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Congress party elevates 42-year old, who is son, grandson and great-grandson of Indian prime ministers, to higher post.

Rahul Gandhi, often tagged as India's "prime minister-in-waiting", was elevated to the governing Congress party's number-two post, positioning him to lead the party, which his family has long dominated, in parliamentary elections next year.

"Together we will transform the country," Gandhi said in his speech accepting the post of Congress vice president on Saturday, according to the Press Trust of India news agency.

"I have great experience," the 42-year-old scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty said in the northern Indian city of Jaipur, at a party meeting held to prepare for general elections in 2014.

Members of the Congress Working Committee earlier approved a motion making him - the son, grandson and great-grandson of Indian prime ministers - second in the party's hierarchy. His mother Sonia Gandhi is the party president.

The move could propel the long-anticipated accession to power of Rahul, who has long been the party's unofficial candidate to succeed Manmohan Singh, 80, as prime minister of the Congress-led national government.

Congress senior leader Janardan Dwivedi declared that Rahul Gandhi was now "next only to Sonia Gandhi in the party" and said "this decision will greatly strengthen the party and the hands of the party president".

Dwivedi added that a decision on who will lead the party in the elections would be made later. Sonia Gandhi led the party to back-to-back victories in the 2004 and 2009 polls.

Turbulent politics

Analysts said the move meant Rahul Gandhi, often accused of staying aloof from daily political battles, now must get his hands dirty trying to revive the party, which has been buffeted by slow economic growth and corruption scandals.

The decision to elevate the boyish-looking politician comes despite the party's dismal results in state elections that have raised serious doubts about his political abilities.

Congress, India's oldest political party, was routed in polls in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab and Goa last year.

Rahul Gandhi's appetite for India's turbulent political scene has often been questioned by critics due to his refusal to accept repeated requests to take on ministerial responsibilities.

But with his mother Sonia holding the reins as Congress president, any opposition within the party to the Gandhis has been swiftly suffocated, say observers.

Oil Minister Veerappa Moily hailed Rahul Gandhi as the country's leader for the "present and for the future" at the meeting.

Party workers celebrated the announcement in the streets with fireworks but the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party denounced Gandhi's promotion as a "sham".

Some observers argue the party's drubbing in states polls should not be taken as a sign of Rahul Gandhi's chances in the general election.

Rahul Gandhi entered politics in 2004 and became a lawmaker from Amethi seat in northern Uttar Pradesh state. The parliamentary seat was held by his mother until she shifted to a neighbouring constituency of Rae Bareli.


Source:AFP

A 42-year-old Russian man literally ran for his life for seven kilometers in the freezing cold after he accidentally fell off a train in the country’s Far East – wearing only a T-shirt, sweatpants and slippers.

­The man said that he had gone to the train’s vestibule for a smoke. As he was coming back to his carriage, he missed his door and opened another one to a non-functioning vestibule. He stepped into the dark – and then found himself in taiga forest, on the railroad, all alone.

The passenger ran after the train for seven kilometers, but couldn’t catch up with it. At the next station – ‘Richard Sorge,’ only 150 kilometers away from the train’s final destination – the man was given help.

“The 42-year-old man survived by sheer luck,” the Interior Ministry’s local transport department reported on Friday.

An investigation into the matter has been launched, and police are trying to ascertain whether what happened was an accident, or whether a train attendant forgot to close the door out of neglect.

Local media reported that the man turned out to be a driver working under a rotation system in Russia’s Far East. “He is feeling fine, has already started working, and has suffered no bodily harm. Certainly, he had been very scared, but got over the shock,” the man’s employer told Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper.

The train was traveling from Moscow to Nerungri, a city in Russia’s Far East, which has a population of just over 62,000 people. The average winter temperatures in the area measure around -30°C.



Image: Vladimir Kremlev for RT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The artistic director of Russia's Bolshoi Theatre, Sergei Filin, is being treated in a Moscow hospital for severe burns to his face after a masked man threw acid in his face, police say.

The attack happened late on Thursday as Mr Filin, an award-winning ballet star, was walking home in central Moscow.

Doctors are now fighting to save his eyesight and Interfax news agency says he will be sent to a clinic abroad.

A Bolshoi spokesman said Mr Filin, 42, had suffered months of threats.

