Interesting news articles.#21 "It was recovered TWICE", that's almost OCD!
- Thread starter johnny
- Start date
NCR600
Likes Dirt
If you take the meaning of "a prostitute" to be " a person who has sex in return for money, gifts or other reward" then it'd be a damn sight more than 1 in 6 men.
Drizz
Likes Dirt
Here is Sam's follow-up on his original article
Personally I think its a bit harsh to criticise someone visitng prostitutes as an "exploiter". No, I never used one myself so i am not saying it with a guilty mind. Let just say I perfectly understand why someone wanted to pay for sex.
Personally I think its a bit harsh to criticise someone visitng prostitutes as an "exploiter". No, I never used one myself so i am not saying it with a guilty mind. Let just say I perfectly understand why someone wanted to pay for sex.
Some one else paid for me..., I enjoyed it so I went back again. Meh, I don't care. Probably won;t do it again...., oh, hang on, also got some home delivery hokers about a month ago after about 36 hours on the sauce and my old mate Charlie.
Ok, after that one, I probably won't do it again. I have no problem with it.
I had always said I never would. Didn't look down on those who did, but just never really considered it for myself. I did work for an "Escort Agency" once as a minder for teh more expensive ladies, so I have zero moral issues with the practice.
I guess that's why I liked the article so much as it made really good sense to me.
Ok, after that one, I probably won't do it again. I have no problem with it.
I had always said I never would. Didn't look down on those who did, but just never really considered it for myself. I did work for an "Escort Agency" once as a minder for teh more expensive ladies, so I have zero moral issues with the practice.
I guess that's why I liked the article so much as it made really good sense to me.
PINT of Stella. mate!
Many, many Scotches
possibly...
toodles
Wheel size expert
Shit yeah. Hell, if you're gonna be shy about that sort of thing then you're going to have the most boring life ever.
This kid is like 16-17 years old. Pretty amazing if you ask me. Also pretty well on the money IFYAM!
Oppression is sexy
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/...1185647900809.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1
Daniel Swain
August 1, 2007
I was raised by communists. In some parts saying that is tantamount to declaring that you were raised by wolves. And my experience has shown me that in many ways communists are like wolves: they hunt in packs, bare their fangs, and are unable to use the accoutrements of modern life such as iPods or deodorant.
My home life was difficult. Other children went to playgroup, I went to Trotskyite plebiscites. Whereas they clutched teddy bears, I slept next to a copy of Das Kapital. In short: I was a melancholic East Berliner toiling behind my self-imposed Berlin Wall.
But being raised red means I have a number of innate abilities: I can invade Eastern European nations with relative ease; there's no process that I can't make more bureaucratic; but most importantly, it has given me an understanding of oppression.
Communism is an ideology about the oppressed: about the gravitational relationship between power and powerlessness. Life, it tells us, is often a zero-sum game where privilege offsets privation, and influence relies upon the support of the insecure.
The problem of oppression was crystalised in a single question - asked by a black American undergraduate student to the most powerful man in the world: "Mr Bush, how can powerful politicians such as yourself hope to understand the plight of the poor and dispossessed?"
The child-President's response was equally illuminating: "I think we've all been oppressed in some way."
As a wealthy, white, well-formed, heterosexual, Anglo-Saxon, Christian conservative, Bush isn't what I'd call an expert on being oppressed. Yet his sentiment is popular. Increasingly we feel able to declare ourselves marginalised without stopping to consider the implications.
As I've grown up I've seen MTV brand the ghetto, I've watched Pauline Hanson opine on the difficulties of being white and I've listened as people such as Bush position themselves among the proletariat. The conclusion is obvious. In the 21st century, oppression is sexy.
Consider the ubiquity of rich, white kids co-opting the culture of black America. The unsubtle mimicry of affectations of speech, dress and manner is coupled with the worship of rap music. Yet the artistic roots of rap gave a voice to minority culture. Decades later and the market has been monopolised by white corporations that seek to sell the idea of oppression back to disaffected teenagers.
The appeal is obvious: as adolescents we identify with the feelings of being ignored, controlled and maligned. It is, however, reprehensible to use people's identities as marketing tactics. These faux expressions of acceptance result in a loss of political capital for minorities: "Why would black America want to be rescued from the ghetto … it's so in this season."
It's as if the culture of political correctness has been inverted: the images of isolation and deprivation used to advocate change have become attractive ways to dispense guilt.
The late Jerry Falwell once said sodomites and feminists were running America. I'm sorry, I must have missed the moment when Congress was taken over by women, when America's lesbian president appointed the first gay Supreme Court Justice. The reality is that the leadership of America's Fortune 500 has slightly more diversity than the Ku Klux Klan. Why do we find our power so distasteful?
Maybe it's because we don't want to recognise our complicity in the status quo. Maybe it's because Falwell didn't want to believe that straight white men such as himself presided over the moral decline of America.
Allow me to conclude with an anecdote. At dinner, my family pondered our radical past. We'd been the Bolsheviks on the block. People would treat us as though we were in a cult (which in hindsight isn't totally inaccurate). My brother expressed that he'd felt like he was a member of minority. My family were aghast. Surely we couldn't compare ourselves with the pitiable proletariat.
