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GUARDIAN Sat, 14 Jan 2012 17:30:00 GMT
Two French passengers and a Peruvian crewman confirmed dead as rescue teams search for 70 people still unaccounted for
Rescue teams are combing the waters around a cruise liner that ran aground off the Italian coast in search of 70 people missing after thousands were evacuated from the stricken vessel.
Three people – two French passengers and a Peruvian crewman – have been confirmed dead after the Costa Concordia hit a sandbar on Friday evening near the Tuscan holiday island of Giglio, less than two hours after leaving port.
More than 3,200 holidaymakers – from Italy, Germany, France and Britain – and 1,000 crew were forced to flee the liner, which is now half submerged.
Italian coastguard commander Francesco Paolillo said three bodies had been retrieved from the sea.
Reports of three other deaths remained unconfirmed, he added.
Another coastguard official, Captain Cosimo Nicastro, said 70 people were unaccounted for.
Divers are helping to carry out a risky operation to......
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 21:48:08 GMT
Europe has been plunged into a fresh crisis after France admitted it had been stripped of its coveted AAA ratingWhy does a credit rating matter?
The interest rate nation states are forced to offer to attract sufficient lenders when taking out multi-billion euro loans depends, in part, on their credit rating. France, Germany, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Finland and Austria have enjoyed the highest rating throughout the crisis, keeping their borrowing costs low. The AAA grade by the two ratings agencies Standard & Poor's and Fitch and Moody's is considered the gold standard.
Can France and the others brush off a downgrade?
They will try, but eurozone countries have borrowed hundreds of billions from overseas lenders, many of them banks and hedge funds; these lenders want to judge the risk of losing their money and pay close attention to ratings given by the two agencies.
How do lenders react to a downgrade?
Interest rates go up, and states find it more expensive to service......
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 22:41:58 GMT
Ex-Turkish Cypriot leader, who helped form the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus in 1983, passed away on Friday
Former Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash, a fierce supporter of Turkish Cypriot independence and key figure in Cyprus's decades-old ethnic conflict, died on Friday, family members and doctors said. He was 88.
Denktash, who had experienced deteriorating health for the past 10 years, was admitted to hospital on 8 January with dehydration which rapidly developed into multiple organ failure.
"He had the soul of a fighter," his son, Serdar Denktash, told state TV in a live broadcast.
Denktash spent several weeks in hospital in 2011 following a stroke.
A controversial figure viewed as a national hero by Turks, but vilified by many Greeks, Denktash held centre stage in the past half-century of the Cyprus conflict.
The island, home to Turks and Greeks, experienced upheaval and ethnic strife after independence from Britain in 1960, and was divided in a Turkish invasion..
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 22:55:02 GMT
Sex was at the centre of the Italian dictator's image
In 1919 Benito Mussolini, an obscure political agitator, assembled a ragbag of black-shirted followers in Milan, and launched the political movement that was to become, two years later, the National Fascist party. The party took its name from the classical Roman symbol of authority – an axe bound in rods, or fasces. Part idealist, part buffoon, Mussolini dreamed of a second Roman empire for Italy, and dominion over the Mediterranean. Occasionally he liked to wear a richly tasselled fez and would pose for the cameras, thrusting out his chin pugnaciously. He introduced the stiff-armed Roman salute, disapproving of the handshake as fey and unhygienic. As Mussolini's regime strengthened, the high priests of fascism began to hail their leader as "divine Caesar", and adopted the passo romano, the Latin goosestep, in parades. Behind the bombast, however, Italian fascism relied on bludgeons, intimidation and, according to Roberto.......
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 20:45:00 GMT
David Cameron wants state funding to go to 'commercial' films. The BBC's Christine Langan and film-maker Gareth Edwards discuss big-screen risks and rewards
This week, ahead of a report on Britain's film industry, David Cameron said state funding should be directed at mainstream films. Christine Langan, head of BBC Films, and Monsters director Gareth Edwards tell Emine Saner what this could mean for film-makers.
