Algeria Begins ‘Final Assault’ on Gas Field; 7 Hostages Reported Killed

Louafi Larbi/Reuters

Algerian police officers escorted a freed Norwegian hostage as he left the In Amenas police station on Saturday.

BAMAKO, Mali — The hostage crisis in the Algerian desert reached a bloody conclusion Saturday as the army carried out a final assault on the gas field taken over by Islamist militants, killing 11 of them, but only after several hostages also died, Algerian officials said.

French, British and American officials said the Algerian government had told them the military operation was over, but a senior Algerian government official said security forces were “doing cleanup” to make sure no kidnappers were hiding in the sprawling industrial complex.

Western officials deplored the loss of life during the four-day siege, which Philip Hammond, the British defense secretary, called “appalling and unacceptable.” Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, who appeared with Mr. Hammond at a news conference in London, said he did not yet have reliable information about the fate of Americans at the facility, although the Algerian official said two had been found “safe and sound.”

Late Saturday, Britain’s foreign secretary, William Hague, emerged from a meeting of the British government’ crisis committee and told reporters that five Britons and one British resident had died in the final battle for the plant. He declined to provide details, saying the government had not yet received a full picture of what happened and that police forces were still fanning out across Britain visiting each of the victims’ families and giving them “the support they need at this very difficult time.”

The provisional death toll for the four days released by Algeria on Saturday, even by the government’s reckoning, was heavy. Out of dozens taken hostage on a site that employed hundreds of workers, 23 were dead while 32 kidnappers were killed, according to the government news service. That represents close to the initial estimate of hostage takers.

The government said it had recovered machine guns, rocket launchers, suicide belts and small arms.

The Algerian news agency report did not give the nationalities of the hostages it said died Saturday, and it remained unclear whether there were other hostages at the remote plant and whether they were alive. Earlier news reports said at least 10 and as many as dozens of hostages from several nations were in the hands of the kidnappers as of Friday.

United States officials had said that “seven or eight” Americans had been at the In Amenas field when it was seized by the militants on Wednesday.

One American, Frederick Buttaccio, 58, of Katy, Tex., was confirmed dead on Friday, and the French government said one of its citizens, identified as Yann Desjeux, had also died before Saturday’s raid. Britain earlier said at least one of its citizens had been killed, and an Algerian state news agency said Algerians had also been killed as of Friday.

The Algerian official, who would speak only on the condition of anonymity, said a precise tally would take time.

“There are corpses that are totally charred,” he said. “We’ve got to do identification work. It’s very difficult.” Algerian officials have said some of the kidnappers blew themselves up. The Algerian news agency said the militants had set fire to part of the complex Friday night, which prompted the troops to launch the military assault Saturday.

The raid, if it swept up all the attackers, would bring to an end a siege involving dozens of hostages and kidnappers that drew criticism from Western governments for the tough manner in which it was handled by the Algerian security services. Attacks on the kidnappers by the government forces caused an unknown number of deaths among the hostages, in addition to those who were executed by the militants, who may be linked to Al Qaeda.

A militant who claimed responsibility for the attack, and who was blamed by the Algerians for leading it, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, was until recently a leading commander of Al Qaeda’s North and West African branch, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

Steven Erlanger and Scott Sayare contributed reporting from Paris, and Elisabeth Bumiller and John F. Burns from London.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 19, 2013

Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article misstated the nationality of a government official who said security forces were searching the gas complex. The official is Algerian, not Turkish.

Read More..

Jeffrey Sprecher’s Improbable Path to Buying the N.Y.S.E.

WHEN nearly all else had failed, Jeffrey C. Sprecher flew to New York City and crashed at his sisters’ apartment, a cramped walk-up on the Upper West Side, one flight above a noisy bar.

It was January 2000, and Mr. Sprecher had been cold-calling Wall Street for weeks. He was searching desperately for someone to back his small company in Atlanta, a business that was eating up his money and years of his life.

That’s when a black limousine pulled up in front of the bar, Jake’s Dilemma. The limo had been sent by the mighty Goldman Sachs to fetch Mr. Sprecher, and as he sank into the back seat that winter day, he set off on an improbable journey that has since taken him to the pinnacle of American finance.

Today Mr. Sprecher, a man virtually unknown outside of financial circles, is poised to buy the New York Stock Exchange. Not one of the 2,300 or so stocks traded on the New York Stock Exchange (combined value of those shares: about $20.1 trillion). No, Jeff Sprecher is buying the entire New York Stock Exchange.

It sounds preposterous. A businessman from Atlanta blows into New York and walks off with the colonnaded high temple of American capitalism. But if all goes according to plan, his $8.2 billion acquisition, announced a few days before Christmas, will close later this year. And with that, 221 years of Wall Street history will come to an end. No more will New York be the master of the New York Stock Exchange. Instead, from its bland headquarters 750 miles from Wall Street, Mr. Sprecher’s young company, IntercontinentalExchange, will run the largest stock exchange in the nation and the world.

Mr. Sprecher, 57, certainly plays the role of a wily upstart. He may wear power suits and a Patek Philippe watch, but he comes across as unusually casual and self-deprecating for a man in his position. He pokes fun at himself for his shortcomings — “I don’t know how to manage people,” he says — and his love of obscure documentaries.

How the New York Stock Exchange fell into Mr. Sprecher’s hands is, at heart, a story of the disruptive power of innovation. ICE, as IntercontinentalExchange is known, did not even exist 13 years ago. It has no cavernous trading floor, no gilded halls, no sweaty brokers braying for money on the financial markets. What it has is technology.

Like many young companies that are upending the old order in business, ICE has used computer power to do things faster and cheaper, if not always better, than people can. Its rapid ascent reflects a new Wall Street where high-speed computers now dominate trading, sometimes with alarming consequences. New, electronic trading systems have greatly reduced the cost of buying and selling stocks, thus saving mutual funds — and, by extension, ordinary investors — countless millions. But they have also helped usher in a period of hair-raising volatility.

Mr. Sprecher (pronounced SPRECK-er) has probably done more than anyone else to dismantle the trading floors of old and replace human brokers with machines. Along the way, he and ICE have traced an arc through some of the defining business stories of our time — from the rise and fall of Enron, to the transformation of old-school investment banks into vast trading operations, to the Wall Street excesses that not long ago helped derail the entire economy. Now, after a series of bold acquisitions, he is about to become the big boss of the Big Board.

Does it really matter who owns the New York Stock Exchange and its parent company, NYSE Euronext? For most people, stock exchanges are probably a bit like plumbing. Most of us don’t think much about them — until something goes wrong. But lately, some things have gone spectacularly wrong.

One sign of trouble came in 2010, when an errant trade ricocheted through computer networks and touched off one of the most harrowing moments in stock market history. The Dow Jones industrial average plunged 900 points in a matter of minutes, and a new phrase entered the lexicon: flash crash.

Since then, flash crashes in individual stocks have been remarkably common, as the centuries-old system of central exchanges has given way to a field of competing electronic systems.

ICE wasn’t involved in any of these problems. In fact, it has been praised as one of the first exchanges to put limits on lightning-quick, high-frequency trading. This points to Mr. Sprecher’s deftness in piloting his company through periods of regulation, deregulation and now re-regulation.

While many banking executives have clashed with Washington, Mr. Sprecher has sensed the changing winds and tacked accordingly. He also stays close — some say too close — to the powerful Wall Street firms that are his customers.

It is perhaps unsurprising that some of the people who make their living on the Big Board’s floor are a bit nervous about the exchange’s new boss. But Mr. Sprecher says they have nothing to fear. His friends and business associates say he could actually turn out to be the best hope for restoring trust in the stock market. After all, he has beaten the odds before.

“There were a number of times when the odds were long, but he wasn’t deterred from stepping in,” says James Newsome, who was Mr. Sprecher’s regulator at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission before becoming his competitor as chief executive of the New York Mercantile Exchange. “A lot of people, if they don’t think they will win, they won’t participate. Jeff doesn’t operate like that.”

For now, Mr. Sprecher is still spending much of his time at ICE’s headquarters in suburban Atlanta. The contrast with the New York Stock Exchange is striking. Behind its neoclassical face, the Big Board is a sprawling labyrinth of historic oil paintings, gilded leather chairs, stained wood and elegant dining rooms — all set amid crowds of gawking tourists.

Read More..

Business Briefing | Medicine: F.D.A. Clears Botox to Help Bladder Control

Botox, the wrinkle treatment made by Allergan, has been approved to treat adults with overactive bladders who cannot tolerate or were not helped by other drugs, the Food and Drug Administration said on Friday. Botox injected into the bladder muscle causes the bladder to relax, increasing its storage capacity. “Clinical studies have demonstrated Botox’s ability to significantly reduce the frequency of urinary incontinence,” Dr. Hylton V. Joffe, director of the F.D.A.’s reproductive and urologic products division, said in a statement. “Today’s approval provides an important additional treatment option for patients with overactive bladder, a condition that affects an estimated 33 million men and women in the United States.”

