Ridley Scott's Robin Hood to open Cannes

British director Ridley Scott's new film Robin Hood, starring Russell Crowe, has been selected to open the annual Cannes Film Festival in May.

The film, about the birth of the Robin Hood legend, also stars Cate Blanchett as Maid Marian, and William Hurt.

It will be screened out of competition on the opening night of the 12-day festival on 12 May.

Nationwide release in France will begin on the same day, with screenings across the world from 14 May.

In 2008 it was reported that production of the movie had been delayed, with studio Universal Pictures citing script concerns and location issues.

The film, which was originally touted to feature Sienna Miller as Maid Marian, has undergone several rewrites, with Crowe at one point mooted to play both Robin and his nemesis the Sheriff of Nottingham.

British actor Matthew Macfadyen - best known as Mr Darcy to Keira Knightley's Elizabeth Bennet in Pride & Prejudice - will now play the Sheriff.

Previous actors to tackle the Robin Hood role include Sean Connery, Errol Flynn and Kevin Costner.

Early award

The movie reunites Crowe, 45, and Scott, 72, who first worked together on the hit 2000 movie Gladiator.

However subsequent collaborations, including 2008's Body of Lies and wine comedy A Good Year (2006), have proved less successful.

It is only Scott's third appearance at the French festival. His early work, The Duellists, appeared in competition in 1977, winning the Best First Work award. Thelma and Louise screened out of competition in 1991.

Robin Hood - originally entitled Nottingham - was adapted for the big screen by Brian Helgeland, who won an Oscar in 1997 for LA Confidential.

Director Tim Burton will head the jury at this year's Cannes Film Festival. Last year's opening film was the hit animated film Up, which won two Oscars earlier this month.

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Russian appeal of 'weather control'

Standing by an open hatch on a Russian military plane high up in the sky is tricky.

All the more so when your job is to "seed" clouds, shovelling chemicals outside to cause rain.

These seeded clouds never make it to Moscow, where millions are enjoying a nice sunny holiday. Or where guests might be dancing at a wedding under the clear blue sky.

Some might think that controlling the weather sounds a bit like science fiction.

But military pilot Alexander Akimenkov doesn't think so.

He has seeded clouds over Moscow on important state holidays for many years. He says the Russians use two different methods to try to drive the rain away.

"Either there's a special machine that spits out silver iodide, dry ice or cement into the clouds, or a hatch opens and a guy with a shovel seeds the clouds manually," he explains.

"As soon as the chemicals touch the cloud, a hole appears. It becomes bigger and bigger, and it either rains right there and then or, if the clouds aren't very dense, they disperse without any precipitation."

The Russian government has used rain prevention methods since Soviet times, seeding clouds for major celebrations three times a year - Victory Day, City Day and, more recently, Russia Day.

There are also private companies that for some $6,000 per hour say they can guarantee sunshine on your wedding day - or for any other private party.

Many ecologists agree that these techniques, also used in many other countries for irrigation purposes, do not pose much of a threat to the environment or people's health, as the period of active influence on the clouds is very short.

But when Moscow's mayor Yuri Luzhkov suggested the technique could shift the winter snow outside the capital - and therefore save more than $10m in snow-clearing costs - many felt the city authorities were going a bit too far.

Even if the idea might appeal to Moscow drivers, tired of constant traffic jams - especially bad in snowy conditions - it has stirred concerns among local ecologists.

"Millions of tonnes of snow diverted from Moscow will create chaos in the areas where it is forced to fall and might even lead to the collapse of bridges and roofs," said Alexei Yablokov, one of Russia's leading environmentalists, who was ecological adviser to former President Boris Yeltsin.

Besides, a lack of snow in Moscow would cause many problems in the capital itself, he said.

"Why do we need snow in Moscow? Snow on the ground helps the roots of trees to survive during severe frosts. If there's no snow, lots of vegetation - trees, bushes - will die.

"Snow also cleans the atmosphere very effectively. If there's nothing to clean the Moscow atmosphere, many people will die - there will be tens or even hundreds of additional deaths," explains Mr Yablokov.

'Groundless' concerns

But Valery Stasenko from Roshydromet - the Federal Service of Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring - calls these concerns groundless.

"It is stupid to say that there won't be any snow in Moscow. If there is some five centimetres of it, it's absolutely fine, but there is a limit when all the transport just stops," he said, adding that the aim of winter cloud-seeding would not be to get rid of snow, but to control its level, not letting it go over this maximum limit.

The planes will be out only occasionally, said Mr Stasenko, to prevent major snowfall that happens on average three or four times a month. Thus it will cost a lot less than using snowploughs that are out most days of the winter.

Besides, the idea didn't come to the Moscow mayor from nowhere, it is based on facts. In the early 1980s, back in the Soviet period, there was a special service to limit snowfall over Moscow. It stopped working during perestroika [Gorbachev's reforms], when money became scarce," Mr Stasenko said.

"Some eight to 10 planes had to find clouds with the most precipitation and spray them with crystallising chemicals.

"Not all water vapour in the atmosphere turns to precipitation, and for the snow to fall, water vapour should concentrate on ice crystals first. So we were making snow fall before it reached Moscow and this work reduced the amount of snow in the capital by 20, 30 and sometimes 40%."

Ecology threat

And even though this winter is over and the snow in Moscow will soon disappear naturally, scientists at the Central Aerological Observatory of Roshydromet have been working for months trying to come up with new, improved techniques of winter cloud-seeding.

They refused to explain the essence of their work. And this secrecy raises important environmental concerns, says a climate specialist from the Russian Academy of Sciences' Department of Earth Sciences, Nina Zaitseva. She believes that even with raincloud seeding, much depends on luck and coincidence.

She is sceptical about the current research and the state's past or present ability to effectively seed winter clouds.

"I don't think there will be good results - dry substances are not able to have any noticeable reaction with ice particles. But if they decide to seed winter clouds with a liquid, they should first and foremost think about the ecological consequences," said Dr Zaitseva.

Regardless of the Moscow authorities' final decision on snow cloud seeding, Russia remains one of the few nations where weather control is more than using anti-hail cannons and battling droughts.

So if you want to visit Moscow and don't fancy rain, go there on one of the three precipitation-free holidays.

And if you want to ensure your wedding day is dry - it might just be possible to make it happen.

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Google's rift with China is a calculated business risk

Google's move into China four years ago was billed by some people as a battle between the irresistible force and the immovable object.

The inexorable expansion of the internet - epitomised by Google - would never exist happily in a command economy like China, said critics.

By taking its search engine onto Chinese soil - and thus agreeing to Beijing's censorship rules - Google was accused of trading reputation for profit.

On Monday, however, Google pulled its search facility out of mainland China, redirecting users to an uncensored site in Hong Kong.

What now for both profits and reputation? Has it shut the door on the world's biggest internet market?

The Great Firewall

China has hit back at Google, limiting its citizens' use of the search facility through web filters that are collectively known as the Great Firewall.

And some of Google's business partners are already starting to distance themselves from the company.

On Wednesday China's second-largest mobile operator, Unicom, announced that it would drop Google's search function from two new handsets that are being developed.

Official Chinese figures put the number of internet users at 384 million. But the number of mobile subscribers - people who do or will eventually - use the internet on their handsets is 745 million.

At Sina Corp, which owns a portal featuring a Google search bar on its main page, executives are considering the future of link with the US giant.

And there are several other news reports from China about how Google's partners and advertisers are reviewing their relationships with the internet giant.

These moves underline the potential impact on Google's business.

On the face of it, picking a fight with the rulers of what is soon to be the world's biggest economy looks like commercial stupidity.

Today's business mantra says that any company which wants to be global has to do business with China.

And yet, there is a growing consensus among analysts that Google's move will have only limited impact on its business.