Gareth Edwards: What films are held up as great examples of commercial films?
Christine Langan: Harry Potter, The King's Speech, The Inbetweeners. I'm not sure if Cameron is prescribing a type of film. I think it's flattering in a way. It's recognition that the British film industry is very valuable. I think Cameron has stirred up a bit of a bees' nest, in that people interpret "commercial" differently. Some people will think that means genre, derivative, exploitative, manipulative. I think he's talking about crowdpleasers. The perfect result for all of us is where you...
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 20:49:06 GMT
American billionaire Ron Burkle buys private members' club stakes as group targets Asia and Far East for expansion
It began as a modest set of private rooms above a restaurant in Old Compton Street, central London, swelling to become a select clutch of exclusive members' clubs beloved by celebrities from London to New York, Berlin to Miami.
Now the Soho House group has taken the most significant step yet in its seemingly unstoppable march across the globe, agreeing a £250m deal with a US billionaire to fund its expansion into subcontinental Asia and the Far East.
The deal, which will earn founder Nick Jones £25m for half his 20% share, will make Soho House the most valuable private members' club in the world.
Jones, who is married to the broadcaster Kirsty Young, sold 80% of the business to the British high-street tycoon Richard Caring in 2008, in a deal that valued the company at just over £130m. Caring will pocket around £125m in exchange for 50% of the group.
The new........
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 21:00:01 GMT
Sandy, Bedfordshire: More bone than skin, its body, pegged up twig by twig on the tree, had a macabre driftwood beauty, the sodden fur rippled and creased over what was left of its rib cage
Out in the fields were two dogs and five gibbets. The dogs lolloped along farm tracks, their owners in slow pursuit. The hounds stopped at each intersection for direction, rooting among the tussocky grass and spending a penny to leave a whiff for old friends. Perhaps these rough margins delineated where once there had been hedgerows: restitution of a sort was now marked by regularly spaced young trees.
As I paused at a birch sapling, I saw through the branches one of the gibbets. The rabbit's head was dark against the light grey sky. It had pocked hollows instead of eyes and raised ears, frayed like an over-loved toy. Though more bone than skin, its body, pegged up twig by twig on the tree, had a macabre driftwood beauty, the sodden fur rippled and creased over what was left of its rib cage....
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 21:30:01 GMT
Shadow chancellor says a Labour government would not be in a position to commit to reversing the Conservatives' cuts
Ed Balls admits he is going through a difficult transition. He just has just started to learn the piano, and as a grade-seven violin player in his teenage years, he is struggling after two or three lessons to read the different staves. It is said to be notoriously difficult to pick up the piano in adulthood, and he admits: "My staff think I must be suffering a mid-life crisis. They are worried I'll next be coming into the office in leathers with a motorbike helmet."
The shadow chancellor cast as Lester Burnham, the protagonist in American Beauty, seems implausible – and anyway, this week the issue is not whether he is in leathers, but a hair shirt.
Some say he is temperamentally incapable of sending out the tough messages the electorate demands of a party that is seen to lack economic credibility. The argument runs that Balls, not his leader, Ed Miliband, is the...
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GUARDIAN Fri, 13 Jan 2012 22:30:02 GMT
To the British, they promise romance amid the recession. But the Italian love affair with this vehicle has often led to tragedy
We long ago learned, if we ever needed to be told, that a vehicle was more than a machine for getting from A to B. Whether it's James Bond's Aston Martin, Boris Johnson's push bike or the Batmobile, there's a message to be had from the means of motion.
So what do scooters say? The last 24 hours have brought two very different possible answers: parsimony and panache. In recession-hit Britain, sales are soaring, while in India, the Italian firm Piaggio is preparing to relaunch its Vespa brand in the belief it will appeal to "fashion-conscious consumers … looking for a premium, exclusive lifestyle".
The scooter is – or rather, has become – a symbol of Italy. And that makes it unique. Neither cars nor lorries are associated with any one country, nor are motorbikes or bicycles. But as soon as you think "scooter", you instinctively think of Vespas lined up....
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