Read More..

Personal Health: That Loving Feeling Takes a Lot of Work

When people fall in love and decide to marry, the expectation is nearly always that love and marriage and the happiness they bring will last; as the vows say, till death do us part. Only the most cynical among us would think, walking down the aisle, that if things don’t work out, “We can always split.”

But the divorce rate in the United States is half the marriage rate, and that does not bode well for this cherished institution.

While some divorces are clearly justified by physical or emotional abuse, intolerable infidelity, addictive behavior or irreconcilable incompatibility, experts say many severed marriages seem to have just withered and died from a lack of effort to keep the embers of love alive.

---

Jane Brody speaks about love and marriage.

---

I say “embers” because the flame of love — the feelings that prompt people to forget all their troubles and fly down the street with wings on their feet — does not last very long, and cannot if lovers are ever to get anything done. The passion ignited by a new love inevitably cools and must mature into the caring, compassion and companionship that can sustain a long-lasting relationship.

Studies by Richard E. Lucas and colleagues at Michigan State University have shown that the happiness boost that occurs with marriage lasts only about two years, after which people revert to their former levels of happiness — or unhappiness.

Infatuation and passion have even shorter life spans, and must evolve into “companionate love, composed more of deep affection, connection and liking,” according to Sonja Lyubomirsky, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside.

In her new book, “The Myths of Happiness,” Dr. Lyubomirsky describes a slew of research-tested actions and words that can do wonders to keep love alive.

She points out that the natural human tendency to become “habituated” to positive circumstances — to get so used to things that make us feel good that they no longer do — can be the death knell of marital happiness. Psychologists call it “hedonic adaptation”: things that thrill us tend to be short-lived.

So Dr. Lyubomirsky’s first suggestion is to adopt measures to avert, or at least slow down, the habituation that can lead to boredom and marital dissatisfaction. While her methods may seem obvious, many married couples forget to put them into practice.

Building Companionship

Steps to slow, prevent or counteract hedonic adaptation and rescue a so-so marriage should be taken long before the union is in trouble, Dr. Lyubomirsky urges. Her recommended strategies include making time to be together and talk, truly listening to each other, and expressing admiration and affection.

Dr. Lyubomirsky emphasizes “the importance of appreciation”: count your blessings and resist taking a spouse for granted. Routinely remind yourself and your partner of what you appreciate about the person and the marriage.

Also important is variety, which is innately stimulating and rewarding and “critical if we want to stave off adaptation,” the psychologist writes. Mix things up, be spontaneous, change how you do things with your partner to keep your relationship “fresh, meaningful and positive.”

Novelty is a powerful aphrodisiac that can also enhance the pleasures of marital sex. But Dr. Lyubomirsky admits that “science has uncovered precious little about how to sustain passionate love.” She likens its decline to growing up or growing old, “simply part of being human.”

Variety goes hand in hand with another tip: surprise. With time, partners tend to get to know each other all too well, and they can fall into routines that become stultifying. Shake it up. Try new activities, new places, new friends. Learn new skills together.

Although I’ve been a “water bug” my whole life, my husband could swim only as far as he could hold his breath. We were able to enjoy the water together when we both learned to kayak.

“A pat on the back, a squeeze of the hand, a hug, an arm around the shoulder — the science of touch suggests that it can save a so-so marriage,” Dr. Lyubomirsky writes. “Introducing more (nonsexual) touching and affection on a daily basis will go a long way in rekindling the warmth and tenderness.”

She suggests “increasing the amount of physical contact in your relationship by a set amount each week” within the comfort level of the spouses’ personalities, backgrounds and openness to nonsexual touch.

Positive Energy

A long-married friend recently told me that her husband said he missed being touched and hugged. And she wondered what the two of them would talk about when they became empty-nesters. Now is the time, dear friend, to work on a more mutually rewarding relationship if you want your marriage to last.

Support your partner’s values, goals and dreams, and greet his or her good news with interest and delight. My husband’s passion lay in writing for the musical theater. When his day job moved to a different city, I suggested that rather than looking for a new one, he pursue his dream. It never became monetarily rewarding, but his vocation fulfilled him and thrilled me. He left a legacy of marvelous lyrics for more than a dozen shows.

Even a marriage that has been marred by negative, angry or hurtful remarks can often be rescued by filling the home with words and actions that elicit positive emotions, psychology research has shown.

According to studies by Barbara L. Fredrickson, a social psychologist and professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a flourishing relationship needs three times as many positive emotions as negative ones. In her forthcoming book, “Love 2.0,” Dr. Fredrickson says that cultivating positive energy everyday “motivates us to reach out for a hug more often or share and inspiring or silly idea or image.”

Dr. Lyubomirsky reports that happily married couples average five positive verbal and emotional expressions toward one another for every negative expression, but “very unhappy couples display ratios of less than one to one.”

To help get your relationship on a happier track, the psychologist suggests keeping a diary of positive and negative events that occur between you and your partner, and striving to increase the ratio of positive to negative.

She suggests asking yourself each morning, “What can I do for five minutes today to make my partner’s life better?” The simplest acts, like sharing an amusing event, smiling, or being playful, can enhance marital happiness.

---

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 18, 2013

The Personal Health column on Tuesday, about making marriages last, misspelled the given name of a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside, who studies happiness. She is Sonja Lyubomirsky, not Sonya.

Read More..

The Boss: New Leaders Inc. C.E.O. on Giving Children a Chance

I AM the youngest of 10 children in my family, and the only one born in the United States. My father was a municipal judge who fled Haiti during the Duvalier regime. He and my mother settled in the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn, but could not initially afford to bring over my four brothers and five sisters, who stayed in Haiti with relatives.

Jean S. Desravines is the chief executive of New Leaders Inc. in New York.

AGE 41

FAVORITE PASTIMES Karate and taekwondo

MEMORABLE BOOK "How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity and the Hidden Power of Character," by Paul Tough

Since he did not speak English fluently, my father worked as a janitor and had a second job as a hospital security guard. He later took a third job driving a taxi at night to pay for my tuition at Nazareth Regional High School, a Roman Catholic school in Brooklyn. My parents were determined that I was going to get a good education, and wanted to keep me away from local troubles, which did claim two of my childhood friends.

Working so many jobs overwhelmed my father. He had a heart attack and died at age 59 behind the wheel of his taxi. My mother found it difficult to cope without my father and moved back to Haiti in 1989 with two of my siblings. I thought I would have to leave school because I had no money for tuition, but Nazareth agreed to pay my way.

I wound up sleeping in my car for almost three months, showering at school after my track team’s practice. I also held down two jobs, both in retailing, and one of my sisters and I rented a basement apartment in East Flatbush.

After graduating from high school in 1990, I attended St. Francis College in Brooklyn, on athletic and academic scholarships. I worked first at the New York City Board of Education, where H. Carl McCall was president, then in his office after he became New York State comptroller. I later worked in the office of Ruth Messinger, then the Manhattan borough president.

I broadened my nonprofit organization experience at the Faith Center for Community Development while earning my master’s of public administration at New York University. I married my high school sweetheart, Melissa, and we now have two children.

In 2001, I began to work toward my original goal — improving educational opportunities for children — and joined the city’s Department of Education. I was later recruited under the new administration of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to help start a program as part of his Children First reforms.

In 2003, I became the Department of Education’s executive director for parent and community engagement, and, two years later, senior counselor to Joel I. Klein, then the school chancellor. He taught me a great deal about leadership and how to change the education system. But I began to realize public education could not be transformed without great principals who function like C.E.O.’s of their schools.

So in 2006 I returned to the nonprofit world, to New Leaders, a national organization founded in 2000 to recruit and develop leaders to turn around low-performing public schools. Initially, I managed city partnerships and expanded our program in areas like New Orleans and Charlotte, N.C.

In 2011, I became C.E.O., and revamped our program to produce even stronger student achievement results, streamlined our costs, diversified funding sources and forged new partnerships. We have an annual budget of $31.5 million, which comes from foundations, businesses, individuals and government grants, and a staff of about 200 people at a dozen locations.

We have a new partnership with Pearson Education to provide greater learning opportunities to public school principals. The goal of these efforts is to have a great principal in each of our nation’s public schools — to make sure that, just as I did, all kids get a chance at success.

As told to Elizabeth Olson.

Read More..

British Leader Sees Wider Threat in Algeria Attack

Oli Scarff/Getty Images

Prime Minister David Cameron en route to Parliament to deliver a statement on the Algeria hostage crisis.