Google's share price had fallen about 6% since the company announced on 12 January that it was considering a withdrawal from China.

But since Monday, when the final decision was made, the shares have been rising.

Don't Be Evil

Google, whose motto Don't Be Evil was tarnished by the move to China, has won plaudits in the blogosphere and among the commentariat for its decision to withdraw.

The company has stood up for free speech and unfettered enterprise, they say.

These are fine words, says technology analyst Graham Titterington, but in reality they are just "fluff".

"Google has taken a hard-headed business decision," he said.

Mr Titterington, principal analyst at Ovum, said: "Google has looked at the benefits and damage to its business, and made a decision on whether the move will do more harm than good."

In the immediate term, Mr Titterington does not expect much damage because China remains a small part of the company's operations. "Indeed, outside China there will be some kudos and benefits to company and its brand image," he said.

China's total internet advertising market was worth about $1bn last year, with Google's revenues from the country amounting to about $250m-$300m.

This revenue figure represents about 1% to 2% of Google's total, estimates Youssef Squali, analyst at Jefferies & Co.

Before Google moved to the mainland, it had perhaps 13% of the China search market. Going "onshore" took market share to about 20%. Even if Google's share returns to 13% or less, it is by no means critical for the company.

"Exiting China would not be too damaging for Google since the company is the market share leader in most non-domestic markets, where search usage and monetisation opportunities still abound," Mr Squali said.

Besides, Google was already struggling to consolidate and grow in China. For many analysts Beijing clearly backed Baidu as the home-grown internet market leader.

Censorship

Google also faced subtle - and not so subtle - attempts to restrict growth, and was already the subject of attacks from officials over alleged failure to comply with censorship rules.

It is likely that Google saw the writing on the wall a long time ago.

But, surely, losing a position in the world's single biggest constituency of web users must be a retrograde step? After all, by 2014 the Chinese market for internet advertising could grow to as much as $20bn, according to estimates.

Mr Titterington agrees: "In the longer term, Google needs China more than China needs Google."

But he does not believe Google will remain outside China forever. In fact, he believes the company could be operating within the country again within three years.

"China is opening, and in time they [the leaders] will change and react," he said.

Google may have anticipated China would relax its rigid control on society sooner than it has done. But eventually it will happen.

"Politicians have to live with short memories. At some stage they [Google and Beijing] will start co-operating again," Mr Titterington said.

The big question, though, will be how much momentum Google will have lost in the meantime." Will the growth of indigenous operators like Baidu effectively marginalise Google, making a return to China irrelevant?

Not everyone is so optimistic that Google will make a quick return. David Wolf, president of technology marketing consultancy Wolf Group, says it will take years for Google to rebuild partnerships in China.

"Trust me, [Google] aren't walking away from this unhurt," he told the Associated Press news agency.

Nor does the rhetoric coming from Beijing bode well for an early rehabilitation.

The Beijing government called Google's withdrawal "totally wrong", while the People's Daily newspaper was even more strident.

The paper said Google was part of an internet war being orchestrated by the US intelligence services.

Herein lies a danger. What is currently a dispute over business, risks becoming a dispute over politics - which would make it far more difficult for relations to heal.

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Multiple Choice Question

Celebrities like to out-do each other in the strange-name stakes. Actor Nicholas Cage has a child named Kal-El, after the birth name of which comic book character

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Your pictures of the week: Lazy

Here's our weekly look at your pictures and this time we asked you for photographs on the theme of being lazy.

We received more than 250 entries this week, so once again I offer my thanks to all of you who submitted work.

You can see the ones I have selected here.

hope you enjoy looking at the pictures and if you have any comments to make, you can do so below.

If your picture didn't make this week's selection, why not send us something for next week?

The new theme is "clouds" - a theme suggested by reader Barbara Gordon.

Interpret this in any way you see fit and send your pictures to us at yourpics@bbc.co.uk or upload them directly from your computer.

Please include the word "clouds" in the subject line of your message.

The deadline is midnight GMT Tuesday 30 March 2010, and remember to add your name and a caption: who, what, where and when should be enough, though the more details you give, the better your chance of being selected.

We will publish a selection of your photos this time next week.

You can now see a list of the next four themes on this page which will be updated each week.

Files should be sent as JPEGs. They shouldn't be larger than 10Mb and ideally much smaller: around 1Mb is fine, or you can resize your pictures to 1,000 pixels across.

Please see our terms and conditions, but remember that the copyright remains with you. The pictures will only be used by the BBC for the purposes of this project. Finally, when taking photos, please do not endanger yourself or others, take unnecessary risks or infringe any laws.

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US schools grapple with gay rights at the school prom

When officials at a small high school in rural Mississippi cancelled the annual prom, little did they know they would trigger a passionate national debate.

For many American teenagers, the high-school prom is a rite of passage on the path to adulthood. But for 18-year-old Constance McMillen, a milestone was reached sooner than she had anticipated when she emerged as a cause celebre among gay rights advocates around the nation.

Ms McMillen - who came out as a lesbian in her early teens - challenged her school's ban on same-sex prom dates.

Earlier this month, Itawamba Agricultural High School scrapped the event rather than reverse a decision banning Ms McMillen escorting her same-sex date, and from wearing a tuxedo - male evening dress - instead of a prom gown.

School officials defended the decision, saying that the whole issue had become a "distraction to the learning process".

Ms McMillen's case has been taken up by the American Civil Liberties Union, which has taken the school to court in an attempt to reinstate the prom. It is also asking the judge to rule on whether Ms McMillen's right to freedom of expression has been violated.

On Tuesday, a federal judge said he wouldn't force the school to hold the dance, but said he would hold a trial at a later date to determine if Ms McMillen's rights had been violated

Ms McMillen had earlier told the court that she "had the right to go to the prom just like someone straight".

Unwelcome spotlight

In the past fortnight, she has been plucked out of her hometown of Fulton to appear on news programmes, and the Ellen DeGeneres show, where she was presented with a $30,000 (£20,000) cheque from a digital media company to help fund her college education.
A Facebook group set up by the ACLU entitled Let Constance Take her Girlfriend to the Prom has attracted almost 400,000 fans.

But, back in rural Fulton, the town of 4,000 residents is reeling from the publicity the case has attracted.

Asked to comment for this article, pastor Bobby Crenshaw of the local Southside Baptist Church acknowledged that the case had brought an unwelcome spotlight to the town but did not want to say more. The Southern Baptist Convention said no-one was available.

Fulton Mayor Paul Walker told the BBC News website by telephone that the "community had had its nose rubbed in it a bit".

"We're deep in the Bible Belt," said Mayor Walker. "It's a traditional Southern town, but contrary to what people think, we don't all stand around in blue overalls chewing tobacco."

He described the community as "conservative" and said it "was a great place to raise a family".

We didn't want this to happen, but it has. But the wounds will heal and we will get back together and move forward," he said.

In court on Monday, the school's principal said he had received thousands of e-mails, mostly supporting Ms McMillen.

"I've been called every name known to man," the Clarion Ledger reported Trae Wiygul as saying. "I've been called a bigot, a homophobe and a few cuss words. It's been pretty rough."

Ms McMillen, too, has said there has been some hostility toward her on the school campus. She reported that one person had said: "Thanks for ruining my senior year."

Prom rights

Chris Hampton of the ACLU's Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender (LGBT) Project, says she has never seen a case like the one in Mississippi.

"We deal with quite a lot of cases where students are told they are not allowed to bring a same-sex partner to a prom but the schools often back down," she says.

We even have a letter on our website that students can download and present to school administrators setting out that LGBT students have rights and that these rights exist in the context of the school prom."

Many schools, of course, allow same-sex dates with no questions asked. On Monday, Macon.com reported that a high school in a small town in the state of Georgia had given the OK for an 18-year-old to take his same-sex date to next month's prom.

