News Headlines (499) 1 May - 2 May 2014

ONLINE TODAY

► An argument flares up between you and a friend or colleague -- and it needs to run its course. That doesn't mean pursuing your opponent if they back down, just that closure is a must. Today might leave you wondering why you didn't decide to invest in breath mints sooner. It just doesn't matter who you're with or what you're talking about -- you've got an awful lot to say, and most of it goes beyond merely entertaining to actually encourage others. Everyone who loves you -- and even some who don't yet -- sits and listens with nothing more in mind than enjoying the ride.

"Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about." — Oscar Wilde

► BLOOMBERG 1 May 2014 : U.S. Signals Putin Not to Move Against New NATO Members

► DAILY BEAST 29 April 2014 : Kerry: U.S. Taped Moscow's Calls to Its Ukraine Spies 

► SCIENCE DAILY 29 April 2014 : Mother's diet affects the 'silencing' of her child's genes

► DAILY MAIL

■ 28 April 2014 : Finally! Apple to replace faulty power buttons on the iPhone 5 for free following TWO YEARS of complaints 
■ 1 May 2014 : British marine archaeologist claims to have found flight MH370 3,000 miles from the search zone after spotting debris painted in the colours of Malaysia Airlines 

► WIRE 1 May 2014

■ Russian Diplomats Are Trolling the U.S. Space Program
■ Ukrainian President Admits They've Lost Control of the East to Russia
■ Syria Is Using Its Remaining Chemical Weapons as Leverage
■ Spying, Ukraine Are the Main Topics for Meeting Between Obama and Merkel

► TELEGRAPH 2 May 2014 :  If we can hurt Vladimir Putin on Ukraine, why pull our punches over Syria?

► EURO NEWS 1 May 2014 : Tymoshenko dismisses civil war fears, says Putin’s regime facing its end

► MOSCOW TIMES 27 April 2014 : Separatists in Donetsk Give Khodorkovsky the Boot  || ► HUFFINGTON POST 1 May 2014 : A Sunday Morning in Paris With Mikhail Khodorkovsky

► WEEK 1 May 2014 : Bummed George Bush laments how Putin 'changed'

► SPACE

■ 30 April 2014 : How Albert Einstein Helped Blackmail President Roosevelt Over Manhattan Project Funding 
■ 1 May 2014 : Why Is Mars So Much Smaller Than Earth?

ERIC GARCETTI

■ ESPN LA 29 Aril 2014: LA mayor rebukes Time Warner Cable
■ DAILY NEWS 1 May 2014 : Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti headed to Washington, D.C., for White House Correspondents Dinner, meetings with federal leaders

► SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY : CROP CIRCLES The Quest for Truth - HD FEATURE FILM. Uploaded on Mar 17, 2011 by UFOTVstudios

► SCIENCE & ECHNOLOGY : REAL SPIES - FBI/CIA (documentary). Published on Sep 5, 2013 by TheBigbang1001

► PEOPLE & BLOG  : WARNING: WE ARE ON THE VERGE OF NUCLEAR WW3 (RUSSIA DECLARE WAR ON UKRAINE, OBAMA DECEPTION). Published on Mar 3, 2014 by Seho Song

► SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY : BBC Space Documentary - We are the Aliens. Clouds of alien life forms are sweeping through outer space and infecting planets with life. The idea that life on Earth came from another planet has been around as a modern scientific theory since the 1960s when it was proposed by Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe. At the time they were ridiculed for their idea -- known as panspermia. But now, with growing evidence, it's back in vogue and even being studied by NASA. Published on Aug 15, 2013 by Space Vacationers 
    
► ENTERTAINMENT : Scientists make breakthrough on bilharzia. A parasitic disease known as bilharzia, or schistosomiasis, has killed more than 200 million people, but scientists in northern Senegal say they have made a breakthrough in treating it.Bilharzia is carried by small snails that are invisible to the naked eye. It penetrates the skin slowly and destroys internal organs.The Diama dam, built in 1986 to protect farmland from brackish water, changed the Senegal River's ecosystem, wiped out the snail's only predator, the prawn, and allowed bilharzia to multiply and infect hundreds of thousands of villagers.Now scientists are reintroducing prawns into the ecosystem in enclosures and are seeing positive results.Bilharzia is the second most common parasitic disease in the world after malaria.Al Jazeera's Nicolas Haque reports from Lumpsar, northern Senegal. Published on Jan 23, 2014 by Al Jazeera English