LONDON — With more than 60 hostages still missing and many feared dead, Prime Minister David Cameron told Parliament on Friday that the Qaeda-linked attack on a remote Algerian gas installation demonstrated the need for Britain and its Western allies, including the United States, to direct more of their diplomatic, military and intelligence resources to the intensifying threat emanating from “the ungoverned space” of the North African desert, treating it with as much concern as the terrorist challenge in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Mr. Cameron offered little new information about the showdown at the In Amenas plant, nearly 1,000 miles from Algiers, the Algerian capital, in the oil-and-gas-rich emptiness of the Sahara, saying the information reaching London about what he described as a “continuing situation” remained sketchy. He added that Britain learned overnight that the number of British citizens caught up in the hostage-taking and the subsequent shootout was “significantly” fewer than the 30 people feared on Thursday. As part of the effort to learn more, he said, a special plane had been assigned to carry Britain’s ambassador in Algiers and other British diplomats to the area of the gas plant on Friday.

But in an hourlong session in the House of Commons, Mr. Cameron pointed to the somber implications of underestimating recent events in Mali and Algeria as a regional problem for North Africa rather than as an increasingly fertile arena for Islamic militants and their hostility to the West. He said he had discussed his concerns in a telephone conversation with President Obama on Thursday.

The British leader said the growth of Islamic terrorist networks in the countries of the Sahel, the broad area of North Africa that runs more than 3,000 miles from Mauritania in the west to Sudan and Somalia in the east, should be a renewed focus of Western counterterrorist concerns and resources. At one point, he said military assistance to the affected countries needed to be part of NATO military planning, though he again emphatically ruled out any British combat role in support of France’s campaign against militants in Mali.

Pointing to the leading role played in the Algerian attack by Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a terrorist ringleader and smuggler with links to North Africa’s main Islamic terrorist group, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Mr. Cameron warned that the Algerian attack was symptomatic of a far broader threat.

“What we know is that the terrorist threat in the Sahel comes from Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which aspires to establish Islamic law across the Sahel and northern Africa, and to attack Western interests in the region and, frankly, wherever it can,” Mr. Cameron said. “Just as we have reduced the scale of the Al Qaeda threat in other parts of the world, including in Pakistan and Afghanistan, so it has grown in other parts of the world. We need to be equally concerned about that, and equally focused on it.”

To some British commentators, Mr. Cameron’s remarks sounded like an effort to prompt the United States to become more deeply involved in North African security matters. In the 2011 Libyan conflict, the United States stepped back from the lead role it has traditionally taken in NATO military operations and left Britain, France and Italy to conduct the bulk of the bombing in support of the Libyan rebels’ successful campaign to topple Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

Since then, high-ranking British officials have expressed concerns that the Obama administration is stepping back from European political and security issues and turning its attentions increasingly to the nations of the Pacific.

With the approach of Mr. Obama’s second inauguration on Sunday, The Spectator, a London-based weekly that is influential in Mr. Cameron’s Conservative Party, devoted its cover this week to an article headlined “The Pacific President,” and an illustration showing Mr. Obama in a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt and shorts surfing off a palm-lined beach. “As Barack Obama is sworn in again as president, his allies in the West will ask themselves the same nervous question they posed four years ago: how much does he care about us?” the accompanying article asked.

White House officials said on Thursday that Mr. Obama had used his telephone conversation with Mr. Cameron to underscore American concerns that Britain remain a robust force within the 27-nation European Union, a hot-button issue for Mr. Cameron. The prime minister had planned — then canceled, amid the Algerian crisis — a landmark speech in Amsterdam on Friday in which he was to have outlined his plan to negotiate a much sparer role for Britain in the European bloc.

In his remarks to lawmakers on Friday, Mr. Cameron offered what could have been construed as an oblique riposte to Mr. Obama, or at least to officials in the Obama administration who have urged that Europe take greater responsibility for confronting terrorist and other security threats at its own doorstep.  He may also have been addressing domestic critics in Britain, or other NATO countries that have been less active than Britain in counterterrorism efforts aimed at confronting the spread of Islamic militant groups.

“There is a great need for not just Britain but other countries to give a priority to understanding better, and working better, with the countries in this region,” he said. “Those who believe that there is a terrorist, extremist Al Qaeda problem in parts of north Africa, but that it is a problem for those places and we can somehow back off and ignore it, are profoundly wrong. That is a problem for those places, and for us.”

Mr. Cameron noted that Britain had been “the first country in the world” to offer France military assistance in its campaign in Mali, deploying one of the largest military transport aircraft it has, an American-made C-17 Globemaster, to ferry French troops and military equipment to Bamako, the Malian capital. He said it was time for Britain and France to move beyond their spheres of influence in Africa dating back to the colonial era, “and recognize that is in our interest to boost the capacity of all African states” confronted by the terrorist threat.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 18, 2013

An earlier version of this article misstated the year that Libyan rebels overthrew Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. It was 2011, not last year.

Read More..

Ministers Express Doubts on Expanding Data Protection Laws

BERLIN — E.U. justice ministers reacted coolly on Friday to a plan that would give consumers the ability to expunge the personal details Internet businesses have collected on them, essentially allowing individuals to block most kinds of online ads.

During an informal meeting in Dublin, the ministers expressed reservations about elements of the proposal, which would impose new limits on data collection and profiling and give national regulators the ability to levy hefty fines equal to 2 percent of sales on companies that failed to comply.

Alan Shatter, the Irish justice minister who chaired the closed-door meeting, said the ministers were concerned that the measures would stymie the Internet’s development by hampering the targeted advertising that makes possible most free services.

“An overall conclusion is that there is widespread acceptance of the need for a uniform approach to regulation,” Mr. Shatter said at a news conference. “There is also a widespread understanding of the need to ensure that business can properly work under any new structure while ensuring the existence of certain protections.”

Ireland holds the European Union’s rotating presidency through June, and Mr. Shatter is seeking an agreement among justice ministers on the proposal. The ministers must approve the plan before a proposal is put to the European Parliament.

Europe last updated its primary data protection laws in 1995, when the Internet was in its infancy and the concept of mining consumer data did not yet exist. The legislative effort to produce an updated law is expected to continue into 2014.

Mr. Shatter described the discussions with ministers as “very interesting and considered” but noted that the conclusion of the group, at least initially, was that updated E.U. data protection laws must be “balanced and proportionate” and not stifle businesses.

The comments by the ministers, their first public statements on the proposal, suggest that privacy advocates have a long road ahead. Viviane Reding, the European justice commissioner who initially proposed the changes last year, said much work still needed to be done.

Appearing with Mr. Shatter, Ms. Reding referred to the “difficult work on the table” before officials could put forth a plan. She said enhanced consumer protections would encourage more online commerce, which in turn would bolster the European economy. She referred to a European Commission study showing that Web businesses could save an estimated €2.3 billion, or $3.1 billion, in legal and other fees if E.U. data protection laws were harmonized.

“There needs to be the trust between citizens and the data controllers,” Ms. Reding said, adding that the more trust there was, the better it would be for business. “So this is a growth-enhancing project.”

Web businesses and advertisers see it differently. They consider the effort to tighten controls a threat to the advertising model that finances much of the Internet. Individual E.U. members are also divided on the issue.

According to a confidential memo prepared on Dec. 12 by E.U. administrators from Cyprus, which at the time held the Union’s rotating presidency and presided over meetings on the issue last year, several European countries have reservations about expanding consumer protections on the Internet.

Four countries — Austria, Estonia, France and Ireland — supported the new right to be forgotten, according to a summary of the meeting seen by the International Herald Tribune, but many countries expressed doubts, like Britain, Germany, Spain, Denmark and Luxembourg.

Representatives of Britain, Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands said a new online “right to be forgotten” could be used to limit freedom of expression, chilling the flow of information on the Web.

According to the memo, representatives of Britain, which has one of the largest advertising industries in Europe, repeatedly objected to many elements, citing concern for how the measure would affect the Internet’s development.

Read More..

Well: A Great Grain Adventure

This week, the Recipes for Health columnist Martha Rose Shulman asks readers to go beyond wild rice and get adventurous with their grains. She offers new recipes with some unusual grains you may not have ever cooked or eaten. Her recipes this week include:

Millet: Millet can be used in bird seed and animal feed, but the grain is enjoying a renaissance in the United States right now as a great source of gluten-free nutrition. It can be used in savory or sweet foods and, depending on how it’s cooked, can be crunchy or creamy. To avoid mushy millet, Ms. Shulman advises cooking no more than 2/3 cup at a time. Toast the seeds in a little oil first and take care not to stir the millet once you have added the water so you will get a fluffy result.

Triticale: This hearty, toothsome grain is a hybrid made from wheat and rye. It is a good source of phosphorus and a very good source of magnesium. It has a chewy texture and earthy flavor, similar to wheatberries.