Ms Hampton said she had never known a school to cancel a prom as a result of a dispute over gay students.

Daryl Presgraves of the Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) agreed that while discrimination in terms of prom policy was not uncommon, this was the most extreme case he had encountered.

He said it was unusual that the school was sticking to its guns "in the face of all the media attention".

Part of the problem was that for most schools, issues to do with sexual orientation and gender expression were relatively new, he said.

"Ten or 15 years ago, most schools would say they didn't have any LGBT students, now most schools have an out LGBT student," he said.

He said many schools were grappling with the issues, particular those schools in what he described as more conservative areas.

"They don't do due diligence to find out what the laws say and what the rights of the students are. We see this particularly in the setting up of Gay-Straight Alliances (GSAs) within schools," he added.

Pervasive bullying

GSAs are student clubs that "work to improve school climate for all students, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity/expression".

There are more than 4,000 GSAs registered with GLSEN - but only six of those, according to Mr Presgraves, are in Mississippi.

While federal civil rights laws expressly address discrimination on the basis of race, colour, gender, disability or national origin, they do not explicitly include sexual orientation or gender identity.

Ms McMillen's case has helped draw attention to a new bill - The Student Anti-Discrimination Act - introduced by Congressman Jared Polis in January, which would extend civil rights protections to such students.

Mr Presgraves said much still needed to be done to protect LGBT students from discrimination, given that bullying was still a "pervasive problem" in schools.

"Schools have made a big effort to address general bullying but their programmes don't address bias-based bullying," he said.

In 2005, GLSEN carried out a national survey of all students - not just LGBT - to gauge what the general population was experiencing in terms of bullying.

"Categories of student bullying based on actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender expression are two of the top three reasons students cited for bullying," said Mr Presgraves.

He said the fact that so many Gay-Straight Alliances had been registered indicated that schools would not be able to avoid the issue for much longer.

Some schools perceived there to be a "culture war" going on around them, he said.

"There is a debate going on and they are saying they don't want anything to do with it. They are, therefore wrongly discriminating to avoid what they perceive to be the great debate going on in society."

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'Pirate' death puts spotlight on 'guns for hire'

The death of a suspected pirate off the coast of Somalia has drawn attention to the use of armed private security contractors on board merchant vessels.

The incident, which involved guards aboard the Panamanian-flagged MV Almezaan, is believed to be the first of its kind.

But several organisations, including the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), have previously expressed concerns over the use of armed security contractors.

"While we understand that owners want to protect their ships, we don't agree in principle with putting armed security on ships," IMB director Capt Pottengal Mukundan told the BBC News website.

"Ships are not an ideal place for a gun battle."

One argument is that the use of armed operatives could encourage pirates to use more violence when taking a ship.

But Mr Mukundan said he had seen no evidence that there had been much of an increase in the use of armed guards by merchant ship owners.

Dozens of warships patrol the waters off the Somali coast, but this has not deterred the pirates. The amount of ocean to patrol is extremely vast and pirates have responded to the increased naval presence by moving attacks farther out to sea.

"The naval forces are displacing the threat - they can't be everywhere at once," says Nick Davis, chief executive of Merchant Maritime Warfare Centre, a not-for-profit organisation.

"Almost the whole of the Indian Ocean region - some 5 million square nautical miles - is a security risk."

Prevention

But the shipping industry has, so far, largely resisted arming their boats - not least because this would deny them port in some nations. Furthermore, arming the ships can raise liability issues and increase insurance costs.

Christopher Ledger, director of security firm Idarat Maritime, says the use of private operatives is not necessary and that ship owners can find other ways to protect themselves, such as boosting training, carrying out more drills and purchasing equipment that could prevent pirates boarding a vessel.

"Private security guards are not necessary, they simply muddy the water," he said. "They are often foreign to the crew themselves and they don't know the ship well.
Many are former soldiers that have been in Iraq or Afghanistan and they think they can shake the dust off their shoes and make it as a private security guard. Their day rate is pretty high and the crew have to find ways to get them on and off the vessels."

Their presence, he said, would only lead to "more spilt blood".

This month, international law firm Ince and Co released a report highlighting the issues arising from the use of armed guards. It pointed out that a fundamental question arose as to who would authorise the use of force.

Stephen Askins, a lawyer with Ince, told the BBC News website that the debate on the use of armed guards was one that polarised the industry.

"Most industry bodies and ship-owners are against them," he said. "But no ship with an armed guard has been hijacked, so there are those - particularly those who have had hijacked ships - who think they are necessary."

He said private security companies had come into their own in places like Iraq and had seen seen the maritime sector as potentially lucrative.

"Many have moved across but there is no system of accreditation, so there is no way of knowing the good from the bad," he said.

Legal status

Most security operatives are former British servicemen, but there are also operatives from the US, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

Mr Askins said some firms provided armed escort vessels, but that these did not have any status in international law.

"The various conventions dealing with piracy relate to states and their navies," he said. "The rights that they are given, like the right of innocent passage relate to military ships. There are also issues over the use of armed force. The relevant law is the law of the flag state, but a merchant ship could, for example, be Panamanian and the escort ship could be, say, UK flagged."

But he also pointed out that there were some very good companies that had "robust rules of engagement".

"Lethal force for them would come after a series of steps including warning shots. The good companies would follow that procedure. Normally that would be enough to deter an attack."

In May 2009, the US Coast Guard drafted a maritime security directive that would require US-flagged ships sailing around the Horn of Africa to post guards, and ship owners to submit anti-piracy security plans for approval.

At the time, the Coast Guard's director of prevention policy, Rear Admiral James Watson, said that they expected to see "additional security" that could "involve the use of firearms".

He added that they were "looking for things that work but that don't make the situation worse".

The directive has not yet passed into law.

For now, the handling of Tuesday's shooting by a private security operative will be watched closely by legal experts.

An independent inquiry is planned, but first investigators will need to establish who had jurisdiction - the flag the vessel was flying, its owners or the nationality of the contractors - and who was responsible for the security contractors.

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The hospital of the future

Norman Foster, the man whose practice brought us the Gherkin, Beijing Airport, and the Great Court at the British Museum has until now had nothing to do with healthcare.

That has all changed, however, as his first hospital opens amid bold claims that it has reinvented what a hospital can look like.

Situated on the outskirts of Bath, the glass and metal box sits on the edge of a business park and suggests that it might be a trendy headquarters for a computer firm or even perhaps an art gallery.

Inside, it certainly feels more like a posh hotel lobby than a typical NHS waiting room and reception.

Instead of disinfectant it is the smell of coffee and leather seating that greets you. The view through the plate glass windows is of the green fields outside Bath.

The forest of signs that normally greets you at the entrance to a hospital is replaced with people to guide you to the right place. Equipment is hidden away. Everything is designed to calm you.

Upstairs, each patient who stays in overnight has their own room with a view. The floor is made of oak. The windowsill has a herbarium. Downstairs even the operating theatre has a view of the countryside.

Painful costs

Of course, Circle Bath is a private hospital but one that will offer operations to NHS patients at the fixed NHS rate. It is claimed that it was built for roughly the same as any comparable modern hospital.

The ideas though are not new. Increasingly, research is beginning to show that we get better quicker if we recuperate in calm environments with natural light.

The surgeons here say that the calmer the patient the less anaesthetic they have to use, the faster people are back on their feet. It raises productivity.

It is an agenda that has been championed by the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, CABE.

Some such as the new childrens' wing at Moorfields, Newton Abbot's Community Hospital and the Norfolk and Norwich have all won praise for introducing light and cheer.

But other products of the £12bn hospital programme have not been praised so highly.

The minister responsible for architecture, Margaret Hodge, spoke last year about the dark rooms and miles of corridors of the new Queens building in Romford.

CABE says there is a long way to go to truly make most of our hospitals welcoming and attractive places to be.