► Priorities

► Ukraine detains Russian military attache for spying - By  Matt Robinson
KIEV - Ukraine detained Russia's military attache to Kiev on suspicion of spying and ordered the diplomat to leave the country.  | Slideshow

* IMF approves $17 billion bailout for Ukraine amid big risks 
* Video: Russians shrug off sanctions, IMF says country in recession

► Ukraine begins to retake town held by seperatists - By Maria Tsvetkova
MOSCOW/DONETSK, Ukraine - Ukrainian forces launched a "large-scale operation" to retake the eastern town of Slaviansk, from pro-Russian separatists holding the town.

* Ukraine wins IMF deal, faces $9 billion in debt payments this year
* Slideshow: May Day rallies 

► US Ambassador in Kiev condems events in east Ukraine

► Pro-Russian demonstrators storm police station in Lugansk

► First commercial flight lands at Qatar's $15 bn airport

► 100,000 Russians march on Red Square in patriotic fervour. Some 100,000 workers joined a May Day parade on mosMoscow's Red Square Thursday for the first time since the 1991 Soviet breakup, as the takeover of Crimea boosts President Vladimir Putin's standing amid a surge of patriotism.

► Raw: Over 7,000 Guitarists Attempt World Record. Thousands of guitarists gathered in the market square of the Polish town of Wroclaw on Thursday, and attempted to break the world record for the number of people playing simultaneously the Jimi Hendrix song "Hey Joe."

► NEWS

■ IMF says Russian economy already in recession 
■ India turns to Russia to help supply arms to Afghan forces 
■ China to conduct naval drills with Russia in East China Sea
■ GOP senators: Arm Ukraine, hit Russian banks 

■ Moscow May Day parade lauds Putin as rebels seize more Ukraine buildings



■ Ukraine renews military draft as unrest intensifies.Putin wants troops out of Ukraine's east



■ SLIDESHOW : Moscow revives May Day tradition 

■ Angelinos march for worker's rights in annual May Day protest



■ Cuba calls terrorism designation by U.S. absurd, manipulative



■ U.S. Jewish coalition rejects lobbying group

■ NATO official: Russia now an adversary

► HEALTH : Antibiotic resistance now 'global threat', WHO warns

► MAGAZINE : Marx in Manhattan -  The curious survival of the US Communist Party 

► CULTURE : Fading Gigolo and cinema's love affair with prostitutes

► Quiz of the week's news

Questions:
1. Skype confirmed this week it had removed some emoji symbols which have the potential to offend. Which of these did NOT go?
2. Sicilian capital Palermo is to get a new statue of Christ. Where is it to be located?
3. British musicians protested this week about which item being restricted in prisons?
4. Drag and drop the correct word to complete this BBC News headline: No more free * for Turkmens : bread, petrol, horses
5. A dig in the New Mexico desert has unearthed an unlikely cache of what?
6. Police have warned the public about approaching escaped animals on the loose in South Wales. What are they?
7. Which Norwegian food has won EU protected designation of origin status?


Answers :
1.It was vomiting. Both the middle finger and high-heeled legs were excised.
2. It's on the seabed. It is hoped the statue will attract divers and thus boost tourism.
3. It was steel-string guitars. The restrictions came as part of the government's incentives to prisoners to engage in rehabilitation.  
4. It was petrol. There had been a free allowance since 2008 but it is now being scrapped.
5. It was games for video games console Atari 2600. Much of the dumped stock was copies of a game based on ET and legendary for its awfulness.
6. It was wild boars. More than 40 of the animals were on the loose after a burglary at a farm.   
7. It's the air-dried cod or torrfisk fra lofoten. It joins the likes of Parma ham and champagne in being recognised.