Farro: Farro has a nutty flavor and a chewy texture, and holds up well in cooking because it doesn’t get mushy. When using farro in a salad, cook it until you see that the grains have begun to splay so they won’t be too chewy and can absorb the dressing properly.

Buckwheat: Buckwheat isn’t related to wheat and is actually a great gluten-free alternative. Ms. Shulman uses buckwheat soba noodles to add a nutty flavor and wholesomeness to her Skillet Soba Salad.

Here are five new ways to cook with grains.

Skillet Brown Rice, Barley or Triticale Salad With Mushrooms and Endive: Triticale is a hybrid grain made from wheat and rye, but any hearty grain would work in this salad.

---

Skillet Beet and Farro Salad: This hearty winter salad can be a meal or a side dish, and warming it in the skillet makes it particularly comforting.

---

Warm Millet, Carrot and Kale Salad With Curry-Scented Dressing: Millet can be tricky to cook, but if you are careful, you will be rewarded with a fluffy and delicious salad.

---

Skillet Wild Rice, Walnut and Broccoli Salad: Broccoli flowers catch the nutty, lemony dressing in this winter salad.

---

Skillet Soba, Baked Tofu and Green Bean Salad With Spicy Dressing: The nutty flavor of buckwheat soba noodles makes for a delicious salad.

---

Read More..

Well: A Great Grain Adventure

This week, the Recipes for Health columnist Martha Rose Shulman asks readers to go beyond wild rice and get adventurous with their grains. She offers new recipes with some unusual grains you may not have ever cooked or eaten. Her recipes this week include:

Millet: Millet can be used in bird seed and animal feed, but the grain is enjoying a renaissance in the United States right now as a great source of gluten-free nutrition. It can be used in savory or sweet foods and, depending on how it’s cooked, can be crunchy or creamy. To avoid mushy millet, Ms. Shulman advises cooking no more than 2/3 cup at a time. Toast the seeds in a little oil first and take care not to stir the millet once you have added the water so you will get a fluffy result.

Triticale: This hearty, toothsome grain is a hybrid made from wheat and rye. It is a good source of phosphorus and a very good source of magnesium. It has a chewy texture and earthy flavor, similar to wheatberries.

Farro: Farro has a nutty flavor and a chewy texture, and holds up well in cooking because it doesn’t get mushy. When using farro in a salad, cook it until you see that the grains have begun to splay so they won’t be too chewy and can absorb the dressing properly.

Buckwheat: Buckwheat isn’t related to wheat and is actually a great gluten-free alternative. Ms. Shulman uses buckwheat soba noodles to add a nutty flavor and wholesomeness to her Skillet Soba Salad.

Here are five new ways to cook with grains.

Skillet Brown Rice, Barley or Triticale Salad With Mushrooms and Endive: Triticale is a hybrid grain made from wheat and rye, but any hearty grain would work in this salad.

---

Skillet Beet and Farro Salad: This hearty winter salad can be a meal or a side dish, and warming it in the skillet makes it particularly comforting.

---

Warm Millet, Carrot and Kale Salad With Curry-Scented Dressing: Millet can be tricky to cook, but if you are careful, you will be rewarded with a fluffy and delicious salad.

---

Skillet Wild Rice, Walnut and Broccoli Salad: Broccoli flowers catch the nutty, lemony dressing in this winter salad.

---

Skillet Soba, Baked Tofu and Green Bean Salad With Spicy Dressing: The nutty flavor of buckwheat soba noodles makes for a delicious salad.

---

Read More..

The Lede: Inside the Fed's 2007 Deliberations

On Friday the Federal Reserve released the transcripts of its discussions in 2007, the year the housing market, the financial markets, and the broader economy began to unravel. Focusing on the crucial period from August to December, reporters from The Times shared their findings on what the transcripts reveal in the blog entries and tweets below.

---

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 18, 2013

An earlier version of the 12:51 p.m. entry in this post misidentified the speaker at a December 2007 meeting who said, "I’m actually very, very worried," describing his concerns about derivative products. It was Frederic Mishkin, not Eric S. Rosengren.

Read More..

The Lede Blog: An Irish Hostage Is 'Safe and Free' in Algeria, but Britons Are Told to Brace for Bad News

An Arabic-language video report from Al Jazeera showing the gas facility in Algeria where dozens of workers were taken hostage by Islamist militants.

Following a military raid on a gas facility in Algeria, where a heavily armed group of Islamist militants took dozens of workers hostage, the Irish government confirmed on Thursday that a man from Belfast who had been part of the group taken captive was freed. The fate of other hostages remained unclear.

Algeria’s communications minister, Mohand Saïd Oublaïd, said that many of the hostages had been freed, but some were killed in the rescue effort, along with “a large number of terrorists.” A news agency in neighboring Mauritania reported that a spokesman for the Islamists claimed that a number of hostages were killed in the Algerian government raid.

Ireland’s foreign minister, Eamon Gilmore, said at a news conference, “while naturally we are delighted that Stephen McFaul is free and safe, our thoughts are with his fellow workers and the other people who have not been so fortunate. Our thoughts are particularly with the citizens of other countries who have still not been accounted for.”

Video of Ireland’s foreign minister, Eamon Gilmore, speaking to reporters about an Irish citizen, Stephen McFaul, who was freed from the custody of kidnappers in Algeria on Thursday.

Mr. McFaul was physically unharmed and being held at a military base, the minister said. He declined to provide further details of Mr. McFaul’s ordeal, out of respect for the families of the other hostages.

Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain confirmed in an interview posted online by Britain’s Channel 4 News that at least one British hostage had been killed and said, “we should be prepared for the possibility of further bad news, very difficult news, in this extremely difficult situation.”

A spokesman for the Norwegian oil firm Statoil, which jointly operates the gas facility with BP, told reporters, “We have received information about two of our employees being physically hurt, not serious, but the situation is unclear and very difficult to follow.”

Agence France-Presse video of a statement by a Norwegian oil company official on the hostage crisis at a facility in Algeria.

In Belfast, Mr. McFaul’s family expressed joy and relief in interviews with Ulster Television and BBC News. “I feel over the moon. I’m just really excited. I just can’t wait for him to get home,” his young son, Dylan, told UTV, as he broke down in tears.

The Irish prime minister, Enda Kenny, said in a statement:

I am greatly relieved to hear that Stephen is safe and well. I believe he has already spoken to his family in Belfast and I wish him a safe return home to his loved ones. I would like to pay tribute to all those who have been involved in the effort to resolve this crisis and my thoughts are with the other oil field workers and their families who have found themselves at the center of this traumatic situation.

In the interview with UTV, Mr. McFaul’s family said he had called his wife after reaching safety. “I was delighted, I could not get better news,” said his mother, Marie. “I feel sorry for the other hostages and their families,” said Mr. McFaul’s father, Christopher.

---

Read More..

Bits Blog: Facebook's Other Big Disruption

Facebook just made a potentially game-changing announcement. It got less fanfare than Tuesday’s announcement that it is going into the social search business, but this other announcement may have bigger long-term implications for the technology industry.

Put simply, some of the world’s biggest computing systems just got a little cheaper, and a lot easier to configure. As a consequence, the companies that supply the hardware to these systems may have to scramble to remain as profitable. The reason is a Facebook-led open source project.

In 2011 Facebook began the Open Compute Project, an effort among technology companies to use open-source computer hardware. Tech companies similarly shared intellectual property with Linux software, which lowered costs and spurred innovation. Facebook’s project has attracted many significant participants, including Goldman Sachs, Arista Networks, Rackspace, Hewlett-Packard and Dell.

At a user summit on Wednesday Intel, another key member of the Open Compute Project, announced it would release to the group a silicon-based optical system that enables the data and computing elements in a rack of computer servers to communicate at 100 gigabits a second. That is significantly faster than conventional wire-based methods, and uses about half the power.

More important, it means that elements of memory and processing that now must be fixed closely together can be separated within a rack, and used as needed for different kinds of tasks. There is a lot of waste in data centers today simply because, when there is an upgrade in servers, lots of other associated data-processing hardware has to be changed, too.

There were other announcements, like a computer motherboard called Grouphug that allows different manufacturers’ chips to be interchanged without altering other parts of the machine. Before, they were custom made. Put together, such innovations potentially lower the cost and complexity of running big and small data centers to an extent that works for a lot of companies.

“Who wouldn’t want a cheaper, more efficient server?” said Frank Frankovsky, vice president of hardware design at Facebook, and the chairman of Open Compute. “The problem we’re solving is much larger than Facebook’s own challenges. There is a massive amount of data in the world that people expect to have processed quickly.”