The problem is that healthcare is far more complex than an art gallery or other prestige architectural projects.

Each building has hundreds of activities that change rapidly over time. Familiar solutions are repeated rather than risk tens of millions on new ideas.

Clinical demands are the priority over beauty or natural light and it is rare for an architect new to the field to be given a remit to experiment.

Circle Bath, though, is a new venture and a co-operative of local clinicians. Clinical demands for a clinical atmosphere have to be married with the need to attract patients.

As a consequence the scheme has borrowed heavily from modern hotel design to try to create an atmosphere we want to be in, more health spa than health factory.

The economics is driven by the fact that they can choose which services to provide - this is a place for knees and cataracts, high volume, straight forward day care.

But by making it a beautiful building they hope it will bring in the customers and will speed their passage through the system. Good design, they hope, pays for itself.

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Late blooming daffodils spark web appeal in Cumbria

Tourism chiefs in Cumbria are encouraging people to "tweet" online should they spot a blooming daffodil in the Lake District.

The daffodils, made famous by William Wordsworth, are more than a month late this year following the cold winter.

One of the most famous places to see daffodils in Cumbria is Dora's Field in Rydal near Ambleside.

The "Daffs Watch" appeal asks people to use the social networking site Twitter to point to where they are blooming.

Eric Robson, Chairman of Cumbria Tourism, said: "It's virtually unheard of not to have seen a single daffodil in the Lake District by the middle of March.

"It's an industry of its own with visitors coming here just to see them by the lakesides.

"The upside is that because they are late, it means they should be out and looking their best for the Easter holidays."

Peter Elkington lives at Rydal Mount and Gardens, which is Wordsworth's former home and a visitor attraction open to the public.

Mr Elkington, the curator, said there were plenty of daffodils in Dora's Field but no signs yet of any blooming.

Dora's Field was named after Wordsworth's daughter Dora, who died in 1847.

William Wordsworth lived at Rydal Mount for 37 years until his death in April 1850.

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US plans to give high-speed broadband to every American

US regulators have unveiled the nation's first plan to give every American super-fast broadband by 2020.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which will now submit the plan to Congress, said broadband was the "greatest infrastructure challenge".

It estimates that one-third of Americans, about 100 million people, are without broadband at home.

The FCC's goal is to provide speeds of 100 megabits per second (Mbps), compared to an average 4Mbps now.

"Broadband for every American is not too ambitious a plan and it is absolutely necessary," former FCC chairman Reed Hundt told BBC News.

"The consequences of not succeeding are heartbreaking. Every nation needs a common medium to gather around and to have the internet as a common medium where a third are left out is unacceptable."

'Silver bullet'

In an executive summary released ahead of the presentation to Congress on 16 March, the FCC said: "Broadband is a foundation for economic growth, job creation, global competitiveness and a better way of life.

It is changing how we educate children, deliver healthcare, manage energy, ensure public safety, engage government, and access, organise and disseminate knowledge".

For industry analyst Erik Sherman of business and news site BNet.com, all the talk "sounds like an overstatement".

"The plan cannot be a silver bullet for all these issues and problems which exist for a number of different reasons and not just because of a lack of broadband.

"The plan is very big in scope and if you look at the rationale, the FCC is basically saying we need more money for more internet. I am not saying we don't need a broadband plan but we have to be realistic about what it can and cannot do," Mr Sherman told BBC News.

'Fairy wings and wishes'

Months of hype and speculation has preceded the presentation of the country's first comprehensive broadband roadmap. The FCC has also held a series of briefings previewing its goals.

"It's an action plan, and action is necessary to meet the challenges of global competitiveness, and harness the power of broadband to help address so many vital national issues," said FCC chairman Julius Genachowski.

The executive summary revealed that access to high-speed internet services had grown dramatically from eight million Americans 20 years ago to nearly 200 million today.

Estimates to implement the plan have been put at $350bn (£233bn). How that bill will be split between private investment and tax dollars is not known.

"Who pays and how much is the big fight ahead," said technology industry analyst Rob Enderle of the Enderle Group.

"The devil is in the detail and right now it's all fairy wings and wishes. The Republicans are going to fight anything that is excessively expensive while the Democrats have to be wary of looking like they are cutting cheques at a time when the government is for the most part broke."

The FCC will auction off some 500 megahertz of spectrum to pay for some of the expense. More than $7bn will come from President Obama's 2009 stimulus package, which targeted broadband-related initiatives.

'Digital exclusion'

For years the technology industry has pushed for the US government to create a national broadband plan

Ahead of today's meeting with Congress, a number of hi-tech companies wrote to Mr Genachowski to praise the plan.

"Broadband is critical to America's long-term economic and social well-being. As society increasingly moves online, the costs of digital exclusion grow as well," said the signatories of the letter, which included Cisco, Sony, Salesforce, Microsoft, Facebook and Intel.

One possible battleground is expected to be over the sale of spectrum that is mostly in the hands of television broadcasters.

Mobile carriers like AT&T and Verizon have said they will need more spectrum in future to provide superfast reliable internet connections to every customer.

"The problem is most of the spectrum is occupied by somebody else. They are going to want a lot of money for this," said Adam Thierer, president of the free-market leaning Progress & Freedom Foundation.

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Japan aims its home fuel cells at Europe

Following the success of a half-price subsidy for CO2-busting fuel-cell heat and energy generators for homes, Japan is now poised to ship its attention to supplying the UK and Germany with this hi-tech next-generation energy source.

With over 5,000 fuel cells providing heat and energy for conventional homes up and down Japan, the BBC has learnt that companies such as electronics giant Panasonic are in talks with EU governments about the possibility of bringing these proven energy and carbon-saving devices to market in Europe and elsewhere.

Panasonic has described the interest in its commercial fuel-cell project from the German, Korean and UK governments as "intense", and is confident that Japan, as the first to start commercial sales for homes last year, will be the forerunner in bringing the technology into common use.

Fuel cells - a technology that has been around for more than 100 years - convert fuels such as hydrogen and natural gas into electricity through an electrochemical reaction. The resultant heat generated also warms buildings in gas-boiler-sized boxes known as cogeneration fuel cells.

The idea is to generate all of the heating and hot water and the majority of the electricity needed by a typical UK home, without the need to be connected to the energy wasteful national grid.

Such efficient use of gas supplies can save the consumer around 25% of total energy costs, and reduce each home's CO2 emissions by up to 2.5 tonnes per annum, according to their makers.

They also claim customers can earn back the system's relatively high cost, running at present into thousands of pounds, within a few years through utility bill savings.

Cost issue

Panasonic and Toshiba, another manufacturer of home-use fuel cells in Japan, sell their cogeneration fuel cells through energy companies such as Tokyo Gas for around 3.1 to 2.2 million yen. Panasonic claims around 3,000 customers so far, including the Japanese PM's office.

Half that price is met by the government on each purchase, while other incentives bring the real price down for consumers to about 1 million yen (£7,300).

If the price falls again still, its popularity will gain momentum," general manager of Panasonic's fuel cell project, Mr Yasumasa Kurosaki, told the BBC. He added that the company aimed at fixing the per-unit price at around 500,000 yen, and get it even lower in the near future.

With economies of scale, Panasonic says, such devices could be competitively priced at around a couple of thousand of pounds by 2013.

"With over 40,000 hours running time already logged, we have proven the safety, reliability and CO2 savings of our devices in the real world while sales are improving gradually. We expect next year's sales to be up 20-30% on the last fiscal year," he said.

The UK government has estimated that microgeneration products, such as fuel-cell combined-heat-and-power (CHP) units, have the potential to supply over one-third of the country's total electricity needs and help meet its environmental obligations.

However, high capital costs are still a major barrier to widespread adoption of fuel-cell technology.