► Today's African Proverb : "A hasty hyena bites the horn" - A proverb from Ethiopia and Eritrea sent by Tarek Mo Alemseged, Glenville, US

► State Guard, police hold night drill in Kiev (VIDEO)
► Iraqi elections: 'Most corrupted one will be the winner' 
► Labor rallies around the globe as world celebrates May Day - LIVE UPDATES 
► IMF gives green light for $17 bn Ukraine aid package
► NSA spies on more US citizens than Russians – Snowden
► BP pipeline sprays 'oily mist' over 33 acres of Alaskan tundra
► Turkish police clash with May Day protesters in Istanbul
► US doesn't care about Ukraine, wants to prove it's still in charge – Lavrov
► Ukrainian troops begin special operation in Slavyansk
► Defiant Apple, Facebook, other firms to inform public of govt surveillance requests
► NATO's second-in-command says Russia is now an enemy, not a partner
► Pentagon says it cannot replace imported Russian rocket engines 
► Fracking-linked earthquakes likely to worsen – seismologists
► Germany drops Snowden's invite to testify on NSA spying in person 
► Fair Russia leader seeks to oust MP for opposing Crimea accession

► OP-ED

■ US-Russia relations need a return to reason
■ Who's really 'presenting lies as facts'? How State Dept. exposes itself to propaganda
■ Scarlet letters: US tool that usurps sanctions?

► BUSINESS

■ Ukraine's gas debt to Russia reaches $3.5 bn
■ Russia sues EU over 'Third Energy Package' - report
■ 'Russia in recession' – IMF

► VIDEOS

■ Locals of east Ukraine cities quit jobs, join protest for greater autonomy. Local administration building, prosecutors office and police headquarters of Ukraine's eastern city of Lugansk have been taken over. Protesters are demanding an amnesty for political prisoners and a referendum on self-determination. RT's Paula Slier met those occupying the administration building in Donetsk, the hub of the pro-autonomy protests.



■ Juice Rap News: Israel vs. Palestine (ft. Kerry, Bibi & Norman Finkelstein)
■ Far-east wildfire ignites military depot, massive explosions rock Siberia, deaths reported

■ Scoring Political Points? NATO bolsters forces in Eastern Europe. Washington repeated its lament for NATO members to boost defense spending. The call has been given greater impetus because the Alliance is stepping up its defense capabilities in Central and Eastern Europe. NATO has sent over 60 more jets to the region. It's also expected to triple its air missions in the Baltic starting next month. Independent researcher and writer Soraya Sepahpour Ulrich believes this is about political points scoring.



■ 'Two steps back: Both EU and Russia should not meddle in Ukraine' - Geert Wilders to RT

■ RT criticized again by US State Dept. for 'false claims' & 'selective editing'. RT has fallen under the criticism of the State Department yet again; accusing the news agency of propagandizing the reports from Ukraine.



■ Guilty by Association? Kerry blames EU for stirring up Ukraine unrest

■ Tear gas, water cannon as May Day protesters clash with police in Istanbul. Riot Police in Istanbul used tear gas and water cannon to break up crowds of protesters during May Day demonstrations. The authorities have blocked off Istanbul's iconic Taksim Square. RT's Sara Firth reports.



■ Anti-govt protesters beat police, storm Prosecutor's Office in Donetsk, E. Ukraine

► Economic top dog: will China overtake US?
► People & Power - Israel's drone dealers
► Iraq Election: Will there be change?

► Lifelines: River of Hope. River Of Hope profiles the work underway in the Senegal Basin to combat the deadly disease schistosomiasis, also known as bilharzia. The approach is novel and the results impressive.

► COLUMNISTS

■ Tit-for-Tat: Putin's Maddening Propaganda Trick - by : Michael Crowley 
■ Where Democracy And American Zionism Butt Heads - by Michael Scherer  
■ The Part of Your Brain That Made You Eat That Doughnut - by : Jeffrey Kluger 

► Watchdog : U.S. War on Drugs in Afghanistan 'A Failure'

► Report : U.S. Should Boost Consumer Privacy Protections

► LOCAL

■ Sterling furor presents test of L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti's leadership
■ Eric Garcetti, L.A.'s back-to-basics mayor. He is building a foundation, but for what?

► FRAMEWORK

■ Pictures in the News | April 30, 2014 - Posted By: Marc Martin
■ Pictures in the News | May 1, 2014 - Posted By: Marc Martin 

In a long-exposure image, embers off burned trees leave long trails in the mountain area near Rancho Cucamonga, Calif. PHOTOGRAPH BY: STUART PALLEY / EPA