"Blade Runner" Pistorius charged with murdering girlfriend

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African "Blade Runner" Oscar Pistorius, a double amputee who became one of the biggest names in world athletics, was charged on Thursday with shooting dead his girlfriend at his upscale home in Pretoria.

Police said they opened a murder case after a 30-year-old woman was found dead at the Paralympic and Olympic star's house in the Silverlakes gated complex on the capital's outskirts.

Pistorius, 26, and his girlfriend, model Reeva Steenkamp, had been the only people in the house at the time of the shooting, police brigadier Denise Beukes, told reporters, adding witnesses had been interviewed about the early morning incident.

"We are talking about neighbors and people that heard things earlier in the evening and when the shooting took place," Beukes said outside the heavily guarded residential complex. Earlier, police said a 9mm pistol had been found at the scene.

Beukes said police were aware of previous incidents at the Pistorius house. "I can confirm that there has previously been incidents at the home of Mr Oscar Pistorious, of allegations of domestic nature," she said.

Pistorius, who uses carbon fiber prosthetic blades to run, is due to appear in a Pretoria court on Friday.

"He is doing well but very emotional," his lawyer Kenny Oldwage told SABC TV, but gave no further comment.

A sports icon for triumphing over disabilities to compete with able-bodied athletes at the Olympics, his sponsorship deals, including one with sports apparel group Nike, are thought to be worth $2 million a year.

South Africa's M-Net cable TV channel said it was pulling adverts featuring Pistorius off air immediately.

"WE ARE ALL DEVASTATED"

Steenkamp's colleagues in the modeling world were distraught. "We are all devastated. Her family is in shock," her agent, Sarita Tomlinson, tearfully told Reuters. "They did have a good relationship. Nobody actually knows what happened."

Pistorius, who was born without a fibula in both legs, was the first double amputee to run in the Olympics and reached the 400-metre semi-finals in London 2012.

In last year's Paralympics he suffered his first loss over 200 meters in nine years. After the race he questioned the legitimacy of Brazilian winner Alan Oliveira's prosthetic blades, though he was quick to express regret for the comments.

South Africa has some of the world's highest rates of violent crime, and many home owners have weapons to defend themselves against intruders, although Pistorius' complex is surrounded by a three-meter high wall and electric fence.

In 2004, Springbok rugby player Rudi Visagie shot dead his 19-year-old daughter after he mistakenly thought she was a robber trying to steal his car in the middle of the night.

Before the murder charge was announced, Johannesburg's Talk Radio 702 said the athlete may have mistaken Steenkamp for a burglar.

Recent media interviews with Pistorius revealed he kept an assortment of weapons in his home.

"Cricket and baseball bats lay behind the door, a pistol by his bed and a machine gun by a window," Britain's Daily Mail wrote in a profile published last year.

Pistorius was arrested in 2009 for assault after slamming a door on a woman and spent a night in police custody. Family and friends said it was just an accident and charges were dropped.

"He's very quiet and very modest but he's a big party animal," one of South Africa's top runners, who knows Pistorius, told Reuters. "I've been with him when we've been smashed and he never seemed violent," said the runner, who declined to be named.

OLYMPIAN UNDERGOES POLICE TESTS

Steenkamp, a regular on the South African social scene, was reported to have been dating Pistorius for several months.

In the social pages of last weekend's Sunday Independent she described him as having "impeccable" taste. "His gifts are always thoughtful," she was quoted as saying.

Some of her last Twitter postings indicated she was looking forward to Valentine's Day on Thursday. "What do you have up your sleeve for your love tomorrow???" she posted.

Pistorius was on Thursday being processed through the police system. "At this stage he is on his way to a district surgeon for medical examination," the police brigadier said.

"When a person has been accused of a crime like murder they look at things like testing under the finger nails, taking a blood alcohol sample and all kinds of other test that are done. They are standard medical tests," Beukes said.

Pistorius is also sponsored by British telecoms firm BT, sunglasses maker Oakley and French designer Thierry Mugler.