The BBC's Steve Rosenberg in Moscow says it is suspected that he was the victim of infighting and rows between different groups of dancers at the Bolshoi.

According to the Bolshoi statement, the assailant shouted to Mr Filin as he was approaching the entrance to his apartment block, then threw acid in Mr Filin's face.

Mr Filin then got help from a warden keeping watch over nearby cars.

The theatre's executive director, Anatoly Iksanov, told Russian television that Mr Filin was "uncompromising" in his management style.

"If he thought a performer was unready to play a certain role, or incapable of it, he would not let the performer do it," he said.

Tensions at the Bolshoi over its artistic programme have been widely reported in Russian media.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In 2011 two ballet stars - Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev - resigned in protest at the Bolshoi's new repertoire.

At the time of Mr Filin's appointment the head of the Bolshoi's ballet troupe, Gennady Yanin, resigned after erotic photographs purporting to be him were posted on a website.

Another celebrated performer, Nikolai Tsiskaridze, sharply criticised Mr Filin in early 2012.
 

India welcomed the “positive statements” coming from Pakistan on talks to defuse their border tension and said the border flare-ups of the past 10 days, including the Jan 8 brutal killing of two Indian soldiers, would not undermine their peace process.

As Kazakhstan has restricted the number of Russia’s launches from Baikonur involving Proton-M carrier rockets to only 12 (instead of requested 17) in 2013, Moscow may demand to review the cosmodrome lease agreement conditions, Iterfax-Kazakhstan reports, citing Interfax Division for Military News as quoting a source in the Russia’s space industry.

Kazakhstan and China have discussed construction of waterworks facilities at transborder rivers. January 18 Astana hosted the 10th sitting of the Kazakh-Chinese Committee for Use and Protection of Transborder Rivers, according to the Kazakh Agriculture Ministry.

Hundreds of people surrounded a school in India to protest after a seven-year-old girl was allegedly raped in the toilets next door to the headmistress's office.
 
The girl was attacked at Deepvihar high school, which also has a primary faculty, in the city of Vasco da Gama in Goa yesterday.

The incident is the latest in a series of horrific rape cases which have besieged India and caused widespread protests.

More than 150 people surrounded the school last night demanding the arrest of the headmistress and the rapist, who is thought to be in his 20s.

A police official said: 'The girl was raped inside the school toilet during recess'.
 
The headmistress was later arrested for negligence of duty.

 'We will not spare the accused and anyone involved in this crime,' Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar added.

 The attack in Goa comes after a 23-year-old student died after being brutally gang raped by five men on a bus in Delhi last month.
 
The victim and male friend had boarded the bus after going to watch a film before attacking the couple and taking it in turns to rape her.
 
She died two weeks later in a Singapore hospital.

The case has thrown the international spotlight on sexual abuse in India and thousands have protested demanding greater protection for women and the death penalty for rape.

At the latest hearing today, one of the accused presented documents in a bid to prove he was a juvenile at the time of the attack.

If a judge rules in his favour he cannot be given the death penalty if convicted.
 
Yesterday, six men were arrested after another alleged gang rape of a woman on a bus in New Delhi.
 
The victim had been travelling to her in-laws hosue in Punjab on Friday when she was allegedly snatched and to a district bordering Amritsar, the Sikh holy city.
 
Five men joined the driver and conductor, who had taken her by motorbike to an unknown address, and took turns to rape the 29-year-old.
 
In a separate case, a policeman in Goa was arrested yesterday on suspicion of sexually abusing sex workers, who said he and two other policemen, all now suspended, had been sexually exploiting them in return for protection of their trade.
 

One of Russia’s most notorious criminal masterminds, Mafia godfather Aslan Usoyan, also known as ‘Grandpa Hassan,’ was shot dead by a sniper rifle in central Moscow on Wednesday, police said.

A sniper fired at Usoyan as the 75-year-old was walking out of a restaurant in Povarskaya Street in Central Moscow.

His bodyguards failed to cover him in time, and the crime boss died from his injuries soon after he was taken to hospital.

“Usoyan was taken to Botkin Hospital in deep coma, unconscious, but was still breathing, and his heart was beating,” a hospital source told Interfax. Ten minutes later, he failed to regain consciousness and died in the hospital’s emergency surgery room, the source added.