Fuel-cell makers have yet to turn a profit despite the massive investments in Japan and elsewhere around the world.

But some are optimistic the gas-burning-without-combustion systems could be the answer to soaring fuel costs and lowering carbon emissions.

Pay-back time

"Once fuel cells hit the US$5,000 (£3,300) mark, which we imagine will happen in the next 2 years, these units will become as compelling to home owners as energy-saving water-heaters and double-glazing," Tokyo- based entrepreneur and business analyst Terrie Lloyd told the BBC.

"It will be hard to ignore a product that might save US$2,500 or more a year on energy bills."

The UK government meanwhile recently announced further support for the adoption of the technology with a money-back feed-in-tariff (FIT) for all fuel-cell owners that starts this April.

Under the FIT, any household installing a fuel cell will receive a generation payment of 10p/kWh for all electricity generated over a 10-year period, plus an additional export payment of 3p/kWh for any electricity that is not consumed in the home and is fed back into the grid.

Importantly, households will still retain the efficiency savings on their energy bills, providing an incentive to consume any electricity generated on-site, in preference to exporting to the grid.

"On average, a home fuel user can expect about £360-a-year cash-back in addition to the energy bill savings from consuming the electricity generated on-site," according to the UK's leading fuel-cell maker, Ceres Power.

The company plans to go into mass production after completing field studies this year. Initial prices for its generators are not yet available but they are unlikely to match Japanese competiveness, says Mr Lloyd, as Japan has achieved a big start with widespread commercialization last year.

Export possibilities

Despite high prices, some think the market is ready to explode. Tokyo-based research firm Fuji-Keizai Group has estimated Japan's market for fuel cells will expand nearly 100-fold from fiscal 2009 to 1.61 trillion yen in fiscal 2025 owing to uptake of the technology for housing and vehicles.

Fuel-cell systems for housing, says its report, will serve as a driving force for the market until 2018 when fuel-celled cars are expected to take over demand.

Panasonic is bullish about possible exports of Japanese know-how to the UK and Germany where gas is generally cheaper than electricity per kW and solar cells offer a poor return on investment.

Mr Kurosaki said he was confident Panasonic could reduce costs, increase efficiency and extend the life of its units which now have a lifespan of 10 years to make an attractive package to overseas buyers and governments looking to cut CO2 emissions quickly.

With gas fuel for Japan's fuel cells more costly per kW than electricity in Japan, some analysts see Japan's nascent fuel-cell industry reaping benefits abroad.

And with such high prices for gas in energy-poor Japan, take up of the new technology may well fizzle out along with the government subsidies that support the current market. Cutting capital costs and boosting sales to compete abroad seems the only likelihood of success for the Japanese makers if they are to scale up and be competitive without subsidies.

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Hollywood plans turkey tale movie

The story of a woman who was stranded by snow for a month after she popped out to buy a Christmas turkey could be made into a Hollywood film.

A company has bought the rights to the story of Kay Ure, who lives with husband John in Cape Wrath, in the extreme north west of Scotland.

Mrs Ure set out on 19 December to go to Inverness to buy festive food, but was unable to return home for 30 days.

Movie company Furst Films offered the couple £40,000 for their story.

Mrs Ure was driven by her husband 11 miles from their home in the Cape Wrath lighthouse keeper's cottage to a jetty where their boat was moored and from there they crossed the Kyle of Durness sea loch.

She then embarked on 100-mile bus journey to Inverness, where she managed to reach the shops and buy a turkey before attempting to return home - only to discover that the final 11-mile leg of the journey was blocked by snow.

She had to spend Christmas in a friend's caravan, while her husband had the company of their six dogs, and two walkers who had been passing-by.

Furst Films - whose movies include The Matador, The Cooler and The Girl In The Park - are to pay the couple for the rights to a screenplay and consultation.

Mr Ure told BBC Scotland the offer from Furst had come as a complete surprise.

He said: "We thought it was a joke until we Googled them and found out they'd won a few Golden Globes."

Mr Ure said he would like "someone with a bit of character" to play him, with his choice being Scottish actor Robert Carlyle.

But he stressed the film would be as much about the couple's lifestyle - they have no mains electricity and are forced to rely on a generator - as it was about poultry.

"It's not just about the turkey, it's about our life story and how we came to be here," he explained.

"People find it intriguing that we're living this kind of lifestyle up here but we're used to it and it's a pleasant way to live."

He said he hoped the film would help bring some business to their small cafe, which is one of Britain's most remote eateries.

"We've only had one customer since Christmas and they only wanted coffee and snacks, but we expect business to pick up in May," he told BBC Scotland.

The couple are already planning for this year's festive period, with Mr Ure joking: "This Christmas I'm going to be better prepared, and keep the wife on a shorter lead.

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Divide Nigeria in two, says Muammar Gaddafi

Nigeria should be divided into two nations to avoid further bloodshed between Muslims and Christians, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has said.

In a speech to students, he praised the example of India and Pakistan, where he said partition saved many lives.

Splitting Nigeria "would stop the bloodshed and burning of places of worship," state news agency Jana quoted him as saying.

A senior Nigerian diplomat said he did not take the suggestion seriously.

Hundreds of people have died in communal violence in villages around the central Nigerian city of Jos this year.

'Historic, radical solution'

Although the violence generally takes place between Muslim and Christian communities, the underlying causes are a complex mix of political, social and economic grievances.

Nigeria is roughly split between its largely Muslim north, and a Christian-dominated south.

Mr Gaddafi, until recently head of the African Union, characterised the Jos violence as a "deep conflict of religious nature" caused by the federal state, "which was made and imposed by the British in spite of the people's resistance to it".

He described the partition of India as a "historic, radical solution" which saved the lives of "millions of Hindus and Muslims".

Splitting India in 1947 caused a breakdown of law and order in which at least 200,000 people died. Some estimates say one million people were killed.

About 12 million people were left homeless and thousands were raped.

An attempt by the Igbo people of south-eastern Nigeria to secede in 1967 sparked a war which left more than one million people dead.

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US sends FBI agents to investigate Mexico killings

American FBI agents have been sent to the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez to investigate the deaths of three US citizens.

Three people connected to the consulate were killed in drive-by shootings on Saturday in two separate incidents.

The US state department said the killings underscored the "severe and significant danger" Mexico represents to the United States.

Mexico has blamed the killings on a gang linked to a drugs cartel.

But investigators have said it is too early to tell if those killed were deliberately targeted.

"It could be a mistaken identity, it could be that they were targeted; we don't know at this point," special agent Andrea Simmons, a spokesman for the FBI's El Paso, Texas, office told Agence France-Presse.

Some eight FBI agents will be working alongside Mexican authorities in the investigation, she added.

Flashpoint city

On Saturday, Lesley Enrique - a US citizen working at the Juarez consulate - her American husband, Arthur Redelf, and Jorge Alberto Sarcido - the Mexican husband of another consular employee - were shot dead in two separate incidents.

Both couples had just left a social event in the city when they were killed.

Enriquez, 35, and her 34-year-old husband were killed in a hail of bullets as they drove their car towards the US side of the border. Their one-year-old baby was found unharmed in the back seat.

In the second attack, gunmen opened fire on the car belonging to Jorge Alberto Sarcido, killing him and wounding his two children.

The state department said the killings were a "tragedy".

"We all share the determination that, ultimately, through a variety of means, we will take back these streets one community at a time," state spokesman PJ Crowley told a news briefing.

His comments come a day ahead of a visit to the city by Mexican President Felipe Calderon, who will make his third tour this year of the country's most violent city to discuss the government's efforts to tackle organised crime.

Mexico is battling a drug war that has killed some 18,000 people since 2006.

Ciudad Juarez is a major flashpoint in the battle between Mexican drug gangs over trafficking routes to the US. More than 2,600 people were murdered there in drug-related violence last year alone.