"We are shocked by this terrible, tragic news. We await the outcome of the South African police investigation," a BT spokeswoman said before Pistorius was charged.

A Nike spokesman in London said before hearing of the murder charge that the company was "saddened by the news, but we have no further comment to make at this stage".

Pistorius also has a sponsorship deal with Icelandic prosthetics manufacturer Ossur.

"I can only say that our thoughts and prayers are with Oscar and the families involved in the tragedy," Ossur CEO Jon Sigurdsson told Reuters. "It is completely premature to discuss or speculate on our business relationship with him."

Neighbors expressed shock at the arrest of a "good guy".

"It is difficult to imagine an intruder entering this community, but we live in a country where intruders can get in wherever they want to," said one Silverlakes resident, who did not want to be named.

"Oscar is a good guy, an upstanding neighbor, and if he is innocent I feel for this guy deeply," he said.

(Additional reporting by Sherilee Lakmidas, David Dolan, Ed Cropley, Jon Herskovitz, Keith Weir and Kate Holton; Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Will Waterman and Peter Millership)

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CDL, CapitaLand, StarHub in list of sustainable companies

SINGAPORE: Three companies in Singapore have made it to the exclusive Global 100 list, which consists of the world's most sustainable companies.

The companies are City Developments Limited (CDL), CapitaLand and StarHub.

Esther An, general manager of corporate affairs at City Developments says globally, buildings can account for 40 per cent of energy consumption and 30 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions.

Ms An said: "Even in Singapore, the building sector is one of the biggest contributors to carbon emission. So therefore, we are in a strong position not just to implement sustainable business practices, but also to influence our stakeholders."

To do this, CDL has adopted traditional green practices, like using eco-friendly methods and materials to shrink its carbon footprint.

But as a company, she said sustainability cuts across all levels.

Talking about sustainability is not just PR talk," she said. "You have to put it in action. We have adopted a triple bottom-line approach, which is to strike a balance between financial, environmental and social performance."

CDL is one of three companies in Singapore to make it to Corporate Knights Global 100 in 2012 - For CDL it was the fourth consecutive year on the list.

The firm was ranked 52nd, up from 62nd the year before.

This is Knights' ninth annual list, which narrows down a field of about 4,000 companies before settling on its top 100.

When Knights makes the list, they are not just taking a company's green initiatives into consideration. They also look at things like CEO-to-average-worker pay ratio, leadership diversity and employee turnover.

In total, companies are scored on up to 12 performance indicators. Telco StarHub made its first appearance on the list, holding on to the 66th spot.

Developer CapitaLand also made the list for the second year, ranking 77th. The firm moved up 10 spots from the previous year. Chief Corporate Officer Tan Seng Chai said it takes a lot more than just green buildings to keep a company sustainable - it takes people too.

Mr Tan said: "We want to ensure our employees feel very engaged with the company and sustainability has become one of the critical factor. We are seeing more talents growing up the ranks. And today we have something close to 30 per cent of females in senior management. It is quite a progress for us."

More investors are weighing a company's environmental and social attitudes before putting their money down, meaning sustainability is something companies can no longer afford to overlook.

"Sources of energy become more expensive so if you continue to depend on traditional source of energy, then your cost of running a business in the long term will become higher," said Mr Tan.

Ms An said: "If we don't practice business models that can help to reduce the use of natural resources, that can mitigate carbon footprint, what is this world becoming to? And without the planet, no businesses will survive and there will be no buyers, no market and no individuals."

- CNA/xq

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I was sexually abused for several years, Anoushka Shankar says

NEW DELHI: Anoushka Shankar, daughter of legendary sitarist Ravi Shankar, has thrown her weight behind an online campaign demanding an end to crime against women, in the wake of the Delhi gang rape.

The 31-year-old sitarist has invited one billion women and those who love them, via the website Change.org, to walk out, "Dance, rise up, and demand" an end to this violence this Valentine's Day, February 14.

"The campaign 'One Billion Rising' is a promise that we will rise up with women and men worldwide to say, 'Enough! The violence ends now'," the website said.

