A suicide bomber has killed himself and at least nine other people near a church in the northern Nigerian city of Bauchi, police have told the BBC.
They say the man drove a car full with explosives towards the church. About 30 people were wounded in the blast.
No group has claimed the bombing, but it comes amid a wave of violence by the radical Islamic sect Boko Haram.
The group has carried out numerous attacks in northern Nigeria, killing hundreds of people since 2009.
According to Bauchi residents, a man tried to drive a car through a fence outside the Harvest Field Pentecostal church on Sunday.
The vehicle did not break through the fence and the bomb was detonated. Some of those killed by the blast were inside the church and others were standing outside.
Eyewitness Aliku Jon told Reuters news agency: "I had just left after the morning service and was out of the church when I heard a loud explosion. I rushed back and there were dozens of people lying in pools of blood."
Some residents told Reuters they had counted 12 bodies, but police put the death toll at 10.
Boko Haram - whose name means "No to Western education" - has its stronghold in the north-eastern city of Maiduguri and wants to impose Sharia law across Nigeria.
It has targeted churches as well as schools, police stations, and other government buildings.
BBC
MOSCOW — When Eugene Kaspersky, the founder of Europe’s largest antivirus company, discovered the Flame virus that is afflicting computers in Iran and the Middle East, he recognized it as a technologically sophisticated virus that only a government could create.
He also recognized that the virus, which he compares to the Stuxnet virus built by programmers employed by the United States and Israel, adds weight to his warnings of the grave dangers posed by governments that manufacture and release viruses on the Internet.
“Cyberweapons are the most dangerous innovation of this century,” he told a gathering of technology company executives, called the CeBIT conference, last month in Sydney, Australia. While the United States and Israel are using the weapons to slow the nuclear bomb-making abilities of Iran, they could also be used to disrupt power grids and financial systems or even wreak havoc with military defenses.
Computer security companies have for years used their discovery of a new virus or worm to call attention to themselves and win more business from companies seeking computer protection. Mr. Kaspersky, a Russian computer security expert, and his company, Kaspersky Lab, are no different in that regard. But he is also using his company’s integral role in exposing or decrypting three computer viruses apparently intended to slow or halt Iran’s nuclear program to argue for an international treaty banning computer warfare.
A growing array of nations and other entities are using online weapons, he says, because they are “thousands of times cheaper” than conventional armaments.
While antivirus companies might catch some, he says, only an international treaty that would ban militaries and spy agencies from making viruses will truly solve the problem.
The wide disclosure of the details of the Flame virus by Kaspersky Lab also seems intended to promote the Russian call for a ban on cyberweapons like those that blocked poison gas or expanding bullets from the armies of major nations and other entities.
And that puts the Russian company in a difficult position because it already faces suspicions that it is tied to the Russian government, accusations Mr. Kaspersky has constantly denied as he has built his business.
While Russian officials have not commented on the discovery of Flame, the Russian minister of telecommunications gave a speech, also in May, calling for an international cyberweapon ban. Russia has also pushed for a bilateral treaty with the United States.
The United States has agreed to discuss such a disarmament treaty with the Russians, but has also tried to encourage Russia to prosecute online crime, which flourishes in this country.
The United States has long objected to the Russian crusade for an online arms control ban. “There is no broad international support for a cyberweapon ban,” says James A. Lewis, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “This is a global diplomatic ploy by the Russians to take down a perceived area of U.S. military advantage.”
Russia, many security experts note, has been accused of using cyberwarfare in disputes with Estonia and wars in Georgia.
Mr. Kaspersky said that at no point did he cooperate with the Federal Security Agency, the successor agency to the K.G.B., as the Flame virus was not a threat to Russian citizens.
Kaspersky Lab, he said, felt justified exposing the Flame virus because the company was working under the auspices of a United Nations agency. But the company has been noticeably silent on viruses perpetrated in its own backyard, where Russian-speaking criminal syndicates controlled a third of the estimated $12 billion global cybercrime market last year, according to the Russian security firm Group-IB.
Some say there is good reason. “He’s got family,” said Sean Sullivan, an adviser at F-Secure, a computer security firm in Helsinki. “I wouldn’t expect them to be the most aggressive about publicizing threats in their neighborhood for fear those neighbors would retaliate.”
Last year, Mr. Kaspersky’s 19-year-old son was kidnapped by criminals demanding a ransom. The kidnappers did not appear to have ties to any of Russia’s online criminal syndicates, but Mr. Sullivan says, “It was probably a wake-up call.”