And they were right, you aren't really oppressed if you can see the limits of your oppression.
My dad - the Marxist - accepted a job at the bank while Mum - the feminist - stopped fighting the patriarchy and started working part-time. They both realised that perhaps the workers of the world didn't have to unite, that perhaps it wasn't a case of: "It's my Communist Party and I'll cry if I want to." (Because it's hard to feel alienated when you have a machine that makes you coffee.)
In the end, the only thing that was oppressing us was our love of oppression.
Daniel Swain is a year 11 student at Smith's Hill High School in Wollongong. This is an adaptation of the winning speech he gave at the state final of the Sydney Morning Herald Plain English Speaking Award on Monday.
Oppression is sexy
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/...1185647900809.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1
Daniel Swain
August 1, 2007
I was raised by communists. In some parts saying that is tantamount to declaring that you were raised by wolves. And my experience has shown me that in many ways communists are like wolves: they hunt in packs, bare their fangs, and are unable to use the accoutrements of modern life such as iPods or deodorant.
My home life was difficult. Other children went to playgroup, I went to Trotskyite plebiscites. Whereas they clutched teddy bears, I slept next to a copy of Das Kapital. In short: I was a melancholic East Berliner toiling behind my self-imposed Berlin Wall.
But being raised red means I have a number of innate abilities: I can invade Eastern European nations with relative ease; there's no process that I can't make more bureaucratic; but most importantly, it has given me an understanding of oppression.
Communism is an ideology about the oppressed: about the gravitational relationship between power and powerlessness. Life, it tells us, is often a zero-sum game where privilege offsets privation, and influence relies upon the support of the insecure.
The problem of oppression was crystalised in a single question - asked by a black American undergraduate student to the most powerful man in the world: "Mr Bush, how can powerful politicians such as yourself hope to understand the plight of the poor and dispossessed?"
The child-President's response was equally illuminating: "I think we've all been oppressed in some way."
As a wealthy, white, well-formed, heterosexual, Anglo-Saxon, Christian conservative, Bush isn't what I'd call an expert on being oppressed. Yet his sentiment is popular. Increasingly we feel able to declare ourselves marginalised without stopping to consider the implications.
As I've grown up I've seen MTV brand the ghetto, I've watched Pauline Hanson opine on the difficulties of being white and I've listened as people such as Bush position themselves among the proletariat. The conclusion is obvious. In the 21st century, oppression is sexy.
Consider the ubiquity of rich, white kids co-opting the culture of black America. The unsubtle mimicry of affectations of speech, dress and manner is coupled with the worship of rap music. Yet the artistic roots of rap gave a voice to minority culture. Decades later and the market has been monopolised by white corporations that seek to sell the idea of oppression back to disaffected teenagers.
The appeal is obvious: as adolescents we identify with the feelings of being ignored, controlled and maligned. It is, however, reprehensible to use people's identities as marketing tactics. These faux expressions of acceptance result in a loss of political capital for minorities: "Why would black America want to be rescued from the ghetto … it's so in this season."
It's as if the culture of political correctness has been inverted: the images of isolation and deprivation used to advocate change have become attractive ways to dispense guilt.
The late Jerry Falwell once said sodomites and feminists were running America. I'm sorry, I must have missed the moment when Congress was taken over by women, when America's lesbian president appointed the first gay Supreme Court Justice. The reality is that the leadership of America's Fortune 500 has slightly more diversity than the Ku Klux Klan. Why do we find our power so distasteful?
Maybe it's because we don't want to recognise our complicity in the status quo. Maybe it's because Falwell didn't want to believe that straight white men such as himself presided over the moral decline of America.
Allow me to conclude with an anecdote. At dinner, my family pondered our radical past. We'd been the Bolsheviks on the block. People would treat us as though we were in a cult (which in hindsight isn't totally inaccurate). My brother expressed that he'd felt like he was a member of minority. My family were aghast. Surely we couldn't compare ourselves with the pitiable proletariat.
And they were right, you aren't really oppressed if you can see the limits of your oppression.
My dad - the Marxist - accepted a job at the bank while Mum - the feminist - stopped fighting the patriarchy and started working part-time. They both realised that perhaps the workers of the world didn't have to unite, that perhaps it wasn't a case of: "It's my Communist Party and I'll cry if I want to." (Because it's hard to feel alienated when you have a machine that makes you coffee.)
In the end, the only thing that was oppressing us was our love of oppression.
Daniel Swain is a year 11 student at Smith's Hill High School in Wollongong. This is an adaptation of the winning speech he gave at the state final of the Sydney Morning Herald Plain English Speaking Award on Monday.
Drizz
Likes Dirt
LOL...... So Dutch is the new New Zealanders
Sheep baa'd in sex case
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22194529-13762,00.html
August 06, 2007 12:00am
A MAN who was accused of having sex with a sheep has walked free because the animal was unable to testify.
The man, from Haaksbergen, near Utrecht in the Netherlands, was reported to police after a farmer caught him having sex with a sheep.