It also contains a video of Anoushka speaking out for women who have been victims of abuse and asking people to join the campaign.

"As a child I suffered sexual and emotional abuse for several years at the hands of a man my parents trusted implicitly. Growing up, like most women I know, I suffered various forms of groping, touching, verbal abuse and other things I didn't know how to deal with, I didn't know I could change," said the Indian composer, now living in London.

"As a woman I find I am frequently living in fear. Afraid to walk alone at night, afraid to answer a man who asks for the time ... and enough is enough. I am rising, for (the Delhi rape victim) and women like her. I am rising with the amazing women of my country. I am rising for the child in me, who I don't think will ever forgive and recover from what happened to her.

"So, join me, let's rise, let's dance. Dance has the power to heal, to transform. So let's transform ourselves and this world. Let's rise together," she added.

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Report: Tracking system needed to fight fake drugs

WASHINGTON (AP) — Fighting the problem of fake drugs will require putting medications through a chain of custody like U.S. courts require for evidence in a trial, the Institute of Medicine reported Wednesday.

The call for a national drug tracking system comes a week after the Food and Drug Administration warned doctors, for the third time in about a year, that it discovered a counterfeit batch of the cancer drug Avastin that lacked the real tumor-killing ingredient.

Fake and substandard drugs have become an increasing concern as U.S. pharmaceutical companies move more of their manufacturing overseas. The risk made headlines in 2008 when U.S. patients died from a contaminated blood thinner imported from China.

The Institute of Medicine report made clear that this is a global problem that requires an international response, with developing countries especially at risk from phony medications. Drug-resistant tuberculosis, for example, is fueled in part by watered-down medications sold in many poor countries.

"There can be nothing worse than for a patient to take a medication that either doesn't work or poisons the patient," said Lawrence O. Gostin, a professor of health law at Georgetown University who led the IOM committee that studied how to combat the growing problem.

A mandatory drug-tracking system could use some form of barcodes or electronic tags to verify that a medication and the ingredients used to make it are authentic at every step, from the manufacturing of the active ingredient all the way to the pharmacy, he said. His committee examined fakes so sophisticated that health experts couldn't tell the difference between the packaging of the FDA-approved product and the look-alike.

"It's unreliable unless you know where it's been and can secure each point in the supply chain," Gostin said.

Patient safety advocates have pushed for that kind of tracking system for years, but attempts to include it in FDA drug-safety legislation last summer failed.

The report also concluded that:

—The World Health Organization should develop an international code of practice that sets guidelines for monitoring, regulation and law enforcement to crack down on fake drugs.

—States should beef up licensing requirements for the wholesalers and distributors who get a drug from its manufacturer to the pharmacy, hospital or doctor's office.

__Internet pharmacies are a particularly weak link, because fraudulent sites can mimic legitimate ones. The report urged wider promotion of the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy's online accreditation program as a tool to help consumers spot trustworthy sites.

The Institute of Medicine is an independent organization that advises the government on health matters.

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Charred Human Remains Found in Burned Cabin

Investigators have located charred human remains in the burned-out cabin where they believe suspected cop killer and ex-LAPD officer Christopher Dorner was holed up as the structure burned to the ground, police said.

The human remains were found within the debris of the burned cabin and identification will be attempted through forensic means, the San Bernardino County Sheriff-Coroner Department said in a news release early this morning.

Dorner barricaded himself in the cabin in the San Bernardino Mountains near Big Bear Tuesday afternoon after engaging in a gunfight with police, killing one officer and injuring another, the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said.

Cindy Bachman, a spokeswoman for the department, which is the lead agency in the action, said Tuesday night investigators would remain at the site all night.

FULL COVERAGE: Christopher Dorner Manhunt

When Bachman was asked whether police thought Dorner was in the burning cabin, she said, "Right. We believe that the person that barricaded himself inside the cabin engaged in gunfire with our deputies and other law enforcement officers is still inside there, even though the building burned."