Evidence uncovered by investigators indicated that Usoyan was killed by a highly motivated and dedicated professional.

The assassin used a silenced ‘Val’ 9mm assault rifle designed for Soviet special operations forces, RIA Novosti news agency reported. When disassembled, the rifle can fit into a briefcase. This weapon is fitted with a silencer and muzzle flash reducer, making it near-impossible to detect the location of a shooter.

One of Usoyan’s bodyguards reportedly returned fire with several blind shots, but the fact that it took some time for police to find shooter’s position showed that the bodyguard had failed completely at locating the sniper.Val rifles can also easily shoot through body armor, and are capable of piercing a 6-millimeter-thick sheet of steel. The killer reportedly used armor-piercing bullets in the assassination.

After the sniper shot Usoyan in the head, a woman walking near the mob boss stepped into the assassin’s firing line. According to LifeNews daily’s timeline, the hitman attempted to move her by shooting her in the thigh. When she remained upright, she was shot again in the chest and fell, allowing the sniper to hit Usoyan once more as his bodyguards grouped around their wounded boss.

The young woman, a waitress at the restaurant who was walking Usoyan to the exit, was rushed to a hospital for surgery and remains in critical condition due to heavy blood loss, medics told Interfax.

On Thursday, Russia’s Investigative Committee released another report on the incident, which said that Usoyan was only wounded once as he stood in the doorway of the restaurant, not in the yard. The committee maintained that his bodyguards dragged their boss inside the restaurant, and that the waitress was wounded two times because of five blind shots the sniper made after the restaurant door was slammed shut.

The sniper’s perch was discovered to be a stairway between the fifth and sixth floor of a building facing the restaurant’s yard. There, detectives found a folding chair, six used Val cartridges, three cigarette butts, sporting trousers and a piece of cloth. A print of the hitman’s hand was reportedly taken from an open windowpane.

However, investigators believe these items may have been brought to the scene and left there on purpose to imitate a sniper’s activities, a source close to the investigation told LifeNews tabloid.

Police dogs traced the killer’s escape route to a nearby house 100 meters away from the restaurant, where a getaway car likely awaited.

Witnesses said that a few days before the assassination, two men were observed taking photos of the street on the same stairway from which the killing shots were made. The central Moscow building is monitored by CCTV cameras, making it difficult to infiltrate unnoticed.

Two tenants of the house whose flats overlook the restaurant received phone calls prior to the assassination demanding they sell their apartments.

Over the years ‘Grandpa Hassan’ had managed to survive at least two previous assassination attempts: A would-be killer missed him in Sochi in 1998, and another one seriously injured Usoyan and his bodyguard in a 2010 Moscow shooting.

The ‘godfather’ had lately become a target in a war between criminal clans, the police said. The 2010 and 2013 sniper shootings “are connected and have apparently been prepared by the same people,” a police source told Interfax.

A criminal case over murder and illicit possession of arms has been opened, Russia’s investigation committee said in a statement. Various versions, including ones connected with Usoyan's criminal activity, are being considered, the statement added.

Usoyan, an ethnic Kurdish Yezidi mobster, started his criminal career in Georgia, where he earned his first jail term for fighting police at the age of 19.

While in jail on speculation charges from 1966 to 1968, he acquired the status of ‘thief in law’ – marking his standing among the elite of the Soviet and post-Soviet criminal underworld.

In recent years, ‘Grandpa Hassan’ was widely suspected of controlling various organized criminal groups that dealt in illegal gambling, arms and drug trafficking, and the theft of natural resources.
 

A ceasefire took hold on Thursday in disputed Kashmir after the Indian and Pakistani armies agreed to halt deadly cross-border firing that had threatened to unravel a fragile peace process.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The case of five men charged with the gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old woman in Delhi has been moved to a fast-track court for trial.

Lawyers for the defendants say that the case will get under way on Monday.

A sixth suspect, who is thought to be 17, will be tried separately in a youth court if it is confirmed he is a minor.

The case has shocked India and sparked a debate about the treatment of women. If convicted, the men could face the death penalty.

In the wake of the public outcry and nationwide protests, the government promised a fast-track legal process for this and other rape cases.