But the case was thrown out of court as the sheep couldn't take to the stand to testify that it didn't want to have sex and had suffered emotional stress.
Under Dutch law, bestiality is not a crime unless it can be proved the animal didn't want to have sex.
"Short of putting the sheep in the dock, at the moment these perverts cannot be prosecuted," animal rights campaigner Jos van Huisen said.
Sheep baa'd in sex case
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22194529-13762,00.html
August 06, 2007 12:00am
A MAN who was accused of having sex with a sheep has walked free because the animal was unable to testify.
The man, from Haaksbergen, near Utrecht in the Netherlands, was reported to police after a farmer caught him having sex with a sheep.
But the case was thrown out of court as the sheep couldn't take to the stand to testify that it didn't want to have sex and had suffered emotional stress.
Under Dutch law, bestiality is not a crime unless it can be proved the animal didn't want to have sex.
"Short of putting the sheep in the dock, at the moment these perverts cannot be prosecuted," animal rights campaigner Jos van Huisen said.
Drizz
Likes Dirt
I sense a cheesy B grade Hollywood martial art flick coming. Straight to the five buck bargain bin.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070831/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_china_ninja
China kung fu monks seek apology for ninja affront
BEIJING (Reuters) - China's Shaolin Temple, the cradle of Chinese kung fu, is demanding an apology from an Internet user who said its monks had once been beaten in unarmed combat by a Japanese ninja, Chinese media reported on Friday.
Shaolin Temple, in the northern province of Henan, became famous in the West as the training ground for Kwai Chang "Grasshopper" Caine in the 1970s "Kung Fu" TV series.
Ninjas -- professional assassins trained in martial arts -- date back to mediaeval Japan.
"The so-called defeat is purely fabricated, and we demand the Internet user to apologise to the whole nation for the wrongs he or she did," the Beijing News said, citing a notice announced by a lawyer for the Shaolin monks.
Relations between Chinese and Japanese are sensitive at the best of times, with emotions still running high over Japan's invasion and occupation of parts of China in the first half of the 20th Century.
The Internet user, calling themselves "Five Minutes Every Day", said on an online forum last week that a Japanese ninja came to Shaolin, asked for a fight and many monks failed to beat him, the newspaper said.
"The facts that the monks could not defeat a Japanese ninja showed that they were named as kung fu masters in vain," the Internet user was quoted as saying in the post.
The Shaolin temple "strongly condemned the horrible deeds" of the user, the newspaper said.
"It is not only extremely irresponsible behaviour with respect to the Shaolin temple and its
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070831/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_china_ninja
China kung fu monks seek apology for ninja affront
BEIJING (Reuters) - China's Shaolin Temple, the cradle of Chinese kung fu, is demanding an apology from an Internet user who said its monks had once been beaten in unarmed combat by a Japanese ninja, Chinese media reported on Friday.
Shaolin Temple, in the northern province of Henan, became famous in the West as the training ground for Kwai Chang "Grasshopper" Caine in the 1970s "Kung Fu" TV series.
Ninjas -- professional assassins trained in martial arts -- date back to mediaeval Japan.
"The so-called defeat is purely fabricated, and we demand the Internet user to apologise to the whole nation for the wrongs he or she did," the Beijing News said, citing a notice announced by a lawyer for the Shaolin monks.
Relations between Chinese and Japanese are sensitive at the best of times, with emotions still running high over Japan's invasion and occupation of parts of China in the first half of the 20th Century.
The Internet user, calling themselves "Five Minutes Every Day", said on an online forum last week that a Japanese ninja came to Shaolin, asked for a fight and many monks failed to beat him, the newspaper said.
"The facts that the monks could not defeat a Japanese ninja showed that they were named as kung fu masters in vain," the Internet user was quoted as saying in the post.
The Shaolin temple "strongly condemned the horrible deeds" of the user, the newspaper said.
"It is not only extremely irresponsible behaviour with respect to the Shaolin temple and its
China was the future 2500 years ago.
Warriors' timely mission as the world focus shifts
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/...1189881508805.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1
James Button
September 19, 2007
HERE'S a quick test: who is the greatest military leader of all time? Napoleon? Julius Caesar? Alexander the Great? Arguably none of them. Instead, it may well be Qin Shihuangdi. Who he is, and the reason few of us have heard of him, is a story for our times. Born in 259BC, he became king of the Qin people at the age of 13, and set about turning his state into a war machine.
With the aid of a new technology, the crossbow, he massacred, one by one, the armies of six neighbouring states - until in 221BC he created the vast empire of Qin. The clue is in the pronunciation: chin. Qin Shihuangdi was the first emperor of China.
But the emperor slept uneasily at night. He was terrified the battalions he had slaughtered would hunt him in the afterlife. So he created an army of 8000 terracotta soldiers to guard his tomb.
He had 700,000 men build his tomb and palace, many of whom were worked to death or buried alive with him. He had his tomb - part of an underworld city 56 square kilometres in size - booby-trapped with crossbows. After his sudden death at the age of 49, he and his minions settled under the earth to await the clash of the dead.
Then in 1974, two labourers digging a well discovered a clay face in the soil near the remote city of Xian. They had uncovered perhaps the greatest archaeological find of the 20th century.