Bachman spoke shortly after the Los Angeles Police Department denied earlier reports that a body was found in the cabin, contradicting what law enforcement sources told ABC News and other news organizations.

Police around the cabin told ABC News they saw Dorner enter but never leave the building as it was consumed by flames, creating a billowing column of black smoke seen for miles.

A news conference is scheduled for later today in San Bernardino.

One sheriff's deputy was killed in a shootout with Dorner earlier Tuesday afternoon, believed to be his fourth victim after killing a Riverside police officer and two other people this month, including the daughter of a former police captain, and promising to kill many more in an online manifesto.

PHOTOS: Former LAPD Officer Suspected in Shootings

Carjacking Victim Says Christopher Dorner Was Dressed for Damage Watch Video

Christopher Dorner Manhunt: Inside the Shootout Watch Video

Chris Dorner Manhunt: Fugitive Ex-Cop in Shootout With Police Watch Video

Cops said they heard a single gunshot go off from inside the cabin just as they began to see smoke and fire. Later they heard the sound of more gunshots, which was the sound of ammunition being ignited by the heat of the blaze, law enforcement officials said.

Police did not enter the building, but shot tear gas inside.

One of the largest dragnets in recent history, which led police to follow clues across the West and into Mexico, apparently ended just miles from where Dorner's trail went cold last week.

It all began at 12:20 p.m. PT Tuesday, when a maid working at a local resort called 911, saying she and another worker had been tied up and held hostage by Dorner in a cabin, sources said.

The maid told police she was able to escape, but Dorner had stolen one of their cars, which was identified as a purple Nissan.

The San Bernardino Sheriff's Office and state Fish and Wildlife wardens spotted the stolen vehicle and engaged in a shootout with Dorner.

Officials say Dorner crashed the stolen vehicle and fled on foot only to commandeer Rick Heltebrake's white pickup truck on a nearby road a short time later.

"[Dorner] said, 'I don't want to hurt you, just get out and start walking up the road and take your dog with you.' He was calm. I was calm. I would say I was in fear for my life, there was no panic, he told me what to do and I did it," Heltebrake said.

"He was dressed in all camouflage, had a big assault sniper-type rifle. He had a vest on like a ballistic vest," Heltebrake added.

The white pickup truck bought Dorner extra time because police were still looking for the purple Nissan, California Department of Fish and Wildlife Lt. Patrick Foy told "Good Morning America" today.

"We were looking for a purple color Nissan and all of a sudden this white pickup starts coming by in the opposite direction. That's not the suspect's vehicle that we had been looking for," Foy said.

A warden with the Fish and Wildlife department noticed Dorner driving and the pursuit picked up again, Foy said.

"Ultimately, the officer who was driving that vehicle stopped and pulled out his patrol rifle and engaged probably 15 to 20 shots as Dorner was driving away," Foy said.

Dorner then ran on foot to the cabin in which he barricaded himself and got in a shootout with San Bernardino County sheriff's deputies and other officers who arrived.

The two deputies were wounded in the firefight and airlifted to a nearby hospital, where one died, police said. The second deputy was in surgery and was expected to survive, police said.

Police sealed all the roads into the area, preventing cars from entering the area and searching all of those on the way out. All schools were briefly placed on lockdown.

Believing that Dorner might have been watching reports of the standoff, authorities asked media not to broadcast images of police officers' surrounding the cabin, but sent him a message.

"If he's watching this, the message is: Enough is enough," Los Angeles Police Department spokesman Andy Smith told reporters at a news conference Tuesday. "It's time to turn yourself in. It's time to stop the bloodshed. It's time to let this event and let this incident be over."

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Insight: Divided Damascus confronted by all-out war

DAMASCUS (Reuters) - MiG warplanes roar low overhead to strike rebels fighting to oust President Bashar al-Assad on the fringes of Damascus, while artillery batteries pound the insurgents from hills overlooking a city divided between all-out war and a deceptive calm.

Whole families can be obliterated by air raids that miss their targets. Wealthy Syrians or their children are kidnapped. Some are returned but people tell grim tales of how others are tortured and dumped even when the ransom is paid.