NY Times
MADRID - Spaniards alarmed by the dire state of their banks are squirreling money abroad at the fastest rate since records began, figures showed on Thursday, and the credit ratings of eight regions were cut.
Spain is the next country in the firing line of the euro zone's debt crisis, with spendthrift regions and shaky banks threatening to blow a hole in state finances and pushing funding costs towards levels that signal the need for a bailout.
The European Commission gave new help on Wednesday, offering direct aid from a euro zone rescue fund to recapitalize Spanish banks and more time for Madrid to reduce its budget deficit.
That helped lower the risk premium investors demand to hold Spanish 10-year debt rather than the German benchmark on Thursday, but it remained close to the euro-era record, at 520 basis points.
Bank of Spain data showed a net 66.2 billion euros ($82.0 billion) was sent abroad in March, the most since records began in 1990. The figure compares to a 5.4 billion net entry of funds during the same month one year ago.
Spaniards are worried about the health of their banks, hit by their exposure to a 2008 property crash, and have been sending money to deposit accounts in stronger economies of northern Europe.
Spain's Economy Minister Luis de Guindos however said the data was more a reflection of the troubles of the banking sector to fund itself externally than deposits flying abroad.
The capital flight data predates the nationalization of Spain's fourth biggest lender Bankia in May when it became clear the bank could not handle losses from bad real estate investments, compounded by a recession.
Spain's centre-right government has contracted independent auditors to assess the health of its financial system in an effort to restore faith in its banks.
Spain must lay out its restructuring plans for Bankia to the European Commission (EC), a spokesman for the EU executive arm said on Thursday. He added that a domestic solution to the country's bank crisis would be better than a European rescue.
The government said on Wednesday it would finance a 23.5 billion euro rescue of the bank through the bank fund, FROB but senior debt bankers said that the syndicated bond market is currently closed for Spanish agencies.
REMOVING UNCERTAINTIES
The prospect that Spain might not be able to handle losses at its banks has pummeled shares and the euro, although both regained some stability on Thursday.
De Guindos said that the future of the euro would be at stake in the next few weeks in Spain and Italy, adding that the rumors that Spain was negotiating financial assistance with the International Monetary Fund were "complete nonsense."
"The battle of the euro is being fought right now in Spain and Italy," he said at an event in Sitges, in the north-eastern region of Catalonia.
He also said Germany should help correct imbalances in the euro zone created by a loose monetary policy over the last decade and by the non-respect by Berlin of the stability and growth pact in 2003.
"We need to correct decisions which favored Germany... Germany has to assume its part," he said, adding that decisions in this respect would be taken in the next few days.
The Spanish government also hopes to clear doubts on Friday about how it plans to ease financing problems among its 17 autonomous regions.
Treasury ministry sources said a mechanism to back the regions' debt would be agreed at the weekly cabinet meeting and figures showing they were on track to meet their spending cuts targets would be released.
Fitch Ratings downgraded eight regions on Thursday, warning that a failure from the government to adopt new measures would result in further ratings cuts.
Spain's Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria was meeting U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and International Monetary Fund Director General Christine Lagarde in Washington on Thursday.
The deputy PM will outline Spain's measures to tackle its crisis during the meetings, which were scheduled before Spain's situation reached boiling point, a government spokesman said.
Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Spaniards+move+money+abroad+record+rate/6714186/story.html#ixzz1wpbRQ4Zq
A 6.6-magnitude earthquake struck on Sunday in the Pacific Ocean south of Panama, but there was no risk of a massive tsunami, US seismologists said.
The quake struck at 6:45am at a depth of 10 kilometers (six miles), the US Geological Survey said. The epicenter was located 370 kilometers
(230 miles) south of the Panamanian city of David.
There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said "no destructive widespread tsunami threat exists," but warned that quakes of a similar magnitude can "sometimes generate local tsunamis in coastal areas near the epicenter.
Hindustan Times
On June 1, market rumors were coming out of a hedge fund luncheon stating that Pimco, JP Morgan, and other financial companies were cancelling summer vacations for employees so they could prepare for a major 'Lehman type' economic crash projected for the coming months. These rumors came on a day when the markets nearly came to capitulation, with the DOW falling more than 274 points, and gold soaring over $63 as traders across the board fled stocks and moved into safer investments.
Todd Harrison is the CEO of the award winning internet media company Minyanville, while Todd Shoenberger is a managing principal at the Blackbay Group, and an adjunct professor of Finance at Cecil College.