Thirty-three years later, a detachment of the terracotta warriors has stormed into London. Open only a week, The First Emperor, China's Terracotta Army is being hailed as the British Museum's most important exhibit since Tutankhamen in 1972. More than 140,000 tickets have been sold for the show, which lasts until April. The British hordes are marching in at the rate of 400 people an hour.
It is not the first time any warriors have left Xian - some came to the Art Gallery of NSW in the early 1980s - but, with 20 figures present, it is the largest number to do so. It is all very gratifying for the leading British sinologist Dame Jessica Rawson, the exhibition's academic adviser.
"Forty years ago no one ever thought about China," she says. "I'd suggest an exhibition [at the British Museum] and people would say over lunch: 'Is it as important as Greece?' Nobody would ever say that now."
Dame Jessica is standing under the domed Reading Room of the British Museum, where Karl Marx plotted the end of other empires not so long ago, relatively speaking. Marx's influence has faded, and empires of Greece and Rome fell, but - the dame points out - Qin's remains.
"China has never been colonised," she says. The monetary system created by Qin lasted into the 20th century. He created a central bureaucracy, standardised weights and measures and set widths for cart tracks that would become the gauge for China's railways. If he was a bloody ruler, he was also a capable one.
In the exhibit's main room, emerging out of shade as befits an army of the dead, are eight warriors. They are not behind glass or in a pit, as they are in Xian, but are close enough to touch, and to see that each is different. The bodies were made in moulds, before artists were brought in to make each soldier's face and dress unique. Some faces are broad and Turkic, from western China; others look more like Han Chinese. It is a multicultural force, at once fearsome and deeply human, and well representative of the West's hopes and anxieties about China.
Because, such blockbusters are never simply about the past. Britain has sought the warriors because China now matters; China has sent them as an act of diplomacy. But observing the buzz around the show, it struck me how Britain and Europe still discuss the rise of China as a novelty. It seems to be a conversation Australia was having 15 years ago.
Australia's economy and geography have long made it sensible to look towards China. Even as we do, Australia still sees itself - and is widely seen - as being at the end of the earth. Yet our grandchildren are unlikely to feel that way, as the terracotta army marches on and the Middle Kingdom looks set to become the centre of the world.
Warriors' timely mission as the world focus shifts
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/...1189881508805.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1
James Button
September 19, 2007
HERE'S a quick test: who is the greatest military leader of all time? Napoleon? Julius Caesar? Alexander the Great? Arguably none of them. Instead, it may well be Qin Shihuangdi. Who he is, and the reason few of us have heard of him, is a story for our times. Born in 259BC, he became king of the Qin people at the age of 13, and set about turning his state into a war machine.
With the aid of a new technology, the crossbow, he massacred, one by one, the armies of six neighbouring states - until in 221BC he created the vast empire of Qin. The clue is in the pronunciation: chin. Qin Shihuangdi was the first emperor of China.
But the emperor slept uneasily at night. He was terrified the battalions he had slaughtered would hunt him in the afterlife. So he created an army of 8000 terracotta soldiers to guard his tomb.
He had 700,000 men build his tomb and palace, many of whom were worked to death or buried alive with him. He had his tomb - part of an underworld city 56 square kilometres in size - booby-trapped with crossbows. After his sudden death at the age of 49, he and his minions settled under the earth to await the clash of the dead.
Then in 1974, two labourers digging a well discovered a clay face in the soil near the remote city of Xian. They had uncovered perhaps the greatest archaeological find of the 20th century.
Thirty-three years later, a detachment of the terracotta warriors has stormed into London. Open only a week, The First Emperor, China's Terracotta Army is being hailed as the British Museum's most important exhibit since Tutankhamen in 1972. More than 140,000 tickets have been sold for the show, which lasts until April. The British hordes are marching in at the rate of 400 people an hour.
It is not the first time any warriors have left Xian - some came to the Art Gallery of NSW in the early 1980s - but, with 20 figures present, it is the largest number to do so. It is all very gratifying for the leading British sinologist Dame Jessica Rawson, the exhibition's academic adviser.
"Forty years ago no one ever thought about China," she says. "I'd suggest an exhibition [at the British Museum] and people would say over lunch: 'Is it as important as Greece?' Nobody would ever say that now."
Dame Jessica is standing under the domed Reading Room of the British Museum, where Karl Marx plotted the end of other empires not so long ago, relatively speaking. Marx's influence has faded, and empires of Greece and Rome fell, but - the dame points out - Qin's remains.
"China has never been colonised," she says. The monetary system created by Qin lasted into the 20th century. He created a central bureaucracy, standardised weights and measures and set widths for cart tracks that would become the gauge for China's railways. If he was a bloody ruler, he was also a capable one.
In the exhibit's main room, emerging out of shade as befits an army of the dead, are eight warriors. They are not behind glass or in a pit, as they are in Xian, but are close enough to touch, and to see that each is different. The bodies were made in moulds, before artists were brought in to make each soldier's face and dress unique. Some faces are broad and Turkic, from western China; others look more like Han Chinese. It is a multicultural force, at once fearsome and deeply human, and well representative of the West's hopes and anxieties about China.