People also tell of prisoners dying under torture or from infected wounds; of looting by the government's feared shabbiha militias or by rebels fighting to throw out the Assad family.

That is one Damascus. In the other, comprising the central districts of a capital said to be the oldest continually inhabited city in the world, the restaurant menus are full, the wine is cheap and the souks are packed with shoppers.

Employees report for work, children go to school and shops are open, seemingly undeterred by the din and thud of war.

The two cities exist a few miles apart - for now.

For Damascus and its outskirts are rapidly descending into civil war and everything that comes with it - lawlessness, looting, kidnapping and revenge killings. Like the rest of the country, the capital and its suburbs are crawling with armed gangs.

"Anybody can come to you pretending he is security and grab you in broad daylight, put you in a car and speed off and nobody dares interfere or rescue you," says Lama Zayyat, 42. "A girl in the 7th grade was kidnapped and her father was asked to pay a big ransom. The same happened to other children," she said.

Nobody really knows who is behind the kidnappings. In one gang, one brother is in charge of abductions while another brother negotiates with the victims. The fear is palpable.

NO SECT HAS BEEN SPARED

The war has not yet reached the heart of the capital, but it is shredding the suburbs. In the past week, government troops backed by air power unleashed fierce barrages on the east of the city in an attempt to flush out rebel groups.

Most of central Damascus is controlled by Assad's forces, who have erected checkpoints to stop bomb attacks. The insurgents have so far failed to take territory in the center.

Just as loyalist forces seem unable to regain control of the country, there looks to be little chance the rebels can storm the center of Damascus and attack the seat of Assad's power.

For most of last week the army rained shells on the eastern and southern neighborhoods of Douma, Jobar, Zamalka and Hajar al-Aswad, using units of the elite Republican Guard based on the imposing Qasioun mountain that looms over the city.

The rebels, trying to break through the government's defense perimeter, were periodically able to overrun roadblocks and some army positions, but at heavy cost.

Jobar and Zamalka are situated near military compounds housing Assad's forces, while Hajar al-Aswad in the south is one of the gateways into the city, close to Assad's home and the headquarters of his republican guard and army.

Since the uprising began two years ago, 70,000 people have been killed, 700,000 have been driven from Syria and millions more are displaced, homeless and hungry. No section of society has been spared, whether Christians, Alawites or Sunnis, but in every community it is the poor who are suffering most.

Electricity is sporadic. Hospitals are understaffed as so many doctors - often targeted on suspicion of treating rebel wounded - have fled. Hotels and businesses barely function.

Outside petrol stations and bakeries, queues are long and supplies often run out, meaning people have to come back the next day. Those who can afford it pay double on a thriving black market.

The scale of the suffering can be seen in the ubiquitous obituary notices on the walls of Damascus streets - some announcing the deaths of whole families killed by shelling.

As if oblivious of these private daily tragedies, the government insists the situation is under control, while the rebels say the Assads' days are numbered.

NOWHERE NEAR OVER

Ordinary Syrians are convinced their ordeal is nowhere near over. While they believe Assad will not be able to reverse the gains of the rebels, they cannot see his enemies prevailing over his superior firepower, and Russian and Iranian support.

"The regime won't be able to crush the revolution and the rebels won't be able to bring down the regime," said leading opposition figure Hassan Abdel-Azim. "The continuation of violence won't lead to the downfall of the regime, it will lead to the seizure of the country by armed gangs, which will pose a grave danger not only to Syria but to our neighbors".

"Right now no one is capable of winning," said a Damascus-based senior Arab envoy. "The crisis will continue if there is no political process. It is deadlock."

Other diplomats in Damascus say the United States and its allies are getting cold feet about arming the rebels, fearing the growing influence of Islamist radicals such the al-Nusra Front linked to al-Qaeda, banned last year by Washington.

Some remarks recur again and again in Damascus conversations: "Maybe he will stay in power, after all", and, above all, "Who is the alternative to Assad?"