To be sure, it’s in Facebook’s interest to attack expensive hardware. The company makes money from a service that requires hundreds of thousands of computer servers distributed in big centers around the world. Google and Amazon.com, which are not members of the project, maintain proprietary systems which they apparently felt gave them a competitive edge.

For Facebook, the difference seems to be more in the software. To the extent hardware costs drop, that’s great for them. Mr. Frankovsky argued that, while “this puts challenges on the incumbents” in hardware, “it also helps them. They have a finite number of engineering resources, and this way they hear from a community about whether there is an interest for a product.” Intel may hope to benefit from its open-source release, since it could see an overall rise in demand for its chips with the move toward cheaper computing.

The real test is whether Facebook can increase the number of potential buyers for Open Compute equipment. “The question is, can they extend this beyond a few Web businesses like Facebook and Rackspace, or a few financial exercises at Goldman, and bring this to industries like oil or aerospace?” said Matt Eastwood, an analyst with IDC, a technology research firm. “That will take it from 20 or 30 companies to hundreds of companies.”

The issue isn’t so much a technical one, he argues, as it is one of getting corporate information technology professionals interested in radical design changes. Mr. Frankovsky is aware of the problem. Recently he and his colleagues led a seminar in Texas for BP, Shell and other oil giants on how they could use Open Compute hardware in their data centers.

This will not change things dramatically this year, and possibly even next, but over the long haul it could remake a lot of businesses. Linux, remember, was around for several years as a minor player, but eventually undid Sun Microsystems and others.

Read More..

Life, Interrupted: Brotherly Love

Life, Interrupted

Suleika Jaouad writes about her experiences as a young adult with cancer.

There are a lot of things about having cancer in your 20s that feel absurd. One of those instances was when I found myself calling my brother Adam on Skype while he was studying abroad in Argentina to tell him that I had just been diagnosed with leukemia and that — no pressure — he was my only hope for a cure.

Today, my brother and I share almost identical DNA, the result of a successful bone marrow transplant I had last April using his healthy stem cells. But Adam and I couldn’t be more different. Like a lot of siblings, we got along swimmingly at one moment and were in each other’s hair the next. My younger brother by two years, he said I was a bossy older sister. I, of course, thought I knew best for my little brother and wanted him to see the world how I did. My brother is quieter, more reflective. I’m a chronic social butterfly who is probably a bit too impulsive and self-serious. I dreamed of dancing in the New York City Ballet, and he imagined himself playing in the N.B.A. While the sounds of the rapper Mos Def blared from Adam’s room growing up, I practiced for concerto competitions. Friends joked that one of us had to be adopted. We even look different, some people say. But really, we’re just siblings like any others.

When I was diagnosed with cancer at age 22, I learned just how much cancer affects families when it affects individuals. My doctors informed me that I had a high-risk form of leukemia and that a bone marrow transplant was my only shot at a cure. ‘Did I have any siblings?’ the doctors asked immediately. That would be my best chance to find a bone marrow match. Suddenly, everyone in our family was leaning on the little brother. He was in his last semester of college, and while his friends were applying to jobs and partying the final weeks of the school year away, he was soon shuttling from upstate New York to New York City for appointments with the transplant doctors.

I’d heard of organ transplants before, but what was a bone marrow transplant? The extent of my knowledge about bone marrow came from French cuisine: the fancy dish occasionally served with a side of toasted baguette.

Jokes aside, I learned that cancer patients become quick studies in the human body and how cancer treatment works. The thought of going through a bone marrow transplant, which in my case called for a life-threatening dose of chemotherapy followed by a total replacement of my body’s bone marrow, was scary enough. But then I learned that finding a donor can be the scariest part of all.

It turns out that not all transplants are created equal. Without a match, the path to a cure becomes much less certain, in many cases even impossible. This is particularly true for minorities and people from mixed ethnic backgrounds, groups that are severely underrepresented in bone marrow registries. As a first generation American, the child of a Swiss mother and Tunisian father, I suddenly found myself in a scary place. My doctors worried that a global, harried search for a bone marrow match would delay critical treatment for my fast-moving leukemia.

That meant that my younger brother was my best hope — but my doctors were careful to measure hope with reality. Siblings are the best chance for a match, but a match only happens about 25 percent of the time.

To our relief, results showed that my brother was a perfect match: a 10-out-of-10 on the donor scale. It was only then that it struck me how lucky I had been. Doctors never said it this way, but without a match, my chances of living through the next year were low. I have met many people since who, after dozens of efforts to encourage potential bone marrow donors to sign up, still have not found a match. Adding your name to the bone marrow registry is quick, easy and painless — you can sign up at marrow.org — and it just takes a swab of a Q-tip to get your DNA. For cancer patients around the world, it could mean a cure.

The bone marrow transplant procedure itself can be dangerous, but it is swift, which makes it feel strangely anti-climactic. On “Day Zero,” my brother’s stem cells dripped into my veins from a hanging I.V. bag, and it was all over in minutes. Doctors tell me that the hardest part of the transplant is recovering from it. I’ve found that to be true, and I’ve also recognized that the same is true for Adam. As I slowly grow stronger, my little brother has assumed a caretaker role in my life. I carry his blood cells — the ones keeping me alive — and he is carrying the responsibility, and often fear and anxiety, of the loving onlooker. He tells me I’m still a bossy older sister. But our relationship is now changed forever. I have to look to him for support and guidance more than I ever have. He’ll always be my little brother, but he’s growing up fast.

---

Suleika Jaouad (pronounced su-LAKE-uh ja-WAD) is a 24-year-old writer who lives in New York City. Her column, “Life, Interrupted,” chronicling her experiences as a young adult with cancer, appears regularly on Well. Follow @suleikajaouad on Twitter.

Read More..

Life, Interrupted: Brotherly Love

Life, Interrupted

Suleika Jaouad writes about her experiences as a young adult with cancer.

There are a lot of things about having cancer in your 20s that feel absurd. One of those instances was when I found myself calling my brother Adam on Skype while he was studying abroad in Argentina to tell him that I had just been diagnosed with leukemia and that — no pressure — he was my only hope for a cure.

Today, my brother and I share almost identical DNA, the result of a successful bone marrow transplant I had last April using his healthy stem cells. But Adam and I couldn’t be more different. Like a lot of siblings, we got along swimmingly at one moment and were in each other’s hair the next. My younger brother by two years, he said I was a bossy older sister. I, of course, thought I knew best for my little brother and wanted him to see the world how I did. My brother is quieter, more reflective. I’m a chronic social butterfly who is probably a bit too impulsive and self-serious. I dreamed of dancing in the New York City Ballet, and he imagined himself playing in the N.B.A. While the sounds of the rapper Mos Def blared from Adam’s room growing up, I practiced for concerto competitions. Friends joked that one of us had to be adopted. We even look different, some people say. But really, we’re just siblings like any others.

When I was diagnosed with cancer at age 22, I learned just how much cancer affects families when it affects individuals. My doctors informed me that I had a high-risk form of leukemia and that a bone marrow transplant was my only shot at a cure. ‘Did I have any siblings?’ the doctors asked immediately. That would be my best chance to find a bone marrow match. Suddenly, everyone in our family was leaning on the little brother. He was in his last semester of college, and while his friends were applying to jobs and partying the final weeks of the school year away, he was soon shuttling from upstate New York to New York City for appointments with the transplant doctors.

I’d heard of organ transplants before, but what was a bone marrow transplant? The extent of my knowledge about bone marrow came from French cuisine: the fancy dish occasionally served with a side of toasted baguette.

Jokes aside, I learned that cancer patients become quick studies in the human body and how cancer treatment works. The thought of going through a bone marrow transplant, which in my case called for a life-threatening dose of chemotherapy followed by a total replacement of my body’s bone marrow, was scary enough. But then I learned that finding a donor can be the scariest part of all.

It turns out that not all transplants are created equal. Without a match, the path to a cure becomes much less certain, in many cases even impossible. This is particularly true for minorities and people from mixed ethnic backgrounds, groups that are severely underrepresented in bone marrow registries. As a first generation American, the child of a Swiss mother and Tunisian father, I suddenly found myself in a scary place. My doctors worried that a global, harried search for a bone marrow match would delay critical treatment for my fast-moving leukemia.

That meant that my younger brother was my best hope — but my doctors were careful to measure hope with reality. Siblings are the best chance for a match, but a match only happens about 25 percent of the time.

To our relief, results showed that my brother was a perfect match: a 10-out-of-10 on the donor scale. It was only then that it struck me how lucky I had been. Doctors never said it this way, but without a match, my chances of living through the next year were low. I have met many people since who, after dozens of efforts to encourage potential bone marrow donors to sign up, still have not found a match. Adding your name to the bone marrow registry is quick, easy and painless — you can sign up at marrow.org — and it just takes a swab of a Q-tip to get your DNA. For cancer patients around the world, it could mean a cure.