Because, such blockbusters are never simply about the past. Britain has sought the warriors because China now matters; China has sent them as an act of diplomacy. But observing the buzz around the show, it struck me how Britain and Europe still discuss the rise of China as a novelty. It seems to be a conversation Australia was having 15 years ago.
Australia's economy and geography have long made it sensible to look towards China. Even as we do, Australia still sees itself - and is widely seen - as being at the end of the earth. Yet our grandchildren are unlikely to feel that way, as the terracotta army marches on and the Middle Kingdom looks set to become the centre of the world.
Christo
Likes Bikes and Dirt
Andromeda syndrome
Thanks, been nice knowing you, I'm off to hide in my bunker...
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2007/09/18/1189881490291.html
Peru meteor illness deepens
About 200 villagers have fallen ill from mysterious gases that spewed from a crater after a meteorite crashed in southeastern Peru, but no radiation has been detected, officials and scientists say.
Scores of residents of the farming village of Carancas began vomiting and complaining of headaches and dizziness after the space object struck the area Saturday, creating an eight metre deep, 20 metre-wide crater.
"We have determined with precision instruments that there is no radiation," engineer Renan Ramirez of the Peruvian Nuclear Energy Institute told AFP.
Ramirez said the illnesses may have been triggered by sulfur, arsenic or other toxins that may have melted in the extreme heat produced by the meteorite strike.
"It is a conventional meteorite that, when it struck, produced gases by fusing with elements of the terrain," he said. He also ruled out that the object was a satellite.
Nestor Quispe, mayor of the nearby town of Desaguadero, said about 200 sick villagers are being treated and that Carancas residents fear that they fear long-term side effects.
There is also "a lot of panic and fear because villagers are afraid that other space objects could fall," Quispe told AFP.
The director of the health ministry in the Puno region, Jorge Lopez, said none of the patients was in serious condition but that they would have to undergo blood and neurological tests as a precaution in three to six months.
A medical facility was installed in Carancas to treat the patients, and "if necessary, some will be sent to hospitals in Puno," the nearest big city, he said.
Police have cordoned off the crater. Lopez said that despite wearing a mask while he approached the crater, the fumes irritated his nose and throat.
AFP
Thanks, been nice knowing you, I'm off to hide in my bunker...
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2007/09/18/1189881490291.html
Peru meteor illness deepens
About 200 villagers have fallen ill from mysterious gases that spewed from a crater after a meteorite crashed in southeastern Peru, but no radiation has been detected, officials and scientists say.
Scores of residents of the farming village of Carancas began vomiting and complaining of headaches and dizziness after the space object struck the area Saturday, creating an eight metre deep, 20 metre-wide crater.
"We have determined with precision instruments that there is no radiation," engineer Renan Ramirez of the Peruvian Nuclear Energy Institute told AFP.
Ramirez said the illnesses may have been triggered by sulfur, arsenic or other toxins that may have melted in the extreme heat produced by the meteorite strike.
"It is a conventional meteorite that, when it struck, produced gases by fusing with elements of the terrain," he said. He also ruled out that the object was a satellite.
Nestor Quispe, mayor of the nearby town of Desaguadero, said about 200 sick villagers are being treated and that Carancas residents fear that they fear long-term side effects.
There is also "a lot of panic and fear because villagers are afraid that other space objects could fall," Quispe told AFP.
The director of the health ministry in the Puno region, Jorge Lopez, said none of the patients was in serious condition but that they would have to undergo blood and neurological tests as a precaution in three to six months.
A medical facility was installed in Carancas to treat the patients, and "if necessary, some will be sent to hospitals in Puno," the nearest big city, he said.
Police have cordoned off the crater. Lopez said that despite wearing a mask while he approached the crater, the fumes irritated his nose and throat.
AFP
Customjimmy
Likes Dirt
Scenario: Israeli strikes on Syria. Iranian strikes on Israel. US into Iran (close to the end of the Cheney administration maybe?).
China sits back, says hey, we make all your shit, you are now all our bitches.
Drizz
Likes Dirt
Kind of like Switzerland being everyone's bankers.
Personally if I am a dictator first country I invaded are the neutral countries. Neutrality my ass! Take side or die!!
brisneyland
Likes Dirt
Ze Germans are infiltrating the Terracotta Warriors
http://www.smh.com.au/news/unusual-tales/pablos-gone-pottery/2006/09/18/1158431625640.html
A German art student hoodwinked police in China's famed terracotta warrior museum by disguising himself as a clay soldier among a forest of ancient statues, reports state media.
Pablo Wendel jumped into an archaeological pit showcasing several thousand terracotta soldiers, found a spot to stand and frustrated police who had difficulty finding him amid the 2,200-year-old warriors, Xinhua news agency said.
After finally locating the art student, Wendel refused to budge and police at the museum near China's ancient capital of Xian were forced to carry him off "as if he were a log," Xinhua said.
Wendel, 26, told police that since he was a child he had been fascinated by the terracotta warriors, created to protect the nearby tomb of the legendary Emperor Qinshihuang who united China over 2,200 years ago.
