Radcliffe admits being drunk during "Harry Potter" scenes

LOS ANGELES: Daniel Radcliffe admitted he was drunk while filming some scenes for the “Harry Potter” movies during a period in his life where he was drinking “nightly,” the young star said in an interview.

“I have a very addictive personality. It was a problem. People with problems like that are very adept at hiding it. It was bad. I don’t want to go into details, but I drank a lot and it was daily – I mean nightly,” Radcliffe said to British celebrity news magazine Heat earlier this week.

“I can honestly say I never drank at work on ‘Harry Potter.’ I went into work still drunk, but I never drank at work. I can point to many scenes where I’m just gone. Dead behind the eyes,” the 22-year-old actor said.

The young British star, who was propelled to fame at 11-years-old after being cast to play boy wizard Harry Potter in the movies based on J.K. Rowling’s best-selling novels, discussed his “very busy personality” and also talked about his production-assistant girlfriend, who he said was “a wonderful, wonderful girl, who’s far too good for me.”

“I can also be quite insecure. A lot of actors have self-doubt. I live under that the whole time, and it’s how I function best. I think she puts up with a lot; she says she doesn’t,” said Radcliffe.

The “Harry Potter” star, who has received critical praise for his theater work in the Broadway and West End productions “Equus” and “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,”

is currently on the promotional rounds for his film, “The Woman in Black,” out in U.S. theaters on Friday.

Hackers peep into secret agency’s meeting; FBI confirms

WASHINGTON: Hacker group Anonymous, in an embarrassment for law enforcement, released a recording of a conference call between the FBI and Scotland Yard discussing operations against the hacking collective.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed the authenticity of the nearly 17-minute recording posted on YouTube and other sites and said it was “intended for law enforcement officers only and was illegally obtained.”

“A criminal investigation is under way to identify and hold accountable those responsible,” the FBI said in a statement.

The release of the audio recording was one in a series of attacks Friday by the shadowy loose-knit group of international hackers.

Members of Anonymous also attacked the website of the Greek justice ministry in a protest against the country’s tough fiscal reforms and a site operated by the Boston Police Department.

In addition, members of the hacker group claimed to have briefly knocked Citibank offline and defaced the website of the law firm that defended a US Marine charged in connection with the 2005 killing of 24 Iraqi civilians.

Anonymous, in a statement on the website of the law firm of Puckett and Faraj, also claimed to have published online three gigabytes of private email messages of attorneys Neal Puckett and Haytham Faraj.

Puckett served as a lawyer for Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich, who faced a court martial last month in connection with the killings in the Iraqi town of Haditha.

Wuterich, 31, admitted one count of negligent dereliction of duty but manslaughter charges were dropped as part of a plea deal with prosecutors and he is not serving any jail time.

Along with the FBI-Scotland Yard recording, Anonymous posted online the email invitation from an FBI agent setting up the call for January 17.

The email invites members of European law enforcement agencies to take part in a call “to discuss the on-going investigations related to Anonymous, Lulzsec, Antisec, and other associated splinter groups.”

The email was sent to law enforcement officials in Britain, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and Sweden but the only people who identify themselves on the call are from the FBI and Scotland Yard.

The email includes the number to be called along with the access code.

In a message on Twitter, Anonymous posted links to the recording and said the FBI “might be curious how we’re able to continuously read their internal comms for some time now.”

According to the FBI, no agency computer systems were breached in connection with the incident.

Graham Cluley of computer security firm Sophos said the hackers were apparently able to access the call “because they have compromised a police investigator’s email account.”

“No doubt the police authorities will be appalled to realize that the very people that they are trying to apprehend, could have been tuning in to their internal conversations,” Cluley said in a blog post.

During the call, the British and American participants discuss some of the targets of their operations including Jake Davis and Ryan Cleary, two British teenagers who were arrested last year over hacking.

Other names mentioned during the call are bleeped out.

Davis is charged with hacking into websites, including that of Britain’s Serious Organised Crime Agency, which was out of service for several hours on June 20 after apparently being targeted.

Cleary was detained in connection with a month-long global rampage last year by the Anonymous splinter group Lulz Security.

At one point in the call, a British participant thanks his American counterpart for helping out with an examination of Cleary’s hard drive.

Later, a British participant mentions a hacker from West Midlands who goes by the handle “tehwongz.”

“He’s a 15-year-old who’s basically just doing this all for attention and a bit of an idiot,” he said, going on to describe him as “a pain in the bum.”

Last month, Anonymous briefly knocked the FBI and Justice Department websites offline in retaliation for the US shutdown of file-sharing site Megaupload.