The bone marrow transplant procedure itself can be dangerous, but it is swift, which makes it feel strangely anti-climactic. On “Day Zero,” my brother’s stem cells dripped into my veins from a hanging I.V. bag, and it was all over in minutes. Doctors tell me that the hardest part of the transplant is recovering from it. I’ve found that to be true, and I’ve also recognized that the same is true for Adam. As I slowly grow stronger, my little brother has assumed a caretaker role in my life. I carry his blood cells — the ones keeping me alive — and he is carrying the responsibility, and often fear and anxiety, of the loving onlooker. He tells me I’m still a bossy older sister. But our relationship is now changed forever. I have to look to him for support and guidance more than I ever have. He’ll always be my little brother, but he’s growing up fast.

---

Suleika Jaouad (pronounced su-LAKE-uh ja-WAD) is a 24-year-old writer who lives in New York City. Her column, “Life, Interrupted,” chronicling her experiences as a young adult with cancer, appears regularly on Well. Follow @suleikajaouad on Twitter.

Read More..

DealBook: Rio Tinto to Book $14 Billion Charge; C.E.O. Replaced

5:42 a.m. | Updated

LONDON — Two expensive acquisitions have come at a steep price for Rio Tinto, the Anglo-Australian mining giant.

The company, the world’s second-largest mining company after BHP Billiton, said on Thursday that it was taking a $14 billion write-down on the value of aluminum and coal mining assets — a huge amount that came as a surprise to some analysts and investors.

As a result, the company’s chief executive, Tom Albanese, resigned after five years in the top post. The company quickly named Sam Walsh, head of the iron ore unit, as its new chief.

The write-down is a significant blow for Rio Tinto, which once looked poised to capitalize on a global economic boom. Analysts said that the size of the write-downs signaled just how much the company had misjudged the values of the acquisitions, one of which happened as recently as two years ago.

“The level of the write-down is very disappointing, and it does come as a surprise,” said Keith Bowman, an analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown. “There have been some rash takeovers in the mining industry, and I hope this continues to prove a lesson.”

The write-downs are linked to two of Rio Tinto’s biggest acquisitions in recent years: Alcan, an aluminum producer based in Canada, and the coal producer Riversdale Mining, which is based in Australia and manages mines in Africa.

The company blamed falling aluminum prices for $10 billion to $11 billion of the charge. Most of Rio Tinto’s aluminum assets stem from its $38 billion acquisition of Alcan, a deal that was led by Mr. Albanese.

The acquisition of Alcan was part of a multibillion-dollar takeover frenzy in the mining industry at the time. It was driven by soaring metal prices, and it led to Rio Tinto itself becoming a target in what would have been one of the biggest takeovers in history. In the end, Rio Tinto rejected the offer, by BHP Billiton, as too low.

Rio Tinto successfully outbid the American aluminum giant Alcoa to acquire Alcan in 2007. Rio Tinto seized on the merger, hoping to take advantage of rising metal prices on the back of a booming Chinese economy. But then global economic growth slowed, and demand for aluminum dropped quickly.

“In hindsight, it was a bad call,” said Richard Knights, an analyst at Liberum Capital. “But it was a different environment back then.”

The acquisition of Alcan in particular has weighed heavily on Rio Tinto’s performance. Mr. Albanese acknowledged last year that the company had paid a high price for the deal and he had repeatedly come under pressure to resign after the Alcan takeover had burdened Rio Tinto with debt.

Last year, Mr. Albanese decided to forgo his bonus after the company reported a 59 percent drop in 2011 earnings because it wrote down $8.9 billion on the value of Alcan assets.

“We are also deeply disappointed to have to take a further substantial write-down in our aluminum businesses, albeit in an industry that continues to experience significant adverse changes globally,” Jan du Plessis, Rio Tinto’s chairman, said in a statement.

About $3 billion of the $14 billion write-down was related to lowered estimates of the value of its coal business in Mozambique after the company failed to secure crucial government approvals to ship coal it mined in the African country.

Rio Tinto also overestimated how much coking coal it could recover there. Rio Tinto bought Riversdale Mining for around $4 billion in 2011 after increasing its offer price to resolve a standoff with Riversdale’s shareholders.

Mr. du Plessis said in the statement that the scale of the write-down related to the assets in Mozambique was “unacceptable.”

Rio Tinto cited strong currencies and high energy and raw material costs as other factors leading to the write-down.

Doug Ritchie, a Rio Tinto executive who led the purchase of coal assets in Mozambique two years ago, also stepped down on Thursday.

Rio Tinto’s shares fell about 1 percent in trading in London on Thursday. The company’s shares have dropped 6 percent in the last 12 months, even as the stock price of its competitor BHP Billiton increased 0.8 percent in the same period.

Mr. Albanese said in the company’s statement that he fully recognized “that accountability for all aspects of the business rests with the C.E.O.”

Mr. Albanese will stay on until July 16 to help with the transition. He will not receive a bonus for this year and any outstanding remuneration in the form of deferred stock bonuses would lapse, Rio Tinto said.

Read More..

IHT Special: Women Appointed to Saudi Council for First Time

DUBAI — For the first time in Saudi Arabia’s history, women have been appointed to the Shura Council, the traditionally all-male body which drafts laws, debates major issues and provides advice to the king.

It may seem a modest step.

There are still no female ministers in the cabinet and women will remain segregated within the council, with their own seating area and a separate door.

The unelected council has only an advisory role: It proposes laws but the king wields sole legislative power.

Yet the chosen women, and some others, are calling the appointments a major advance.

“This enormous, rapid and noteworthy progress means Saudi society and its governing body are finally ready to acknowledge and respect women’s voices and their rights,” said Dr. Khawla Al-Kuraya, a professor of pathology, and director at the King Fahad National Center for Children’s Cancer and Research.

Dr. Kuraya is one of the 30 women — drawn from the elite ranks of Saudi society and including two royal princesses — named by King Abdullah last week to join the 150-member council, which meets in the capital, Riyadh.

The king’s decree, which stipulated that from now on women should make up 20 percent of the council, came amid contradictory signals on women’s rights in the kingdom.

Women are still forbidden to drive and, since November, new electronic texting procedures have been introduced to tighten the compulsory monitoring by their male guardians of women traveling outside the kingdom.

Still, women’s advocates, including some men, are hopeful that the opening of the Shura Council could lead to other advances.

“This is a major move to introduce more reforms when it comes to gender equality throughout our daily lives,” said Khalid Al Khudair, founder of Glowork.net, a recruitment Web site for women in Saudi Arabia.

“Their presence as advisers to the king will move new laws in the right direction, with labor laws suited to allow women to work in new sectors and industries.”

“This could mean we will see women driving very soon,” Mr. Khudair added.

The change on the council follows several economic measures aimed at increasing female participation in the work force.

Since August last year, the Labor Ministry has progressively opened up jobs for women in the retail industry, notably by ordering the replacement of male assistants in stores selling lingerie, abayas and jewelry.

Mounira Jamjoom, a research specialist at the Booz consulting firm in Riyadh, said: “The decision to integrate women in the political process is timely, and by providing policy stability, the government can unleash the region’s considerable human promise — its increasingly educated and aspiring women.”

As recently as 2011 women were excluded from voting in municipal elections — the highest, if occasional, forum for democracy in a kingdom that has no elected national institutions. But the king has promised that they will be allowed to vote and run for office in the next municipals, planned for 2015.

“Saudi Arabia is the most conservative Gulf country when it comes to women’s rights, so the appointment of women to the Shura Council, while in the short term its impact is symbolic, in the long term its impact is significant,” said Najla Al Awadhi, a former member of the United Arab Emirates Parliament and one of the first female members of the legislature there.

“This step by the Saudi king begins to chip away at the institutional and psychological barriers in Saudi society that have historically been unaccepting of a woman’s role in public life where national issues are debated and shaped,” she added. “So the presence of Saudi women there is critical.”

Appointing women to the Shura Council also will create role models for younger women in a society where women have been expected to stay out of the limelight. “We are going to be partners in building our country and that is a phenomenal change from just 10 years ago,” said Muna AbuSulayman, a Saudi development consultant who was formerly a popular television talk show host and secretary general of the Alwaleed Bin Talal Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Kingdom Holding. “It is a great step in realizing that female rights are really human rights.”

Women will be able to join any of the committees of the council including economic, family and foreign affairs.

“Contrary to popular belief, I don’t believe that specific female-related issues are going to be the main focus of the women of the Shura,” said Dr. Kuraya. “Rather, as members we have the right to raise and address the diverse array of issues that concern Saudi society as a whole.”

Read More..