"I have always dreamed of disguising myself as a terracotta warrior among the real ones," Xinhua quoted Wendel as saying.
As Wendel's "performance art" did not harm any of the ancient relics, he was not arrested or charged but only given "serious criticism and education," the report said.
However, Wendel's costume was confiscated and he was sent back to eastern Hangzhou city where he studies art, it said.
flying high dh killer
Likes Dirt
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article2461421.ece
I wonder what the ramifications of this are going to be.
Israelis ‘blew apart Syrian nuclear cache’
Secret raid on Korean shipment
Uzi Mahnaimi in Tel Aviv, Sarah Baxter in Washington and Michael Sheridan
IT was just after midnight when the 69th Squadron of Israeli F15Is crossed the Syrian coast-line. On the ground, Syria’s formidable air defences went dead. An audacious raid on a Syrian target 50 miles from the Iraqi border was under way.
At a rendezvous point on the ground, a Shaldag air force commando team was waiting to direct their laser beams at the target for the approaching jets. The team had arrived a day earlier, taking up position near a large underground depot. Soon the bunkers were in flames.
Ten days after the jets reached home, their mission was the focus of intense speculation this weekend amid claims that Israel believed it had destroyed a cache of nuclear materials from North Korea.
The Israeli government was not saying. “The security sources and IDF [Israeli Defence Forces] soldiers are demonstrating unusual courage,” said Ehud Olmert, the prime minister. “We naturally cannot always show the public our cards.”
Related Links
A tale of two dictatorships: The links between North Korea and Syria
PM to discuss Iran crisis at Bush summit
US tells generals to ‘lay off’ Britain
The Syrians were also keeping mum. “I cannot reveal the details,” said Farouk al-Sharaa, the vice-president. “All I can say is the military and political echelon is looking into a series of responses as we speak. Results are forthcoming.” The official story that the target comprised weapons destined for Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shi’ite group, appeared to be crumbling in the face of widespread scepticism.
Andrew Semmel, a senior US State Department official, said Syria might have obtained nuclear equipment from “secret suppliers”, and added that there were a “number of foreign technicians” in the country.
Asked if they could be North Korean, he replied: “There are North Korean people there. There’s no question about that.” He said a network run by AQ Khan, the disgraced creator of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, could be involved.
But why would nuclear material be in Syria? Known to have chemical weapons, was it seeking to bolster its arsenal with something even more deadly?
Alternatively, could it be hiding equipment for North Korea, enabling Kim Jong-il to pretend to be giving up his nuclear programme in exchange for economic aid? Or was the material bound for Iran, as some authorities in America suggest?
According to Israeli sources, preparations for the attack had been going on since late spring, when Meir Dagan, the head of Mossad, presented Olmert with evidence that Syria was seeking to buy a nuclear device from North Korea.
The Israeli spy chief apparently feared such a device could eventually be installed on North-Korean-made Scud-C missiles.
“This was supposed to be a devastating Syrian surprise for Israel,” said an Israeli source. “We’ve known for a long time that Syria has deadly chemical warheads on its Scuds, but Israel can’t live with a nuclear warhead.”
An expert on the Middle East, who has spoken to Israeli participants in the raid, told yesterday’s Washington Post that the timing of the raid on September 6 appeared to be linked to the arrival three days earlier of a ship carrying North Korean material labelled as cement but suspected of concealing nuclear equipment.
The target was identified as a northern Syrian facility that purported to be an agricultural research centre on the Euphrates river. Israel had been monitoring it for some time, concerned that it was being used to extract uranium from phosphates.
According to an Israeli air force source, the Israeli satellite Ofek 7, launched in June, was diverted from Iran to Syria. It sent out high-quality images of a northeastern area every 90 minutes, making it easy for air force specialists to spot the facility.
Early in the summer Ehud Barak, the defence minister, had given the order to double Israeli forces on its Golan Heights border with Syria in anticipation of possible retaliation by Damascus in the event of air strikes.
Sergei Kirpichenko, the Russian ambassador to Syria, warned President Bashar al-Assad last month that Israel was planning an attack, but suggested the target was the Golan Heights.
Israeli military intelligence sources claim Syrian special forces moved towards the Israeli outpost of Mount Hermon on the Golan Heights. Tension rose, but nobody knew why.
At this point, Barak feared events could spiral out of control. The decision was taken to reduce the number of Israeli troops on the Golan Heights and tell Damascus the tension was over. Syria relaxed its guard shortly before the Israeli Defence Forces struck.
Only three Israeli cabinet ministers are said to have been in the know � Olmert, Barak and Tzipi Livni, the foreign minister. America was also consulted. According to Israeli sources, American air force codes were given to the Israeli air force attaché in Washington to ensure Israel’s F15Is would not mistakenly attack their US counterparts.
Once the mission was under way, Israel imposed draconian military censorship and no news of the operation emerged until Syria complained that Israeli aircraft had violated its airspace. Syria claimed its air defences had engaged the planes, forcing them to drop fuel tanks to lighten their loads as they fled.