Pimco and JP Morgan Chase are not the only financial institutions worried about a potential repeat of the 2008 credit crisis. On May 31, one day before Pinco rumors began to spread around the markets, World Bank President Robert Zoellick issued the same warnings of a potential 'rerun of the great panic of 2008'.
The head of the World Bank yesterday warned that financial markets face a rerun of the Great Panic of 2008.
On the bleakest day for the global economy this year, Robert Zoellick said crisis-torn Europe was heading for the ‘danger zone’.
Mr Zoellick, who stands down at the end of the month after five years in charge of the watchdog, said it was ‘far from clear that eurozone leaders have steeled themselves’ for the looming catastrophe amid fears of a Greek exit from the single currency and meltdown in Spain. - The Daily Mail
Market indicators over the past two months in Europe have been signalling an economic slowdown, with the potential for total economic collpase increasing over the past few weeks. The US markets have dropped more than 1000 points since their highs in March, and on Friday, all gains for the year were completely wiped out after the shocking jobs report was issued.
Additionally, a new study from a former hedge fund manager on May 31st outlined that for the first time in the economic cycle, economies did not recover all their losses from prior recessions before going into a new one. The conclusions point to the need for a complete reset of the financial systems, as capitalism and central bank intervention (money printing) no longer have any real effect on economic growth.
When one company decides to cancel vacations, or impose additional workloads on their employees due to projected events, it is not considered relative news. However, when several institutions, analysts, and even the head of the World Bank acknowledge a coming crisis, then everyone needs to come to the realization that something big is on the horizon that will have an effect on both Wall Street and Main Street. The rumors out on June 1 regarding Pimco and JP Morgan should be a wake up call to all investors that Friday's market drops across the board are just the beginning of what could be a repeat of 2008, only much worse this time around.
Examiner
TEHRAN — Any attack by Israel on Iran will blow back on the Jewish state “like thunder,” Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said on Sunday.
Khamenei also said that the international community’s suspicion that Iran was seeking nuclear weapons is based on a “lie” and he insisted that sanctions imposed on his country were ineffective and only strengthened its resolve.
His speech, broadcast on state television to mark the 1989 death of his predecessor and founder of the Islamic republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, contained no sign Iran was prepared to make any concessions on its disputed nuclear program.
Instead, it was infused with defiance and Khamenei’s customary contempt for Iran’s arch-foes Israel and the United States.
If the Israelis “make any misstep or wrong action, it will fall on their heads like thunder,” Khamenei said.
The Jewish state, he added, was feeling “vulnerable” and “terrified” after losing deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak as an ally.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters in Stockholm the threats against Israel were “nothing new,” insisting she would judge Tehran by its actions at upcoming nuclear talks in Russia.
“We look forward to what the Iranians actually bring to the table in Moscow,” she said.
“We want to see a diplomatic resolution. We now have an opportunity to achieve it, and we hope it is an opportunity that’s not lost, for everyone’s sake,” she said.
Allegations that Iran was trying to develop atomic bombs were false, Khamenei said on Sunday.
“International political circles and media talk about the danger of a nuclear Iran, that a nuclear Iran is dangerous. I say that they lie. They are deceiving,” Khamenei said.
“What they are afraid of — and should be afraid of — is not a nuclear but an Islamic Iran.”
He added: “They invoke the term ‘nuclear weapons’ based on a lie. They magnify and highlight the issue in their propaganda based on a lie. Their goal is to divert minds and public opinion from the (economic) events that are happening in the US and Europe.”
Western economic sanctions imposed to pressure Iran to curb its nuclear program were having no effect, Khamenei insisted. Their only impact, he said, was “deepening hatred and animosity of the West in the hearts of the Iranian people.”
Khamenei called the stance by the United States and its Western allies “crazy.”
“The Iranian people have proved they can progress without the United States, and while being an enemy of the United States,” he said.
Western nations, the United States at the fore, accuse Iran of wanting to develop the capability to make nuclear weapons, something Khamenei has repeatedly denied. The supreme leader has called atomic arms “a great sin.”
Talks between the Islamic republic and the so-called P5+1 group of nations — the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, plus Germany — were revived this year and are to go to a crucial next round in Moscow on June 18-19.
But the United States and its ally Israel — the sole, if undeclared, nuclear weapons state in the Middle East — have threatened military strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities if diplomacy fails.
Khamenei’s speech was being closely watched by P5+1 officials for signs of what positions the Iranian delegation might take into the Moscow negotiations. The supreme leader has the final word on any decision on Iran’s nuclear activities.