It announced it was setting up six fast-track courts in Delhi to allow crimes against women to be dealt with swiftly. Legal proceedings in India sometimes involve years of delays.

The five accused have been named as Ram Singh, his brother Mukesh, Pawan Gupta, Vinay Sharma and Akshay Thakur.

The lawyer for Ram Singh, said he would file a petition arguing for the case to be transferred out of Delhi, fearing that the proceedings might be prejudiced because of the intense media interest.

"We are sure we will not get justice in Delhi," VK Ananad said.

Last week another lawyer claimed that the men had been tortured and coerced into confessing they were guilty. Officials refused to comment on the allegations, citing legal restrictions.

The lawyers for two of the suspects have said they will plead not guilty. It is unclear how the three accused will plead. Prosecutors have said they have extensive forensic evidence.

The victim, a physiotherapy student who cannot be named in India for legal reasons, and a male friend were attacked on a bus in south Delhi on 16 December. She died two weeks later in hospital in Singapore.

Campaigners are calling for tougher rape laws and reforms to the police, who - critics say - often fail to file charges against accused attackers.

The government has said that it will bring in stronger sexual assault laws and has established several committees to recommend changes in the law.


India's fast-track courts

• Some 1,200 fast-track courts were operating in India as of March 2012
• In Delhi, six fast-track courts were ordered for the trial of cases related to crimes against women, especially rape. Some other states such as Punjab and Maharashtra are also setting up fast-track courts for this purpose
• In 2000, central government started a scheme for more than 1,700 fast-track courts to try to clear the backlog of cases clogging up the Indian judicial system, partly related to a shortage of judges
• Funding is an issue because the central government said it could no longer fund them after March 2011, leaving future funding decisions to individual states
   

Six men have been arrested after kidnapping and raping a female bus passenger in the northern Indian state of Punjab. The arrests come after a similar New Delhi gang-rape case where the victim died from her injuries, triggering nationwide protests.

The victim was kidnapped after boarding a bus on January 11 to go to her in-laws’ house in a village in Gurdaspur. The bus passed through the woman’s bus stop and continued on to Gurdaspur town.

From there the driver and the conductor forced the woman on to a motorcycle and took her to an unknown location, where five more men joined them and raped the victim.

"The lady, after being kidnapped, was raped brutally throughout the night by the seven accused," officer Raj Jeet Singh told AFP.

Then one of the rapists dropped the woman off near her sister-in-law’s village from where the victim managed to walk home.

The woman reported the incident a day later by lodging a complaint at the Kahnuwan police station.

"Six men have been arrested on allegations of having raped a 29-year-old woman… after forcibly taking her to an unknown location on the night of January 11," Singh said, adding that they were searching for the seventh suspect.

Those arrested include the driver and the conductor. All six have already confessed to their crime, Singh said.

The extent of woman’s injuries is unclear.

The attack comes in the wake of a similar case when on December 16 a 23-year-old medical student was gang-raped and severely injured on a bus in Delhi, while her male companion was cruelly beaten.

Both were then stripped and thrown off the bus, after which the rapists tried to run the woman over, but her male companion managed to push her out of the way.

She later died from her injuries in hospital, triggering a wave of national protests.

Tens of thousands came out on the streets of India to demand tougher measures from the government to protect women from the daily threat of harassment and violence.

Fearing for their safety, hundreds of Indian women applied for firearm licenses and joined self-defense classes.

In response to public uproar, India’s ruling Congress Party is drafting the new legislation for submission to the Justice Verma Committee, charged with reassessing current rape laws and suggesting changing them to ensure greater safety for women.

The document stipulates a maximum jail sentence of 30 years for those convicted of rape and the introduction of chemical castration as a punitive measure, writes the Indian Express.

Additionally, the Indian government heard calls from the Bharatiya Janata Party to hold an emergency parliamentary session to discuss women’s safety.

New Delhi, with a population of nearly 17 million people, has the highest number of reported sex crimes of all India's cities. The number of reported rape cases in the capital has risen since 2011 to 17 per cent, with 661 last year, government figures revealed.

According to police statistics, a rape is reported on average every 18 hours, and a sexual assault occurs every 14 hours in the capital.

However victims of rape often do not come forward to the police in India for fear of shaming their families or being ignored by police, skewing the statistics.
 