But intelligence sources suggested it was a highly successful Israeli raid on nuclear material supplied by North Korea.
Washington was rife with speculation last week about the precise nature of the operation. One source said the air strikes were a diversion for a daring Israeli commando raid, in which nuclear materials were intercepted en route to Iran and hauled to Israel. Others claimed they were destroyed in the attack.
There is no doubt, however, that North Korea is accused of nuclear cooperation with Syria, helped by AQ Khan’s network. John Bolton, who was undersecretary for arms control at the State Department, told the United Nations in 2004 the Pakistani nuclear scientist had “several other” customers besides Iran, Libya and North Korea.
Some of his evidence came from the CIA, which had reported to Congress that it viewed “Syrian nuclear intentions with growing concern”.
“I’ve been worried for some time about North Korea and Iran outsourcing their nuclear programmes,” Bolton said last week. Syria, he added, was a member of a “junior axis of evil”, with a well-established ambition to develop weapons of mass destruction.
The links between Syria and North Korea date back to the rule of Kim Il-sung and President Hafez al-Assad in the last century. In recent months, their sons have quietly ordered an increase in military and technical cooperation.
Foreign diplomats who follow North Korean affairs are taking note. There were reports of Syrian passengers on flights from Beijing to Pyongyang and sightings of Middle Eastern businessmen from sources who watch the trains from North Korea to China.
On August 14, Rim Kyong Man, the North Korean foreign trade minister, was in Syria to sign a protocol on “cooperation in trade and science and technology”. No details were released, but it caught Israel’s attention.
Syria possesses between 60 and 120 Scud-C missiles, which it has bought from North Korea over the past 15 years. Diplomats believe North Korean engineers have been working on extending their 300-mile range. It means they can be used in the deserts of northeastern Syria � the area of the Israeli strike.
The triangular relationship between North Korea, Syria and Iran continues to perplex intelligence analysts. Syria served as a conduit for the transport to Iran of an estimated £50m of missile components and technology sent by sea from North Korea. The same route may be in use for nuclear equipment.
But North Korea is at a sensitive stage of negotiations to end its nuclear programme in exchange for security guarantees and aid, leading some diplomats to cast doubt on the likelihood that Kim would cross America’s “red line” forbidding the proliferation of nuclear materials.
Christopher Hill, the State Department official representing America in the talks, said on Friday he could not confirm “intelligence-type things”, but the reports underscored the need “to make sure the North Koreans get out of the nuclear business”.
By its actions, Israel showed it is not interested in waiting for diplomacy to work where nuclear weapons are at stake.
As a bonus, the Israelis proved they could penetrate the Syrian air defence system, which is stronger than the one protecting Iranian nuclear sites.
This weekend President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran sent Ali Akbar Mehrabian, his nephew, to Syria to assess the damage. The new “axis of evil” may have lost one of its spokes.
I wonder what the ramifications of this are going to be.
Israelis ‘blew apart Syrian nuclear cache’
Secret raid on Korean shipment
Uzi Mahnaimi in Tel Aviv, Sarah Baxter in Washington and Michael Sheridan
IT was just after midnight when the 69th Squadron of Israeli F15Is crossed the Syrian coast-line. On the ground, Syria’s formidable air defences went dead. An audacious raid on a Syrian target 50 miles from the Iraqi border was under way.
At a rendezvous point on the ground, a Shaldag air force commando team was waiting to direct their laser beams at the target for the approaching jets. The team had arrived a day earlier, taking up position near a large underground depot. Soon the bunkers were in flames.
Ten days after the jets reached home, their mission was the focus of intense speculation this weekend amid claims that Israel believed it had destroyed a cache of nuclear materials from North Korea.
The Israeli government was not saying. “The security sources and IDF [Israeli Defence Forces] soldiers are demonstrating unusual courage,” said Ehud Olmert, the prime minister. “We naturally cannot always show the public our cards.”
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The Syrians were also keeping mum. “I cannot reveal the details,” said Farouk al-Sharaa, the vice-president. “All I can say is the military and political echelon is looking into a series of responses as we speak. Results are forthcoming.” The official story that the target comprised weapons destined for Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shi’ite group, appeared to be crumbling in the face of widespread scepticism.
Andrew Semmel, a senior US State Department official, said Syria might have obtained nuclear equipment from “secret suppliers”, and added that there were a “number of foreign technicians” in the country.
Asked if they could be North Korean, he replied: “There are North Korean people there. There’s no question about that.” He said a network run by AQ Khan, the disgraced creator of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, could be involved.
But why would nuclear material be in Syria? Known to have chemical weapons, was it seeking to bolster its arsenal with something even more deadly?
Alternatively, could it be hiding equipment for North Korea, enabling Kim Jong-il to pretend to be giving up his nuclear programme in exchange for economic aid? Or was the material bound for Iran, as some authorities in America suggest?
According to Israeli sources, preparations for the attack had been going on since late spring, when Meir Dagan, the head of Mossad, presented Olmert with evidence that Syria was seeking to buy a nuclear device from North Korea.
The Israeli spy chief apparently feared such a device could eventually be installed on North-Korean-made Scud-C missiles.