"At first I thought it was a matter of months. That's why I came here and stayed to bear witness to the final moments," said Rana Mardam Beik, a Syrian-American writer. "But it looks like it will be a while so I am thinking of going back to the U.S."

Loyalty to Assad is partly fed by fear of the alternative. Facing a Sunni-dominated revolt, Syria's minorities, including Christians and Assad's own Alawites - an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam - fear they will slaughtered or sidelined if the revolution succeeds and Sunni fundamentalists come to power.

MINORITIES' FEAR

Many Christians are already trying to emigrate to countries such as Sweden, diplomats say.

"The minorities have every right to be frightened because no one knows what is the alternative. Is it a liberal, civic, pluralistic and democratic state, or is the alternative an Islamist extremist rule that considers the minorities infidels and heretics?" said Abdel Azim.

The government tells the minorities the only alternative to Assad is Islamism. Loyalist brutality against the Sunni majority is in danger of making this a self-fulfilling prophecy, by sucking in jihadi extremists from Libya to Saudi Arabia.

"I am not with the regime but we are sure that if Bashar goes the first people they will come for are the Alawites, then the Shi'ites and then us Christians. They are fanatics," said George Husheir, 50, an IT engineer.

At the Saint Joseph Church in Bab Touma, the old Christian quarter of Damascus, Christians in their dozens, mostly middle-aged and older couples, gathered for mass on a Friday morning.

"We don't know what the future holds for us and for this country," said the priest in his sermon. "The Christians of Syria need to pray more."

Nabiha, a dentist in her 40s, said: "Bashar is a Muslim president but he is not a fanatic. He gave us everything. Why shouldn't we love him. Look at us here in our church, we pray, we mark our religious rituals freely, we do what we like and nobody interferes with us."

The fear of the Christians extends to the Alawite and minority Shi'ites. "If Bashar goes we definitely have to leave too because the Sufianis (Sunni Salafis) are coming and they are filled with a sectarian revenge against us," said one wealthy middle class Shi'ite.

COSTLY WAR

Alongside sectarian hatreds, class and tribal acrimony is also surfacing. Wealthy Sunnis in the capital are already in a panic about poor Sunni Islamists from rural areas descending on their neighborhoods.

"When they come they will eat us alive", one rich Sunni resident of Damascus said, repeating what a cab driver dropping him in the posh Abou Roummaneh district told him: "Looting these houses will be allowed."

Yet many activists feel protective of the revolution, despite the brutal behavior of some Islamist rebels.

"People talk about chaos and anarchy after Assad, but so what if we have two years of a messy transition? That is better than to endure another 30 years of this rule," said Rana Darwaza, 40, a Sunni academic in Damascus.

Prominent human rights lawyer Anwar al-Bunni said the suffering is a price that had to be paid. "Those on the ground will continue to fight even with their bare hands", he said.

He said there are thousands of prisoners in horrific conditions in Assad's jails. Some suffocate in overcrowded cells while others die under torture or from untreated wounds. "They don't give them medical treatment or pain killers or antibiotics. They leave them to die," he said.

Close watchers of Syria predict that if there is no settlement in a few months the conflict could go on for years. Yet the economy is collapsing, leaving the government to rely on dwindling foreign reserves, private assets and Iranian funds.

There is no tourism, no oil revenue, and 70 percent of businesses have left Syria, said analyst Nabil Samman. "We are heading for destruction, the future is dark", he added.

Added to the religious animosity between the Sunni majority and the Alawite minority who took control when Hafez al-Assad seized power in 1970 are social and economic grievances fuelled by the predatory practices of the elite.

This resentment extends to young middle class Syrians who feel they have lost a way of life and that their country is being used by regional powers for proxy war.

"All the regional point-scoring is taking place in Syria. We have Libyan fighters and Saudis fighting for freedom in Syria, why are they here? Let them go and demand freedom in their own countries?," said banker Hani Hamaui, 29.