In late 2010, Anonymous attacked the websites of Amazon, Visa, MasterCard, PayPal and others in retaliation for their decisions to stop working with Julian Assange’s anti-secrecy site WikiLeaks. AGENCIES

Scientists catch ‘monster prawn’

WELLINGTON: Scientists have captured a “supergiant” crustacean in waters seven kilometres (4.5 miles) deep off New Zealand, measuring 10 times the normal size of related species.

The “supergiant amphipod”, which resembles a monster prawn, was found during an expedition to the Kermadec Trench north of New Zealand by scientists from the University of Aberdeen and Wellington’s NIWA marine research institute.

Amphipods are normally up to three centimetres (around an inch) long and the University of Aberdeen’s Alan Jamieson said he was stunned to find the 28 centimetre (11 inch) giant when emptying traps on his research vessel’s deck.

“I stopped and thought ‘what on earth is that?’ whilst catching a glimpse of an amphipod far bigger than I ever thought possible,” he said.

“It’s a bit like finding a foot-long cockroach.”

Another amphipod, which was filmed by the expedition but not captured, was an estimated 34 centimetres long.

“It just goes to show that the more you look, the more you find,” NIWA principal scientist Ashley Rowden said.

“For such a large and conspicuous animal to go unnoticed for so long is just testament to how little we know about life in New Zealand’s most deep and unique habitat.”

Supergiant amphipods have been found only once before, in the 1980s. But that was off Hawaii, about 7,000 kilometres (4,500 miles) to the north, and NIWA said it was yet to determine if the latest catch was a new species.

Scientists said they did not know why the deep-sea creatures evolved to such a huge size. AGENCIES

Indian telecom sector in turmoil after court ruling

NEW DELHI: When Norwegian telecom giant Telenor entered India’s overcrowded and fiercely competitive mobile market in 2009, the Scandinavian firm insisted it would be one of the survivors.

Now its investment and those of other foreign firms that jumped into the world’s second-largest telecom market lie in tatters after the Supreme Court Thursday cancelled second-generation (2G) mobile licences issued in 2008.

“It’s a shock for the foreign operators, especially as this was a ruling on a government policy decision,” Kamlesh Bhatia, India research director at global consultancy Gartner, told AFP.

“They stand to lose a sizeable investment.”

Telenor’s joint venture, Uninor, complained that the company was being “unfairly treated”.

“We are shocked to see Uninor is being penalised for faults the court has found in the government process,” it said.

The Norwegian firm paid $1.10 billion for a majority stake in the venture with Indian property developer Unitech, which bought a licence in a distribution process that was under-priced and allegedly corrupt.

Unitech was among a number of Indian companies with no telecom experience that sold stakes in their new mobile operations to foreign investors, including Gulf-based Etisalat and Russia’s Sistema JSFC, for hefty sums.

The licensing sales are at the heart of one of India’s biggest corruption scandals in which former telecom minister A. Raja is alleged to have mis-sold the licences and favoured some firms, costing the treasury up to $39 billion.

Raja and a number of company executives, including a Unitech director, have been charged in the scandal which has cast a shadow over Premier Manmohan Singh’s Congress government and triggered nationwide anti-corruption drives.

Indian law allows the affected firms to seek a review of the court order and companies are weighing what action to take.

“The company would like to state that being a law-abiding organisation, it reserves the right to protect its interests by using all available judicial remedies,” Russia’s Sistema said in a statement.

The court ruling said the licenses must be put up for re-bidding, but it remained unclear whether the firms “will have the stomach or resources to invest more to defend businesses which are still in start-up mode,” said Fitch ratings agency.

Telenor, which has been struggling in the Indian market, and other overseas companies “will have to decide whether they want to continue to do telecom business in India,” said Gartner’s Bhatia.

The ruling affects about 70 million subscribers — out of India’s 894-million odd mobile users — who are clients of the operators which lost their licences, forcing users to seek out other providers.

The decision also raises new uncertainty about India as an investment destination at a time when the country is seeking to raise about $1.0 trillion over the next five years to upgrade its dilapidated infrastructure.

“This (decision) could mean that investors may shy away from other priority sectors such as roads and highways, energy and power utilities,” Naveen Mishra, lead telecoms analyst at CyberMedia Research, told AFP.

The licence cancellation follows on the heels of a high-profile government U-turn late last year on allowing foreign supermarkets to enter India.

“There is no regulatory consistency,” said Ashish Basil, partner at consulting firm Ernst & Young India’s telecom group.

The court ruling’s big winners are local phone service providers such as Bharti Airtel and Vodafone India whose unaffected licences were awarded before 2008.

