work is a great step towards tying together our understanding of the orbits of the outer planets of our solar system and those of the inner planets," said Dayton Jones of Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

The team used the VLBA -- a giant array of radio-telescope antennas spread from Hawaii to the Virgin Islands -- to pinpoint the position of Cassini as it orbited Saturn over the past decade by receiving the signal from the spacecraft's radio transmitter.

They combined this data with information about Cassini's orbit from NASA's Deep Space Network.

The combined observations allowed the scientists to make the most accurate determinations yet of the position of the centre of mass of Saturn and its numerous moons.

The improved positional information will help enhance precise navigation of interplanetary spacecraft and help refine measurements of the masses of solar system objects.

It will also improve predictions of when Saturn or its rings will pass in front of background stars - events that provide a variety of research opportunities for astronomers.

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Govt unblocks 32 websites as they promise to cooperate

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New Delhi: Government has ordered unblocking of all the 32 websites that were being used by terrorists after these sites promised to cooperate with the authorities and removed 'jehadi' content.

"Order was issued on Thursday to unblock all 32 websites that were blocked following complaint of Maharashtra Anti Terrorism Squad that ISIS is disseminating content through them. All websites has responded that they will work with government and removed jehadi content," a source told PTI.   

Indian Computer Emergency Response Team Director General Gulshan Rai confirmed the development.

The websites were blocked in November following an order from Mumbai Court, which was approached by Maharashtra Anti Terrorism Squad (ATS) with a plea to block some websites carrying anti-India content.

During its probe into certain terror cases, the ATS had received information that some websites were carrying anti- national content, said an official.

The websites included dailymotion.com, weebly.com, github.com, pastebin.com, archive.org, heypasteit.com, ipaste.eu, thesnippetapp.com, vimeo.com among others

They purportedly containing material about Areeb Majid, an alleged ISIS member who was arrested by NIA, and three others hailing from North Karnataka's Bhatkal area.

Sources said some of the websites were being used to induce Indian youth to join ISIS and for spreading news about purported death of certain persons while fighting Allied Forces in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq.

Ban was lifted on some of the websites in December and rest of have been ordered to be unblock now, the source said.

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