Russia called on Saturday for a political transition in Syria, while Switzerland said it would petition the International Criminal Court (ICC) to probe war crimes in the country.

Regime warplanes carried out air strikes near the capital and a car bomb blew up in Damascus province, while gunmen shot dead an athletics champion, AFP reported the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights as saying.

A day after U.N.-Arab League special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi met Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State William Burns, Moscow repeated its long-held position that only Syrians can decide their fate.

“In our opinion, the priority task is to immediately stop any violence and bloodshed as well as provide Syrians including internally displaced persons and refugees with humanitarian aid,” the foreign ministry said.

But it added: “At the same time it is necessary to secure the launch of a political transition process in Syria aimed at enshrining in law guaranteed and equal rights of all ethnic-confessional groups of this country.”

Moscow, a key Damascus ally, also reiterated its support for a transition plan that was agreed in Geneva in June but has since split world powers.

Bogdanov also met a Syrian delegation led by Michel Kilo, a prominent anti-regime activist who opposes foreign intervention, and pledged to continue “active contacts” with both Damascus and the opposition, the ministry said.
Conflict intensifies

Moscow has been reluctant to endorse the “Arab Spring” popular revolts of the last two years, saying they have increased instability in the Middle East and created a risk of radical Islamists seizing power.

Although Russia sells arms to Syria and rents one of its naval bases, the economic benefit of its support for President Bashar al-Assad’s regime is minimal. Analysts say President Vladimir Putin wants to prevent the United States from using military force or support from the U.N. Security Council to bring down governments it opposes.

However, as opposition fighters gain ground in the war, Russia has given indications it is preparing for Assad’s possible exit, while continuing to insist he must not be forced out by foreign powers.

Opposition activists say a military escalation and the hardship of winter have accelerated the death toll.

Rebel forces have acquired more powerful anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons during attacks on Assad’s military bases.

Assad’s forces have employed increasing amounts of military hardware including Scud-type ballistic missiles in the past two months. New York-based Human Rights Watch said they had also used incendiary cluster bombs that are banned by most nations.
Stalemate in cities

The weeklong respite from aerial strikes has been marred by snow and thunderstorms that affected millions displaced by the conflict, which has now reached every region of Syria.

On Saturday, the skies were clear and jets and helicopters fired missiles and dropped bombs on a line of towns to the east of Damascus, where rebels have pushed out Assad's ground forces, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The British-based group, which is linked to the opposition, said it had no immediate information on casualties from the strikes on districts including Maleiha and farmland areas.

Rebels control large swathes of rural land around Syria but are stuck in a stalemate with Assad’s forces in cities, where the army has reinforced positions.

State TV said government forces had repelled an attack by terrorists - a term it uses for the armed opposition - on Aleppo's international airport, now used as a helicopter base.

Reuters cannot independently confirm reports due to severe reporting restrictions imposed by the Syrian authorities and security constraints.
On Friday, rebels seized control of one of Syria's largest helicopter bases, Taftanaz in Idlib province, their first capture of a military airfield.

Eight-six people were killed on Friday, including 30 civilians, the Syrian Observatory said.
Switzerland to petition ICC

Meanwhile, amid unrelenting violence, Switzerland said it will file on Monday a petition signed by 52 countries calling for the ICC to open a case on war crimes in Syria, its foreign minister said.

“Serious war crimes are being committed in Syria. We must make sure they not go unpunished,” Didier Burkhalter told Swiss national television TSR.

“We’re submitting a proposal. Now it is up to the Security Council to decide,” he added, saying the U.N. organ could either block or pursue the request.

Since Syria is not a party to the ICC, the world’s only permanent war crimes tribunal, a U.N. Security Council referral is needed for the court to look into crimes committed in the 22-month conflict.

The United Nations estimates that more than 60,000 people have died since the March 2011 outbreak of the revolt, and says more than 600,000 Syrians are registered as refugees in the region.

Escalating violence has led to thousands of low and mid-level defections, when peaceful protests turned violent amid a deadly crackdown on dissent.

In a video posted on the Internet on Friday, a man identifying himself as Jumaa Farraj Jassem, a senior foreign intelligence official, announced his defection. AFP was unable to verify the authenticity of the video.