The ruling may also result in a long-anticipated industry consolidation as weak operators fall by the wayside or are swallowed up by stronger rivals.

“The market was waiting for a trigger — it could have been in the form of a mergers and acquisition policy that the regulator put in place — in this case it may be a forced consolidation,” said Gartner’s Bhatia.

Bharti Airtel shares have climbed nearly eight percent since the ruling on expectations that the company would boost profits by winning more subscribers and pushing up call rates.

“Large (Indian) operators are facing high pressures on their margins and are likely to go in for a price hike in an environment where competition is limited,” said Ernst and Young’s Basil.

PM Gilani contempt case, an internal issue: US

TrendPK.com
WASHINGTON: The USA said contempt against Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani is an internal matter of the country and that it is hoped all issues will be resolved under law and the Constitution, TrendPK reports Saturday.

This contempt of court case against him (Prime Minister Gilani) is nothing new; also this is an internal matter of Pakistan, US State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters during a media briefing here.

Reacting to a query regarding Pak-US relations, he said his country is in persistent contact with Pakistani rulers and in wait for the recommendations by the Parliamentary Committee on National Security (PCNS).

Despite the circumstances besetting Pakistan and stagnancy in the bilateral relations, the two countries have continued the cooperation, Toner said adding U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter is in consistent contact with the Pak leadership. TrendPK

Jesse Bender, Forced Marriage in Pakistan

The parents of a California 13-year-old are under investigation after the girl told police she was being forced to go to Pakistan for an arranged marriage.

Jessie Bender, 13, from Hesperia, Calif., was last seen by her mother on Tuesday, February 22.
Melissa Bender, Jessie’s mother told KTLA that Jessie had been chatting with a man she met on Facebook, on the night she went missing.
“He was the last person she spoke to at 1:47 in the morning,” said Melissa.
Jessie Bender’s folks told authorities last month their daughter ran off because she didn’t want to go on a two-month family trip to her step-father’s native country. They then falsely claimed she was abducted by someone she met on Facebook, officials said.

However, after weeks of investigating leads that wrangled the FBI, the U.S. Marshals Office and police departments nationwide, authorities say it was all a lie.

“Bender family members misled detectives and withheld critical information,” San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Roxanne Walker said in a news release.

Jameel Fakhri son still unaccounted for

WASHINGTON: Renowned Pakistani actor Jameel Fakhri’s son could not be traced out even after the lapse of over year, trendpk.com reported Saturday.

Pakistani diplomats in Washington said the FBI completed its investigations. A report in this connection is expected in next week.

It should be mentioned here that Pakistan’s envoy in US Hussain Haqqani filed a report regarding Ayza Fakhri who went missing in the US, with the government officials in June this year. The search is underway ever since.

Jameel Fakhri said his elder son went missing in USA and that he tried his level best to be in touch with Pakistani Ambassador in USA as well as FIA and CIA but no body gave him proper response, adding nowadays Pakistani ambassador even does not respond him on phone call.

It is pertinent to mention here that Ayaz went out of his residence in New York along with his friend in February and did not return and could not be traced out as yet.

Japan anti-terrorism data leaked

Sensitive police documents in Japan related to international terrorism have been leaked online.
More than 100 documents give personal details of people co-operating with terrorism inquiries, and foreigners in Japan apparently under investigation. The documents, which also include intelligence believed to have come from the FBI, are thought to have been published via file-sharing software.
Tokyo’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) says an inquiry is under way. There are concerns that the leak could affect security at the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (Apec) summit on 13 and 14 November. Japan is preparing to host the leaders of 21 countries and regions, including US President Barack Obama.
The confidential documents are believed to have been created by the MPD’s third foreign affairs division, which handles international terrorism investigations, as well as the National Police Agency and Aichi Prefectural Police.
The Asahi newspaper described the leak as a potential disaster that could shatter international trust in Japanese police. Unnamed Tokyo police officials are cited as saying that the contents of the leaked documents are being studied, and officers questioned to determine how the information got into the public domain.

Initial tests of package in Britain not a bomb- FBI

NEW YORK: A suspicious package found on a UPS plane stopped in Britain was initially tested and found not to contain explosives, an FBI source said on Friday.

U.S. authorities were investigating “potentially suspicious items” on Friday on cargo planes that landed at airports in Newark, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, the Transportation Security Administration said. AGENCIES

Initial tests of package in Britain not a bomb- FBI

NEW YORK: A suspicious package found on a UPS plane stopped in Britain was initially tested and found not to contain explosives, an FBI source said on Friday.

U.S. authorities were investigating “potentially suspicious items” on Friday on cargo planes that landed at airports in Newark, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, the Transportation Security Administration said. AGENCIES

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