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Weymouth ridgeway skeletons 'Scandinavian Vikings'

Fifty-one decapitated skeletons found in a burial pit in Dorset were those of Scandinavian Vikings, scientists say.

Mystery has surrounded the identity of the group since they were discovered at Ridgeway Hill, near Weymouth, in June.

Analysis of teeth from 10 of the men revealed they had grown up in countries with a colder climate than Britain's.

Archaeologists from Oxford believe the men were probably executed by local Anglo Saxons in front of an audience sometime between AD 910 and AD 1030.

The Anglo Saxons were increasingly falling victim to Viking raids and eventually the country was ruled by a Danish king.

The mass grave is one of the largest examples of executed foreigners buried in one spot.

It was discovered during investigative excavation work before construction started on a controversial £87m relief road through the ridgeway.

Samples of 10 remains were identified as Scandinavian by Dr Jane Evans and Carolyn Chenery, of NERC Isotope Geosciences Laboratory, part of the British Geological Survey, based in Nottingham.

Their work has revealed that the men had scattered Scandinavian origins, with one even thought to be from north of the Arctic Circle.

Isotopes in the men's teeth also show they had eaten a high protein diet, comparable with known sites in Sweden.

Initially, it was thought the burial site dated from the Iron Age (from 800 BC) to early Roman times (from AD 43) after examining pottery in the pit, later identified as a Roman quarry.

Radiocarbon dating later revealed they were from the Saxon period.

Oxford Archaeology removed the 51 skulls from the ground and are continuing to examine the remains to try to link the find to historical events.

Project manager David Score said: "To find out that the young men executed were Vikings is a thrilling development.

"Any mass grave is a relatively rare find, but to find one on this scale, from this period of history, is extremely unusual."

He added that without analysing all the bodies it was impossible to know for certain that all the skeletons were those of Vikings, but it was possible to make a "strong inference".

The archaeologists believe the men were stripped naked either before being killed, or before being buried, because there was no evidence of clothing, such as pins or toggles.

Most of them were in their late teens to early 20s, with a handful in their 30s.

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Brazil entrepreneurs thrive on the web

The internet is transforming people's lives in many different ways around the world - but is it making us individually richer and, if so, how?

Brazil is a country with a foot in two camps - part rich, mainly poor, so it's a good place to take the financial pulse of a global phenomenon like the internet.

Brazilians love the web. Not everyone has access, but those who do spend an average of 70 hours a month online, which is more than anywhere else in the world.

Less than a third of Brazilians have a connected computer at home, so most people go online at internet cafes, known locally as Lan Houses.

There are more than 100,000 Lan Houses dotted around the country.

Winning combination

The country's online revolution has created opportunities to establish small businesses that simply didn't exist before.

Fabio Seixas is a 35-year-old "serial entrepreneur" whose three previous businesses went bust.

But he appears to have struck gold with an innovative way of selling designer T-shirts online, by getting his customers to do much of the work.

His website runs online competitions asking people to submit designs for T-shirts, which are then displayed on the site and people vote for the ones they like best.

He then manufactures the winning entries.

It means he only produces goods he is sure customers will like, and in internet-crazy Brazil his online design competitions have become very popular.

"With a local shop, you don't have access to many people, but with the internet I can have customers all over this big country," he says.

He created his company with $7,000 five years ago, and now his turnover is $1m a year.

He says that it is hard for entrepreneurs to raise money in Brazil.

"We don't have access to venture capital and the banks are not lending money, but the internet allows us to start a business with low costs," he says.

"You have to be innovative to attract attention. We're doing well because people are talking about us."

Massive growth

Fabio's business is by no means an isolated case.

The growth of commerce in Brazil is not coming from the top 50 retailers, it comes from the other 10,000 retailers," says Romero Rodrigues, founder of BuscaPe, Brazil's first price comparison website.

He maintains that there is an ever-growing number of internet retailers, whose sales increase every year.

"Many of these companies began working from home, sometimes mom and pop businesses, and now they have 40 or 50 people working for them," he says.

He dropped out of college to found BuscaPe 12 years ago at the age of just 21.

His site helps people find cheap deals on goods ranging from Television sets to perfume.

He started in Brazil, but now BuscaPe has expanded across Latin America and Mr Rodrigues recently sold a 90% stake in the company to a South African electronic media company for more than $300m.

But he denies that the deal made him a multi-millionaire, as the proceeds were shared with other investors who had put money into BuscaPe to finance its rapid expansion.

Social advantages

The internet is also helping people who don't aspire to be entrepreneurs, in ways that open up income generating opportunities.

Paulo Ivan is unemployed and lives in a shelter in the country's commercial capital Sao Paulo.

He uses the internet to find work by emailing his CV in response to online job advertisements.

He logs on at a city council-run internet cafe known as a Telecentro, where internet access is available free of charge.

"This is a huge city so it is easier to look on the web than go walking from one employment agency to another," he explains.

"It saves a lot of time and I don't always have enough money for the bus or the subway, sometimes not even enough to eat," he adds.

The internet has given him hope and opened up new opportunities, even though it has not secured him a job recently.

"Unemployment is a serious problem here, people spend more time out of jobs than in them," he explains.

Changing habits

The growth of the web has also transformed the way services are delivered in Brazil.

Millions of Brazilians do their banking online, buy tickets for the theatre and, most importantly perhaps, interact with government via the web.

Administrative tasks that used to take hours of queuing and hassle at government offices can now be done in minutes online.

The internet helps people get personally richer in myriad small ways that add up to something big, according to economist Diane Coyle, author of a book The Weightless Economy.

"The internet gives people access to much more information, which they can use to find a job or get better qualified," she says.

"It also opens up new market opportunities" by making it easier, cheaper and quicker to buy and sell things.

The internet reduces what economists call "the transaction costs" of doing business.

It is in small ways like this, multiplied many times over, that the internet helps some people become a bit richer - and a few of them very wealthy indeed.

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Sebastian Pinera sees Chile plans jolted by earthquake

Sebastian Pinera will face one of the most daunting challenges ever confronted by a Chilean president when he takes office on Thursday, less than two weeks after the country was hit by a massive earthquake.

He has already acknowledged that his pre-election plans have largely gone up in smoke, and he will have to reassess everything in the light of the catastrophe.

It's still too early to know how much the reconstruction effort will cost, but estimates vary between $12bn (£8bn) and $30bn.

For a relatively small country like Chile, that represents up to 20% of gross domestic product, and Mr Pinera will have to divert funds from other areas to finance the rebuilding.

Even before he has taken his seat in the presidential palace, it seems that the die of his government has been cast.

"Ours will be a government of reconstruction," he said in a sombre news conference last week.

Mr Pinera made some bold promises during the election campaign: 6% annual growth over the next four years and the creation of a million new jobs.

Many analysts questioned those pledges at the time. Now they are even more sceptical.

So far, the new president has said little about how his plans will change, and those fine details are likely to emerge only in the next week or so, once he is in power.

But his interior minister and campaign manager, Rodrigo Hinzpeter, suggested there would have to be a major reassessment.

"It's as if you've been studying for an exam and then just when you're about to take it they change the subject," Mr Hinzpeter told Chilean newspaper El Mercurio at the weekend.

A responsible government has to refocus, re-evaluate and redesign its programme. But we won't use the earthquake as an excuse to abandon the key promises of our campaign."

Despite the enormity of the challenge, the earthquake and its aftermath could well play into Mr Pinera's hands.

Firstly, he is assuming office amid a tremendous outpouring of solidarity and patriotism.

Chileans have donated millions of dollars to help survivors of the 27 February quake, and everywhere you look in Santiago there are red, white and blue national flags draped across buildings.

If Mr Pinera can harness that feeling of goodwill and national defiance in the face of adversity, it could propel his government forward.