“This was supposed to be a devastating Syrian surprise for Israel,” said an Israeli source. “We’ve known for a long time that Syria has deadly chemical warheads on its Scuds, but Israel can’t live with a nuclear warhead.”
An expert on the Middle East, who has spoken to Israeli participants in the raid, told yesterday’s Washington Post that the timing of the raid on September 6 appeared to be linked to the arrival three days earlier of a ship carrying North Korean material labelled as cement but suspected of concealing nuclear equipment.
The target was identified as a northern Syrian facility that purported to be an agricultural research centre on the Euphrates river. Israel had been monitoring it for some time, concerned that it was being used to extract uranium from phosphates.
According to an Israeli air force source, the Israeli satellite Ofek 7, launched in June, was diverted from Iran to Syria. It sent out high-quality images of a northeastern area every 90 minutes, making it easy for air force specialists to spot the facility.
Early in the summer Ehud Barak, the defence minister, had given the order to double Israeli forces on its Golan Heights border with Syria in anticipation of possible retaliation by Damascus in the event of air strikes.
Sergei Kirpichenko, the Russian ambassador to Syria, warned President Bashar al-Assad last month that Israel was planning an attack, but suggested the target was the Golan Heights.
Israeli military intelligence sources claim Syrian special forces moved towards the Israeli outpost of Mount Hermon on the Golan Heights. Tension rose, but nobody knew why.
At this point, Barak feared events could spiral out of control. The decision was taken to reduce the number of Israeli troops on the Golan Heights and tell Damascus the tension was over. Syria relaxed its guard shortly before the Israeli Defence Forces struck.
Only three Israeli cabinet ministers are said to have been in the know � Olmert, Barak and Tzipi Livni, the foreign minister. America was also consulted. According to Israeli sources, American air force codes were given to the Israeli air force attaché in Washington to ensure Israel’s F15Is would not mistakenly attack their US counterparts.
Once the mission was under way, Israel imposed draconian military censorship and no news of the operation emerged until Syria complained that Israeli aircraft had violated its airspace. Syria claimed its air defences had engaged the planes, forcing them to drop fuel tanks to lighten their loads as they fled.
But intelligence sources suggested it was a highly successful Israeli raid on nuclear material supplied by North Korea.
Washington was rife with speculation last week about the precise nature of the operation. One source said the air strikes were a diversion for a daring Israeli commando raid, in which nuclear materials were intercepted en route to Iran and hauled to Israel. Others claimed they were destroyed in the attack.
There is no doubt, however, that North Korea is accused of nuclear cooperation with Syria, helped by AQ Khan’s network. John Bolton, who was undersecretary for arms control at the State Department, told the United Nations in 2004 the Pakistani nuclear scientist had “several other” customers besides Iran, Libya and North Korea.
Some of his evidence came from the CIA, which had reported to Congress that it viewed “Syrian nuclear intentions with growing concern”.
“I’ve been worried for some time about North Korea and Iran outsourcing their nuclear programmes,” Bolton said last week. Syria, he added, was a member of a “junior axis of evil”, with a well-established ambition to develop weapons of mass destruction.
The links between Syria and North Korea date back to the rule of Kim Il-sung and President Hafez al-Assad in the last century. In recent months, their sons have quietly ordered an increase in military and technical cooperation.
Foreign diplomats who follow North Korean affairs are taking note. There were reports of Syrian passengers on flights from Beijing to Pyongyang and sightings of Middle Eastern businessmen from sources who watch the trains from North Korea to China.
On August 14, Rim Kyong Man, the North Korean foreign trade minister, was in Syria to sign a protocol on “cooperation in trade and science and technology”. No details were released, but it caught Israel’s attention.
Syria possesses between 60 and 120 Scud-C missiles, which it has bought from North Korea over the past 15 years. Diplomats believe North Korean engineers have been working on extending their 300-mile range. It means they can be used in the deserts of northeastern Syria � the area of the Israeli strike.
The triangular relationship between North Korea, Syria and Iran continues to perplex intelligence analysts. Syria served as a conduit for the transport to Iran of an estimated £50m of missile components and technology sent by sea from North Korea. The same route may be in use for nuclear equipment.
But North Korea is at a sensitive stage of negotiations to end its nuclear programme in exchange for security guarantees and aid, leading some diplomats to cast doubt on the likelihood that Kim would cross America’s “red line” forbidding the proliferation of nuclear materials.
Christopher Hill, the State Department official representing America in the talks, said on Friday he could not confirm “intelligence-type things”, but the reports underscored the need “to make sure the North Koreans get out of the nuclear business”.
By its actions, Israel showed it is not interested in waiting for diplomacy to work where nuclear weapons are at stake.
As a bonus, the Israelis proved they could penetrate the Syrian air defence system, which is stronger than the one protecting Iranian nuclear sites.
This weekend President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran sent Ali Akbar Mehrabian, his nephew, to Syria to assess the damage. The new “axis of evil” may have lost one of its spokes.
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Drizz
Likes Dirt
I second that! Isn't a "dirty bomb" basically radioactive material + conventional explosive? Let along a conventional explosive from a F15?