Tool Kit: In Choosing a Tablet, First Try It On for Size

In the grand scheme of worries, deciding which size tablet to get — they all sit within a roughly three-inch screen range — does not quite rank.

But technophiles and technophobes alike struggle with the question. About half of the major tablets are the thickness of a failing magazine with screens about seven inches (measured along the diagonal), and the other half are about twice as thick with screens about 10 inches long.

Even if this isn’t a life-changing decision, it can be a baffling one.

The companies that make tablets give some basic but vague guidance. Google’s marketing materials say its larger 10-inch tablet is suitable as a “couch or coffee table companion” and its seven-inch Nexus 7 “is designed to go wherever you go.” Peter Larsen, Amazon’s vice president for the Kindle reader, says the seven-inch Kindle Fire HD is small enough to fit in a purse. He doesn’t say where the 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HD fits.

Here’s the first thing to keep in mind. It kind of doesn’t matter. All tablets can browse the Web, check e-mail and run apps. Some are better at some things than others, but the difference in screen size does not fundamentally change the nature of the machine.

Sarah Rotman Epps, a senior analyst at Forrester Research, had a beautiful way of describing it to me. She said tablets of different sizes were like knives in your kitchen: “You can have a six-inch chef’s knife or an eight-inch chef’s knife or a paring knife, but they all cut food.”

Ms. Epps said that people more often than not use tablets in their homes, where you’d think that more screen real estate would trump more portability. And Jakob Nielsen, principal of the Nielsen Norman Group, who has been studying user interfaces for almost 30 years, agreed. “When it comes to screen size, bigger is better,” he said.

But I’m not sure that’s the whole picture. All those benefits don’t account for the popularity of smaller tablets.

I believe smaller tablets make up for their smaller screens and limited computing power by being easier to hold. That’s different from portability.

Phones are light enough for anyone to hold, and laptops are never expected to be held for long, unless they’re being toted in a bag. But tablets beg not only to be carried like magazines but to be held like them, too. This generation of midsize tablets is not only better out of the house, but more comfortable to hold in the home, on couches and in bed, where they are most often used. The bigger tablets weigh just enough to be annoying after a while.

So, I think you should get a little tablet in most cases. Except these:

YOU HAVE BAD EYES With less screen, text in a comparable app, magazine or e-book will never appear as large as on a full-size tablet.

YOU READ A LOT OF MAGAZINES Condé Nast magazines like GQ and Traveler have been redesigned on iPads to have scrolling pages with bigger text. But some smaller publishers simply port their magazines to tablets by producing what is basically a facsimile of a print page. When shrunk, these pages are nearly impossible to read on smaller tablets, whether they have high-definition screens or not, without zooming in.

YOU HAVE FAT FINGERS Mr. Nielsen says in a blog post about the iPad Mini that apps designed to run on the full-size iPad can’t just be scaled down without making it harder to push on-screen buttons. Nielsen says screen resolution is not as important as buttons, which should be more than a square centimeter in size. I haven’t noticed interface problems on smaller tablets, though.

YOU GIVE PRESENTATIONS Or you call yourself a photographer. Small tablets are clearly personal devices, but full-size tablets can double as sleek presentation tools for doctors displaying X-rays, architects showing off blueprints or sales people making pitches to prospective clients. They can get a lot out of the bigger high-definition screens on bigger tablets.

YOU WRITE A LOT OF MEMOS Or you write a lot of e-mails on your tablet. I don’t get why you would want to do this on a small tablet. Joe Brown, editor in chief of the gadget blog Gizmodo, told me that even on big tablets, touch-screen typing is not as effective as using a physical keyboard. “You should also probably just stick with your laptop,” he said. Unless you don’t have one.

YOU WANT A POST-PC EXISTENCE People who are technophobic seem to take to tablets. You can learn to use them in seconds, there is no long boot-up delay and they rarely crash. Because the lightest laptops tend to be only a little bigger than tablets in screen size and only a pound or two heavier than a full-size tablet, you might as well get the bigger tablet.

YOU LOVE VIDEO GAMES If you’re intent on buying a tablet with the ultimate in graphics performance, you should get a big tablet. Or an Xbox.

YOU ARE VERY BIG AND STRONG If you are an N.B.A. player, Olympian or a person of similar height, strength and weight, I’d guess a big tablet probably feels like a little tablet does to me. (I am a small Chinese-American man.)

Nathan Weiner, chief executive of Pocket, a service that lets people save Web clippings and view them later on any device, said of smaller tablets: “They’re like books and they’re a lot lighter, which is, to be honest, the biggest thing. The big iPad was always a lot of work. You’re always trying to prop it up in bed or on a couch, and it always felt top-heavy. I don’t want to make it sound like I have no arm strength, but it was less tiring in that regard.”

In the end, my advice is that no matter what brand of tablet you buy, you should go to a local store that carries it (Apple or Best Buy should work fine) and try it out. Really try it out — by testing apps, browsing the Web and looking at e-mail, movies and magazines, side by side. And for the sake of this conversation, hold it up the way you would at home for a few minutes. Get down on the floor, if you want. Irritate other shoppers by watching a few long YouTube clips or something. (You are about to part with several hundred dollars. You deserve to take your time with this.)

And if you are still afraid of choosing the wrong one, remember there is no wrong one. You cannot mess this up.

Read More..

Study Confirms Benefits of Flu Vaccine for Pregnant Women

While everyone is being urged to get the flu vaccine as soon as possible, some pregnant women avoid it in the belief that it may harm their babies. A large new study confirms that they should be much more afraid of the flu than the vaccine.

Norwegian researchers studied fetal death among 113,331 women pregnant during the H1N1 flu pandemic of 2009-2010. Some 54,065 women were unvaccinated, 31,912 were vaccinated during pregnancy, and 27,354 were vaccinated after delivery. The scientists then reviewed hospitalizations and doctor visits for the flu among the women.

The results were published on Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

The flu vaccine was not associated with an increased risk for fetal death, the researchers found, and getting the shot during pregnancy reduced the risk of the mother getting the flu by about 70 percent. That was important, because fetuses whose mothers got the flu were much more likely to die.

Unvaccinated women had a 25 percent higher risk of fetal death during the pandemic than those who had had the shot. Among pregnant women with a clinical diagnosis of influenza, the risk of fetal death was nearly doubled. In all, there were 16 fetal deaths among the 2,278 women who were diagnosed with influenza during pregnancy.

Dr. Marian Knight, a professor at the perinatal epidemiology unit of the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the research, called it “a high-quality national study” that shows “there is no evidence of an increased risk of fetal death in women who have been immunized. Clinicians and women can be reassured about the safety of the vaccine in the second and third trimesters of pregnancy.”

The Norwegian health system records vaccinations of individuals and maintains linked registries to track effects and side effects. The lead author, Dr. Camilla Stoltenberg, director of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, said that there are few countries with such complete records.

“This is a great study,” said Dr. Denise J. Jamieson, an obstetrician and a medical officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who was not involved in the work. “It’s nicely done, with good data, and it’s additional information about the importance of the flu vaccine for pregnant women. It shows that it’s effective and might reduce the risk for fetal death.”

In Norway, the vaccine is recommended only in the second and third trimesters, so the study includes little data on vaccination in the first trimester. The C.D.C. recommends the vaccine for all pregnant women, regardless of trimester.

“We knew from other studies that the vaccine protects the woman and the newborn,” Dr. Stoltenberg said. “This study clearly indicates that it protects fetuses as well. I seriously suggest that pregnant women get vaccinated during every flu season.”

Read More..

Study Confirms Benefits of Flu Vaccine for Pregnant Women

While everyone is being urged to get the flu vaccine as soon as possible, some pregnant women avoid it in the belief that it may harm their babies. A large new study confirms that they should be much more afraid of the flu than the vaccine.

Norwegian researchers studied fetal death among 113,331 women pregnant during the H1N1 flu pandemic of 2009-2010. Some 54,065 women were unvaccinated, 31,912 were vaccinated during pregnancy, and 27,354 were vaccinated after delivery. The scientists then reviewed hospitalizations and doctor visits for the flu among the women.

The results were published on Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

The flu vaccine was not associated with an increased risk for fetal death, the researchers found, and getting the shot during pregnancy reduced the risk of the mother getting the flu by about 70 percent. That was important, because fetuses whose mothers got the flu were much more likely to die.

Unvaccinated women had a 25 percent higher risk of fetal death during the pandemic than those who had had the shot. Among pregnant women with a clinical diagnosis of influenza, the risk of fetal death was nearly doubled. In all, there were 16 fetal deaths among the 2,278 women who were diagnosed with influenza during pregnancy.

Dr. Marian Knight, a professor at the perinatal epidemiology unit of the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the research, called it “a high-quality national study” that shows “there is no evidence of an increased risk of fetal death in women who have been immunized. Clinicians and women can be reassured about the safety of the vaccine in the second and third trimesters of pregnancy.”