Secondly, the new president is likely to benefit from a bounce in the economy in the second half of this year, as the reconstruction effort kicks in. Analysts say the building boom will generate employment and offset much of the negative economic impact of the earthquake.

Thirdly, the mood in the country chimes with Mr Pinera's own centre-right agenda. During the election, for example, he campaigned on a tough law-and-order ticket, promising to crack down on crime.

After seeing survivors of the quake looting supermarkets - and in some cases making off with television sets and washing machines - Chileans might feel that Mr Pinera is on the right track.

'Off the hook'

When the army was deployed to stop the looting, many Chileans applauded. The public appears to have adopted a tougher, no-nonsense attitude towards crime and, so long as that persists, Mr Pinera might well prosper.

"It feels like there's been a shift to the political right," said Raul Sohr, a Chilean political analyst. "Suddenly people want someone in charge with a firm hand and that's what Pinera is offering."

Mr Sohr also said that to some extent, the quake "lets Pinera off the hook".

"If he meets his targets he can take the credit for it and if he doesn't he can always blame it on the impact of the earthquake

Mr Pinera has already taken some specific steps to confront the catastrophe.

Last week, he appointed new heads of regional government for the worst hit areas. They included two senior directors of major Chilean construction firms.

For now, Mr Pinera appears to have the public on his side.

A poll in El Mercurio at the weekend found that 56% of Chileans regarded his government as well-prepared for the task ahead.

On Thursday, he will take over from outgoing President Michelle Bachelet in a deliberately austere handover ceremony.

The sumptuous dinners have been cancelled and, instead, Ms Bachelet will simply hand him the red, white and blue presidential sash and wish him well.

From then on, this quake-shattered country is in his hands.

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Lessons from Iraq's first-time voters

In 2006 and 2007, Osama Salim didn't miss a single day's school at Baghdad College for boys.

That was quite an achievement.

Baghdad College is in Adhamiya, a largely Sunni Muslim district of Baghdad which for months was occupied and menaced by al Qaeda in Iraq.

They've gone now but the memory of those days is still vivid.

Of the 1,800 students at the college at the time, only about 300 made it regularly every morning.

I met Osama with four of his friends, all 18 years old - Atar Keyhan, Becker Shakir, Mustafa Ibrahim Younis and Mustafa Abdel Karim.

Last Sunday they all went out to vote for first time.

Osama didn't make it to the polling station - soldiers wouldn't let him pass. The others succeeded.

"It was great voting for the first time," they said, "It was great to choose our leaders. It was a great feeling."

They all agreed when one of them said: "Voting is an obligation."

I asked them if they had access to the internet at home. Three said "Yes."

I asked them if they used Facebook. "Sometimes." They find it a useful way of making contact with other students in Iraq and overseas.

But they don't think Facebook and the internet are very important parts of their lives.

They are more concerned about incessant power cuts in Baghdad and water that isn't fit to drink.

And there was a clear message to students in Britain. They should count themselves lucky and have a serious attitude to studying and work hard - and not spend valuable time on frivolous things like Facebook.

Occupation

I asked if because of all the challenges in Iraq, did they automatically work hard?

"Yes, yes," they chorused, "There is no free time. We work all the time we have."

As the British elections are looming, I wondered if these Baghdad students were aware of the main party leaders in the UK. Gordon Brown? Yes. David Cameron? Silence. Nick Clegg? Blank faces.

One of the students was disappointed that Gordon Brown had defended the invasion of Iraq when he gave evidence at the current Chilcott Enquiry into the Iraq War.

"It was an occupation. The occupation of Iraq was a great error," he said.

All these students are football-crazy. All Iraq is football-crazy. I asked Osama, Atar, Becker and the two Mustafas which national and club teams they supported.

Brazil and Liverpool. Argentina and Barcelona. England and Real Madrid. Egypt and Liverpool. France and Barcelona.

Five young Baghdad students, all speaking to me in fluent English at a college that was founded by American Jesuits in 1932.

When it became clear that these Christian priests had no predatory intentions to convert students to Christianity, they were accepted - partly because of an ethic the Jesuits shared with their Iraqi students: hard work.

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Mystery of 75 starlings falling from the sky

The deaths of 75 starlings which appeared to fall from the sky and crash land on to a driveway in Somerset has mystified the RSPCA animal charity.

The birds were spotted falling onto the entrance of a house in Coxley in Somerset on Sunday 7 March.

Animal welfare officer Alison Sparkes, who was called by police, said: "It was a remarkable sight, I've never seen anything like it."

There is no evidence the birds were ill or poisoned before they hit the ground.

Predator theory

Ms Sparkes said: "Onlookers said they heard a whooshing sound and then the birds just hit the ground.

"They had fallen on to the ground in quite a small area, about 12ft (3.6m) in diameter.

"They appeared to be in good condition other than injuries that they appear to have suffered when they hit they ground.

"Our best guess is that this happened because the starlings were trying to escape a predator such as a sparrow hawk and ended up crash landing."

She said that the birds had suffered broken beaks, broken legs and wings and abdominal injuries.

Five of the birds survived the fall but had to be put down because of their severe injuries.

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Afghanistan does not want 'proxy wars', says Karzai

Afghanistan does not want other countries' "proxy wars" fought on its soil, President Hamid Karzai has said.

He was speaking following talks with Pakistani leaders in Islamabad, and a day after Iran and the US traded blows over their activities in Afghanistan.

Mr Karzai said he did not want India and Pakistan, or anyone else, to fight their wars on his country's territory.

Parties to the Afghan conflict are rethinking policy ahead of 2011 when the US says it will begin to withdraw.

Pakistan role

Mr Karzai is making his first visit to Pakistan since his controversial re-election last year.

The trip comes amid an expected surge of Western troops in Afghanistan this summer. It also follows the recent arrests of Taliban leaders in Pakistan which indicate the military there may be willing to reign in the militants.

The BBC's M Ilyas Khan in Islamabad says Mr Karzai is visiting Pakistan amid a thaw in relations between the two countries on the one hand, and some fundamental shifts in the regional situation on the other.

The Afghan leader held detailed meetings with both President Asif Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani. He has also met Pakistan's army chief, Gen Ashfaq Kayani. Before heading to Islamabad, he had a meeting with the visiting US defence secretary Robert Gates.

"Without Pakistan and without its co-operation with Afghanistan, Afghanistan cannot be stable or peaceful," Mr Karzai told a news conference in Islamabad.

"It is also, I believe, recognised in Pakistan that without a stable and peaceful Afghanistan there cannot be stability or peace in Pakistan.

"Afghanistan does not want a proxy war between India and Pakistan in Afghanistan. It does not want a proxy war between Iran and the United States in Afghanistan," he said.

Mr Karzai also called on Islamabad to hand over the alleged Taliban second-in-command Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, arrested last month. Mr Gilani said his government was still considering the request.

Our correspondent says the purpose of Mr Karzai's visit appears to be to take Pakistani leaders into his confidence on the impending Western troop surge, and to find out to what extent Pakistani political and military leaders would be willing to withdraw support from the Taliban.

For their part, the Pakistanis need guarantees against Indian influence in Afghanistan, our correspondent says.

They are also keen to have a role in training the Afghan forces, a proposal which Mr Karzai has reportedly cold-shouldered for the moment.

On Wednesday Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad paid a short visit to Kabul. He accused the US of playing a "double game" in Afghanistan after the US used the same term to condemn Iran's role.

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Sweden to extradite Auschwitz sign theft suspect

A court in Stockholm has ruled that a Swedish man can be extradited to Poland to face trial over the theft of a sign from the Auschwitz death camp.

Investigators accuse Anders Hogstrom, 34, of instigating the theft of the infamous Arbeit Macht Frei sign from the camp gates last December.

The sign was recovered shortly afterwards, cut into three pieces.