At one point in his speech, Khamenei declared it “forbidden to stop on the path to progress, in the political sphere and in the sphere of science and technology.”
That carried the implication that Iran had no intention on scaling back its nuclear development.
National Post
Speaking at a conference in Italy Mr Soros said the eurozone’s fate lay firmly with Germany, which he urged to agree to measures which would help the region’s ailing banking system and ease borrowing costs among the most troubled member states.
“In my judgment the authorities have a three months’ window during which they could still correct their mistakes and reverse the current trends,” he said.
“By the authorities I mean mainly the German government and the Bundesbank because in a crisis the creditors are in the driver’s seat and nothing can be done without German support.
“In the 1980’s Latin America suffered a lost decade; a similar fate now awaits Europe. That is the responsibility that Germany and the other creditor countries need to acknowledge.”
Mr Soros, who famously made $1bn betting against the pound in 1992, said the Greek crisis would come to a head this autumn.
He argued that although Greek voters were likely on June 17 to elect a government prepared to abide by the austerity terms required to qualify for future bailout funds, the terms would ultimately prove impossible to meet.
“No government can meet the conditions so the Greek crisis is liable to come to a climax in the fall. By that time the German economy will also be weakening so that Chancellor Merkel will find it even more difficult than today to persuade the German public to accept any additional European responsibilities. That is what creates a three months’ window.”
Arguing that the eurozone crisis “threatens to destroy the European Union”, he said the region’s banks would need a European deposit scheme in order to stem the capital flight already evident.
He also supported Spain’s call for the banks to be able to access direct financing from the European Stability Mechanism, the bailout fund, and said heavily indebted countries would need relief on their financing costs.
There are various ways to provide it but they all need the active support of the Bundesbank and the German government.”
Spanish borrowing costs have spiked to unsustainable highs during the crisis while German borrowing costs are at record lows as investors rush to place their money in the safest place.
France, Italy and Spain are in favour of the introduction of so-called eurobonds, which would essentially pool the debt of all eurozone members, spreading risk, but Germany is strongly opposed to the idea.
Mr Soros said that while an orderly break-up of the euro could be possible “in a few years’ time”, the likelihood was that it would survive because a collapse would come at too high a price for Germany.
He said Germany would be left with large unenforceable claims against the periphery countries, with the Bundesbank alone having over a trillion euros of claims against other central banks by the end of this year.
“So Germany is likely to do what is necessary to preserve the euro – but nothing more.” He said Europe would ultimately become “a German empire with the periphery as the hinterland.”
The Telegraph
Germany is helping Israel to develop its military nuclear capabilities, SPIEGEL has learned. According to extensive research carried out by the magazine, Israel is equipping submarines that were built in the northern German city of Kiel and largely paid for by the German government with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles. The missiles can be launched using a previously secret hydraulic ejection system. Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak told SPIEGEL that Germans should be "proud" that they have secured the existence of the state of Israel "for many years."
In the past, the German government has always stuck to the position that it is unaware of nuclear weapons being deployed on the vessels. Now, however, former high-ranking officials from the German Defense Ministry, including former State Secretary Lothar Rühl and former chief of the planning staff Hans Rühle, have told SPIEGEL that they had always assumed that Israel would deploy nuclear weapons on the submarines. Rühl had even discussed the issue with the military in Tel Aviv.
Israel has a policy of not commenting officially on its nuclear weapons program. Documents from the archives of the German Foreign Ministry make it clear, however, that the German government has known about the program since 1961. The last discussion for which there is evidence took place in 1977, when then-Chancellor Helmut Schmidt spoke to then-Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan about the issue.
The submarines are built by the German shipyard HDW in Kiel. Three submarines have already been delivered to Israel, and three more will be delivered by 2017. In addition, Israel is considering ordering its seventh, eighth and ninth submarines from Germany.
The German government recently signed the contract for the delivery of the sixth vessel. According to information obtained by SPIEGEL, Chancellor Angela Merkel made substantial concessions to the Israelis. Not only is Berlin financing one-third of the cost of the submarine, around €135 million ($168 million), but it is also allowing Israel to defer its payment until 2015.
Merkel had tied the delivery of the sixth submarine to a number of conditions, including a demand that Israel stop its expansionist settlement policy and allow the completion of a sewage treatment plant in the Gaza Strip, which is partially financed with German money. So far, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has met none of the terms.
Spiegel
