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Man Suspected in Anthrax Attacks Said to Commit Suicide

WASHINGTON — The seven-year investigation into the anthrax attacks that traumatized and baffled the nation just weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks has taken a stunning new turn with the apparent suicide of a scientist who was the prime suspect in the case.

Dr. Ivins, who was a biodefense researcher at Fort Detrick, knew he had long been a focus of the investigation into the anthrax incidents, said his lawyer, Paul F. Kemp of Rockville, Md., who issued a statement insisting that his client was innocent.

ESTEEMED GALLERY OWNER TIED TO $1B ART FRAUD SCANDAL

Doug Chrismas, a veteran Manhattan and Los Angeles art gallery owner, found himself in the middle of a $1 billion international fraud case last week after federal agents seized a $1.3 million Lichtenstein painting he sold last year - claiming title to the work of art was “free and clear.”

It turns out the 41-year-old painting, “Modern Painting With Yellow Interweave, 1967,” had been smuggled into the country by a Brazilian money launderer, Edemar Cid Ferreira, the former owner of Banco Santos.

Ferreira, now serving a 21-year prison sentence for defrauding the bank and leaving it with $1 billion in debt, used some of the purloined loot to buy 29 works of art worth more than $100 million. The Lichtenstein is just the third piece to be recovered during a years-long international search by Interpol, US Customs and the FBI.

Alzheimer's drug 'halts' decline

UK scientists have developed a drug which may halt the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.

Trials of the drug, known as Rember, in 321 patients showed an 81% difference in rate of mental decline compared with those not taking the treatment.

The Aberdeen University researchers said the drug targeted the build-up of a specific protein in the brain.

Alzheimer’s experts were optimistic about the results, but said larger trials were now needed.

Presenting the results at the International Conference on Alzheimer’s Disease, Professor Claude Wischik said the drug may be on the market by 2012.

Fraud office wins Saudi arms appeal

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has been cleared of unlawfully surrendering to pressure from Saudi Arabia when it dropped a corruption inquiry into a lucrative arms deal.

The then SFO Director Robert Wardle was praised by the Law Lords for taking a “courageous decision” in late 2006 in the face of Saudi threats to withdraw co-operation on anti-terrorism. The director resisted the pressure for as long as he could, said Baroness Hale.

“The great British public may still believe it was the risk to British commercial interests which caused him to give way, but the evidence is quite clear that this was not so,” Lady Hale said. “He only gave way when he was convinced that the threat of withdrawal of Saudi security co-operation was real and that the consequences would be an equally real risk to ‘British lives on British streets’.”

The SFO was investigating allegations that BAE, one of the world’s largest arms-makers, ran a £60 million “slush fund” offering sweeteners to officials from Saudi Arabia in return for lucrative contracts as part of the Al-Yamamah arms deal in the 1980s.

It took the case to the House of Lords after the High Court upheld a judicial review challenge brought by two campaign groups, Corner House Research and Campaign Against Arms Trade.

Two judges in the High Court ruled that the Saudi threat was a “successful attempt by a foreign government to pervert the course of justice in the United Kingdom”. Lord Justice Moses and Mr Justice Sullivan said the SFO and the Government made an “abject surrender” to “blatant threats”.

World trade talks end in collapse

Marathon talks in Geneva aimed at liberalising global trade have collapsed, the head of the World Trade Organisation has said.

Pascal Lamy confirmed the failure, which officials have blamed on China, India and the US failing to agree on import rules.

EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said the result was “heartbreaking”.

The talks were launched in 2001 in Doha and were seen as providing a cornerstone for future global trade.

The main stumbling block was farm import rules, which allow countries to protect poor farmers by imposing a tariff on certain goods in the event of a drop in prices or a surge in imports.

India, China and the US could not agree on the tariff threshold for such an event.

Strong Earthquake Rattles Los Angeles

A strong earthquake shook Southern California on Tuesday, causing buildings to sway and triggering some precautionary evacuations. No immediate damage was reported.

The jolt was felt from Los Angeles to San Diego, and slightly in Las Vegas.

Preliminary information from the U.S. Geological Survey estimated the quake at magnitude 5.8, centered 29 miles east-southeast of downtown Los Angeles near Chino Hills in San Bernardino County.

Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphrey said there were no immediate reports of damage or injury in Los Angeles. San Bernardino County fire dispatch also had no immediate reports of damage.

The quake struck at 11:42 a.m. PDT. Buildings swayed in downtown Los Angeles for several seconds.

Workers quickly evacuated some office buildings.

House poised to apologize for slavery, Jim Crow

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The House of Representatives was poised Tuesday to pass a resolution apologizing to African-Americans for slavery and the era of Jim Crow.

The nonbinding resolution, which is expected to pass, was introduced by Rep. Steve Cohen, a white lawmaker who represents a majority black district in Memphis, Tennessee.

While many states have apologized for slavery, it will be first time a branch of the federal government will apologize for slavery if the resolution passes, an aide to Cohen said.

By passing the resolution, the House would also acknowledge the “injustice, cruelty, brutality and inhumanity of slavery and Jim Crow.”

“Jim Crow,” or Jim Crow laws, were state and local laws enacted mostly in the Southern and border states of the United States between the 1870s and 1965, when African-Americans were denied the right to vote and other civil liberties and were legally segregated from whites.

Trans-fats banned in California

California has become the first US state to ban restaurants and food retailers from using trans-fats, which are linked to coronary heart disease.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said the new legislation, which will take effect in 2010, represented a “strong step toward creating a healthier future”.

Violations will incur fines of between $25 (£13) and $1,000 (£502).

Trans-fats are chemically altered vegetable oils, used to give processed foods a longer shelf-life.

Some cities, like New York City, Philadelphia and Seattle, have already banned the fats. Many food makers and restaurant chains have also been experimenting with replacements for oils and foods that contain them.

'Blimp on Steroids' Joins Hunt for Natural Resources

Peter Jess, president of SkyHook International, isn’t sure what to call the new aircraft he recently contracted The Boeing Company to build.

Officially, the football-field-sized, blimp-shaped, helium-filled aircraft — designed for short distances and heavy loads — is called the Jess Heavy Lifter 40 (JHL-40).

The designer, SkyHook, and the manufacturer, Boeing, claim that the aircraft will have two-and-a-half times the carrying capacity (80,000 pounds) while using half the horsepower of the world’s current heavy-lifting helicopter, the Russian-built MI-26.

Unofficially Jess called the JHL-40 a “blimp on steroids” during a recent press conference.

But that’s not entirely accurate, he admits.

The JHL-40 is “heavier than a blimp but lighter than an airplane,” said Jess. “It’s an entirely new kind of aircraft.”

U.S. Reports Drop in Homeless Population

WASHINGTON — The number of chronically homeless people living in the nation’s streets and shelters has dropped by about 30 percent — to 123,833 from 175,914 — between 2005 and 2007, Bush administration officials said on Tuesday.

Housing officials say the statistics, which the Department of Housing and Urban Development collects each year from more than 3,800 cities and counties, may reflect better data collection and reporting and some variation in the number of communities reporting on an annual basis. But the officials attribute much of the decline to the “housing first” strategy that has been promoted by the Bush administration and Congress and increasingly adopted across the country.

In that approach, local officials place chronically homeless people into permanent shelter — apartments, halfway houses or rooms — and then focus on treating addiction and mental and health problems. HUD defines chronically homeless people as disabled individuals who have been continuously homeless for more than a year or have experienced at least four episodes of homelessness in the past three years.