Mr Hogstrom, 34, a former neo-Nazi leader, is likely to appeal against his extradition, his lawyer said.

Five Polish men have already been arrested over the theft.

The sign, which weighs 40kg (90lb), was half-unscrewed, half-torn from above the death camp's gate.

The 5m (16ft) wrought iron sign - the words on which translate as "Work sets you free" - symbolises for many the atrocities of Nazi Germany.

The theft caused outrage in Israel, Poland and around the world. More than a million people - 90% of them Jews - were murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz in occupied Poland during World War II.

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Bank of America sued for seizing parrot

Bank of America has apologised to a woman in Pennsylvania after one of its contractors entered her house, damaged furniture and confiscated her parrot.

Angela Iannelli has filed a lawsuit alleging that the incident in October caused her so much "emotional distress" that she needed medication for anxiety.

It took her more than a week to secure the release of Luke, a blue macaw.

A BoA spokesman said it had erroneously believed Ms Iannelli was defaulting on her mortgage and the house was vacant.

'Zero tolerance'

An employee had sent the contractor to the property with instructions to install a new lock and otherwise "secure" it, he said.

He added that the bank had "zero tolerance for this kind of error", and would quickly review the lawsuit and "consider any hardship that resulted".

In her civil suit seeking $50,000 in damages, Ms Iannelli said the BoA contractor had invaded her home north of Pittsburgh while she was away, stopped utility services, cut water pipes and electrical wiring, damaged flooring and finishings, poured antifreeze into sinks and toilets and stolen her parrot, according to the Wall Street Journal.

She said that when she rang BoA to protest, its representatives first denied knowing where the parrot was, and later told her she could go to the offices of the contractor, about 80 miles away, to retrieve the bird herself.

Bank officials also allegedly told her they were "tired" of hearing from her, hung up, and advised her to seek help from the police.

Ms Iannelli told the Wall Street Journal that although Luke had initially seemed nervous, he was "doing very well now".

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Camberley mosque plan rejected by council

Plans to build a mosque in Camberley have been thrown out by councillors.

The local Bengali Association's bid to build a mosque on the site of a listed former school building was rejected by Surrey Heath Borough Council.

Local historians and residents had opposed the plans, saying the town's heritage needed to be protected.

Nigel Farage, the UK Independence Party MEP for the South East, described the full council's decision as "the right result for the people of Camberley".

'Fair and just'

He said: "The initial planning application should have been thrown out as the building in question is listed and is sited in a conservation area.

"This was never about religion, but about the fair and just process that applies to everyone no matter what faith or belief."

The plan involved knocking down the listed Victorian school building in London Road, which is about half a mile away from the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst.

It was originally home to Yorktown Infants and Primary schools, before later becoming St Gregory's Roman Catholic school.

When the school closed, the building was sold to the Berkshire, Hampshire & Surrey Bengali Welfare Association which has been using it as an Islamic Centre since 1996.

The association argued that the building no longer met the needs of the growing local Muslim community, and people wanted to worship in a mosque and not in a school.

The plans had been approved by Surrey Heath Borough Council's planning committee earlier this year, but overturned on a technicality.

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Drone raid 'kills 12' in north-west Pakistan

Two missile strikes by US drone aircraft have killed at least 12 suspected militants in north-west Pakistan, security officials say.

The attacks took place in the tribal area of North Waziristan.

The identities of those killed in the attack, the latest of more than a dozen this year, are not yet known.

North and South Waziristan are known to provide sanctuary for al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, who are often targeted by drones.

Locals say the attacks have destroyed many training camps and compounds. They have also killed dozens of local and foreign militants, officials say.

Wednesday's first strike took place at Mizar Madakhel village, some 50km (30 miles) west of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan. This was followed by a second attack in the same area.

The first attack targeted a vehicle and a compound which were being used by suspected militants, killing eight of them, reports say.

The second strike targeted two vehicles, which killed another four.

Correspondents say the United States has stepped up drone attacks in the region since seven CIA officers died in a suicide bomb attack at a US base across the border in Afghanistan last December.

More than 700 people have died in nearly 80 drone strikes since August 2008.

Pakistan has publicly criticised drone attacks, saying they fuel support for militants, but observers say the authorities privately condone the strikes.

The American military does not routinely confirm drone operations, but analysts say the US is the only force capable of deploying such aircraft in the region.

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Pakistan cricket crackdown 'five years too late'

Pakistani cricket is at a crossroads once again.

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), headed by former Test cricketer Ijaz Butt, finally woke up from a deep slumber on Wednesday to dish out unprecedented penalties to a number of leading cricketers.

In what is seen as a landmark disciplinary action following last December's disastrous tour of Australia, ex-skippers Younus Khan and Mohammad Yousuf were barred from the national team indefinitely, while one-year bans were given to senior all-rounders Shoaib Malik and Rana Naved-ul-Hasan for poor conduct.

Heavy fines were imposed on Shahid Afridi for ball tampering and Kamran Akmal and brother Umar for flouting rules and obstinate behaviour during the tour.

All the players have the right to appeal against their punishment.

Player power

The Australian tour debacle was, indeed, the last straw for Pakistani cricket, which has been grappling with a range of problems of late.

These include cancelled home series due to security fears, the 2009 terror attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore, the IPL snub, the growing menace of player power and the thorny issue of the captaincy.

Against this backdrop, Wednesday's decisions have been widely hailed by fans and former cricketers alike - with only a few complaining of a "harsh" verdict. There is much applause, too, for the PCB officials for a rare show of spine while calls for wholesale changes are deafening.

But while the motives behind the decisions are laudable, the haphazard manner in which they are likely to be carried out could see Pakistani cricket sink deeper into the quagmire.

Many experts of the game believe that the verdict has come five years too late. A similar crackdown in 2005-06, they feel, could have yielded far-reaching results.

Then, Inzamam-ul-Haq and his followers were making the PCB dance to their beat, selecting their "favoured lot" match-after-match, at the expense of the hapless selectors, and equally undermining the authority of a high-profile foreign coach, the late Bob Woolmer.

Those were the initial indicators of a re-emergence of player power and needed to be nipped in the bud.

'Tough cops'

The PCB, however, never known for its prompt actions, continued to tolerate it and that finally culminated in the country's shameful campaign at the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean, tragically marred by Woolmer's death.

Yousuf, Younis, Malik, Afridi and Akmal were all an integral part of the squad then and witnessed their predecessors getting away with a lot worse than that which they are accused of today.

Since then, while their talents have been obvious for all to see, people have often questioned their value to Pakistani cricket.

The rampant controversies, their ugly tussle over the captaincy, and the no-holds barred arguments with the team management have not only hurt Pakistani cricket, they have also in some way influenced younger players, leading to the flop Down Under.

There's no doubt that bad governance from politically motivated, less-than-competent cricket board officials has also contributed hugely to the current cricket scenario.

More often than not, it has been the PCB heads themselves - including Lt Gen Tauqir Zia, Shaharyar Khan, Dr Nasim Ashraf and now Ijaz Butt - who have made monsters out of level-headed, talented players like Inzamam-ul-Haq, Yousuf, Shoaib Akhtar, Afridi and many others.

And although Ijaz Butt and Co have suddenly decided to play tough cops, the indiscipline culture is so well entrenched in the team that any half-hearted move could jeopardise the country's future in the game.

The first big international assignment ahead is the World Twenty20 in the West Indies, scheduled for late April and May. The much-hyped campaign for the defending champions is bound to be affected by today's decisions, unless the PCB is prepared to conduct a complete overhaul.

With the emergence of a number of talented under-19 players - Hammad Azam, Mohammad Waqas and Raza Hassan - coupled with young talents like Mohammad Aamir, Umar Akmal and others, Pakistan could still do well, provided those who have been penalised are not allowed to take control once again.

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