The Norwegian health system records vaccinations of individuals and maintains linked registries to track effects and side effects. The lead author, Dr. Camilla Stoltenberg, director of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, said that there are few countries with such complete records.

“This is a great study,” said Dr. Denise J. Jamieson, an obstetrician and a medical officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who was not involved in the work. “It’s nicely done, with good data, and it’s additional information about the importance of the flu vaccine for pregnant women. It shows that it’s effective and might reduce the risk for fetal death.”

In Norway, the vaccine is recommended only in the second and third trimesters, so the study includes little data on vaccination in the first trimester. The C.D.C. recommends the vaccine for all pregnant women, regardless of trimester.

“We knew from other studies that the vaccine protects the woman and the newborn,” Dr. Stoltenberg said. “This study clearly indicates that it protects fetuses as well. I seriously suggest that pregnant women get vaccinated during every flu season.”

Read More..

Supreme Court Hears Argument on Cellphone Towers

WASHINGTON — In June, two Texas cities asked the Supreme Court to decide a practical question and an abstract one, both concerning how quickly local zoning authorities have to respond to applications from telecommunications companies to build wireless towers.

The practical question was whether the Federal Communications Commission was authorized to set time limits. But the Supreme Court, which includes four former law professors with an interest in administrative law, agreed to decide only the abstract question of whether an administrative agency like the commission may determine the scope of its own jurisdiction.

At the argument of the case on Wednesday, some of the justices seemed content to tease apart the semantic distinctions posed by the second question, though there did not seem to be much enthusiasm for adding further complexity to an already tangled area. Others appeared frustrated that the court had gone out of its way to avoid having to give real-world guidance about a concrete and consequential issue.

The case, City of Arlington v. Federal Communications Commission, No. 11-1545, concerns a 1996 federal law that requires state and local authorities to act “within a reasonable period of time” after receiving applications to build or alter wireless facilities. In response to a request from a trade association for the wireless industry, the commission made two decisions.

First, it found that it had jurisdiction to define what a reasonable time was. Second, it said that 90 or 150 days were generally appropriate deadlines, depending on the circumstances.

The Texas cities, Arlington and San Antonio, said Congress had not authorized the commission to act in the first place, pointing to a part of the law that said it was not meant to limit the power of state and local governments.

The general rules in this area were set out in 1984 in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, which said that judges should defer to an administrative agency’s views when Congress itself has not spoken clearly.

The additional question in the new case was whether Chevron’s general framework applies to an agency’s determination of whether it has the power to act in the first place. Several justices said it did.

“The jurisdictional question, like any other question,” Justice Antonin Scalia said, “is to be decided with deference to the agency.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor appeared to agree, adding that it was hard to tell the two kinds of questions apart. “It’s almost impossible to talk about what’s jurisdictional and what’s an application of jurisdiction,” she said.

A lawyer for the cities, Thomas C. Goldstein, responded that there are times when courts should draw distinctions between an agency’s general authority to interpret a law and its specific authority to interpret a particular provision of the law based on the text of the statute.

Justice Elena Kagan said that was slicing things too fine. “Mr. Goldstein, at one level you are right,” she said. “It’s just a level that doesn’t help you very much.”

At the end of the day, she said, it is all the same question. “We’ve just had some very simple rules about what gets you into the box where an agency is entitled to deference,” she said.

Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr., representing the commission, said that a uniform approach was workable. The alternative proposed by the cities, he said, would “open a Pandora’s box” because there was no “clear, neat dividing line” between the two kinds of questions.

Justice Stephen G. Breyer said the court should generally defer to agencies with expertise that lawmakers lack. “Congress, which is not expert, would have wanted the F.C.C. to figure this one out,” he said.

But Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said there might be a special reason not to defer to the commission in this case because it concerned a conflict between federal and state powers. Federal courts, he said, are better suited to policing that boundary than “an agency of unelected bureaucrats.”

Read More..

The Lede Blog: Video of Aleppo University Bombing

Last Updated, 6:07 p.m. Video posted online by Syrian opposition activists appeared to show the moment one in a series of deadly explosions struck the campus of Aleppo University on Tuesday.

Video said to capture an explosion on the campus of Aleppo University in Syria on Tuesday, uploaded to the Web by opposition activists.

The brief clip, uploaded to the YouTube channel of the ANA New Media Association (formerly the Syrian Activists News Association), begins with a view of smoke rising from behind a university building as students mill about. Moments later, following a very loud explosion close to the camera, students run for cover and a much larger plume can be seen above the building.

The building visible in the video looks similar one pictured in a photograph of the campus uploaded to the Web in 2010, which suggests that the clip was recorded by someone standing outside the university’s college of education, looking in the direction of the school of architecture.

A description of the video posted on YouTube by ANA, which is run from Cairo by the British-Syrian activist Rami Jarrah, said that the video was filmed by an activist just after the university was hit by a missile fired from a Syrian Air Force MIG fighter jet, and captured the impact of a second airstrike.

Another video clip, uploaded to the Web earlier in the day, appeared to offer a more distant view of the plumes of smoke above the campus. Mr. Jarrah, who blogs as Alexander Page, suggested that one part of the video showed the fighter jet’s contrail in the sky over the damaged buildings.

NEW FOOTAGE: Shows trail of Jet Fighter seconds after Airstrike on University of #Aleppo http://t.co/CRk3C8wb Syrian state TV Lie

— Alexander Page (@AlexanderPageSY) 15 Jan 13

While opposition activists insisted that the blasts, which killed more than 80 people according to the government, were the result of airstrikes by President Bashar al-Assad’s air force, state-controlled television channels claimed that “terrorists” had fired rockets at the campus.

An English-language news bulletin from Syrian state television started with a minute of raw footage showing the aftermath of “the terrorist explosion at Aleppo University.” The pro-Assad satellite channel al-Ikhbaria also broadcast video of the aftermath, showing extensive damage to the campus and victims being rushed from the scene as on-screen text blamed the attack on rebel forces.

Video from the pro-government Syrian satellite channel al-Ikhbaria showed the aftermath of bombings at Aleppo University on Tuesday

Restrictions on independent reporting in Syria make it hard to confirm who was responsible for the explosions, but the university is in a government-controlled area of the city and large anti-Assad demonstrations there last May were harshly dealt with by the security forces, despite the presence of United Nations observers.

Opposition activists claimed that witnesses saw the bombs drop from jets, and one antigovernment Facebook page posted what it said was a copy of a statement from the univesity’s own press office accusing Syrian Air Force MIG fighter planes of targeting the campus in two “criminal” missile attacks three minutes apart.

A blogger in Aleppo who supported peaceful protests against the Assad government but has been fiercely critical of the armed rebellion, Edward Dark, described the carnage as a result of an air attack that was “probably a mistake, not an intentional bombing.”

just now: regime jet bombs Aleppo Uni faculty of architecture as students are taking tests. this is in a peaceful regime held area #Syria

— edward dark (@edwardedark) 15 Jan 13

@APHClarkson no, I think it was probably a mistake, not an intentional bombing

— edward dark (@edwardedark) 15 Jan 13

A pair of video clips posted on YouTube shortly after the bombings showed extensive damage to what was described as the university’s architecture school. In one of the clips, dazed students made their way through shattered glass, carrying a wounded or dead man on a table, in the entrance hall to the architecture faculty pictured on the university’s Web site.

Video said to show the badly damaged school of architecture at Aleppo University on Tuesday.

Video of a wounded man being evacuated from Aleppo University’s school of architecture on Tuesday.

Another pro-Assad satellite channel, Addounia, broadcast a report blaming “a terrorist group” for the bombings — which was uploaded, with English subtitles, to YouTube.

A video report on bombings at Aleppo University from Addounia, a pro-Assad satellite channel.

Writing on Twitter, a Syrian-American from Aleppo who uses the pen name Amal Hanano posted links to photographs of three people identified as victims of the bombings by activists on social networks.

Muhanned Assi, 1st year Civil Engineering student. Killed in today’s bombing in University of #Aleppo. #RIP #Syria http://t.co/Wj3o5kII

— Amal Hanano (@AmalHanano) 15 Jan 13

Fahed Miri, 23, refugee living in the dorms, volunteer, killed in today’s bombing in University of #Aleppo. #RIP #Syria http://t.co/Z8mjJGdM

— Amal Hanano (@AmalHanano) 15 Jan 13

Sawsan Haqi, mother of 3, grandmother of 2, beloved citizen, killed today in University of #Aleppo bombing. #RIP #Syria http://t.co/WTjENdhZ

— Amal Hanano (@AmalHanano) 15 Jan 13

Read More..