Two years into the uprising, Assad is hanging on. Some will always back him and others want him dead. But many just want an end to the fighting. They may have to wait for some time.

Signs daubed on the gates to the city by Assad's troops are a reminder that the battle for Damascus will be costly. "Either Assad, or we will set the country ablaze", they say.

(Editing by Giles Elgood)

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Olympics: Wrestlers vow to fight Olympic removal

PARIS: Wrestlers around the world on Wednesday vowed to fight to save the ancient sport's Olympic status, after the International Olympic Committee voted to drop it for the 2020 Games.

Japan and Turkey -- whose cities Tokyo and Istanbul are bidding to host the Games in seven years' time -- led the calls for the world body to reconsider, as an online petition was organised urging a rethink and gained thousands of supporters.

The president of the Turkish wrestling federation, Hamza Yerlikaya, called the decision, taken at the IOC executive board meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Tuesday, "unfair" and a "mistake" that they would seek to overturn.

"To have the 2020 Olympics in Istanbul without wrestling is unthinkable," said Yerlikaya, himself a double Olympic gold medallist, three-time world champion and eight-time European champion in Greco-Roman wrestling.

"We won't allow it," he added.

In Japan, Yerlikaya's counterpart Tomiaki Fukuda said on his federation's website that he was "dissatisfied and baffled", echoing the views of the sport's world governing body, which called the decision "an aberration".

Wrestling will remain on the programme for the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro but faces a fight against seven other sports for inclusion at the Games four years later. A final decision is to be made when all IOC members meet in September.

Members are seen as unlikely to vote against the executive board, however, raising the prospect that one of the few sports that survived from the original Olympics in ancient Greece into the modern era will disappear.

Wrestling first appeared in 708 BC and has only ever been left out of the Olympic programme once before in 1900.

The International Federation of Associated Wrestling Styles (FILA) has vowed to fight the decision, while multiple medallists Russia and Iran have also said they hoped the IOC would backtrack.

"This issue will definitely be a big blow to the country's sport, as it is one of our country's most popular sports," the head of Iran's national Olympic commitee, Mohammad Aliabadi was quoted as saying in Iranian media, "I will certainly pursue the case."

IOC president Jacques Rogge meanwhile insisted on Wednesday that the vote -- by secret ballot -- was fair and said he understood the angry response from those involved in the sport.

A meeting was planned between the committee and the International Federation of Associated Wrestling Styles (FILA), to discuss the matter, he told a news conference in Lausanne.

Wrestlers have been left dismayed by the decision, with Japan's undisputed queen of the ring, Saori Yoshida, saying: "I am so devastated that I don't know what to do."

Yoshida, a 55kg-class freestyle wrestler who is the face of Tokyo's campaign for the right to host the 2020 Games, has won a record 13 straight Olympic and world championship gold medals over 10 years.

In India, Sushil Kumar, who won a bronze in Beijing and a silver in London last year, said: "I still can't get over the news that we won't be at the Olympics.

"All sportsmen look towards the Olympics as the pinnacle of excellence, everyone wants to take part in them. Now what do we do? Give up wrestling? I hope the IOC will reconsider this decision."

An online petition at change.org entitled "The International Olympic Committee: Save Wrestling as an Olympic sport #SaveOlympicWrestling" has also been mounted, urging the US Senate to take up the matter.

By late afternoon on Wednesday, it had more than 21,000 signatures.

On Twitter, one user, @WrestlersLoveUs, wrote: "Ancient Olympic wrestlers used to sometimes fight to the death. IOC better understand we're ready to do that again. #SaveOlympicWrestling."

-AFP/fl

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United Insurance Company penalized for refusing insurance claim

NEW DELHI: A district consumer forum has asked the United Insurance Company Limited to compensate one of its clients with Rs 50,000 and also fulfill his vehicle insurance claim.

The order was passed after Sarojini Tiwari dragged the insurance company to the forum for refusing to pay Rs 2, 79, 879 for the repairs done to his car. In his complaint Tiwari stated that after an accident he handed over the car to Autovikas Sales and Services for repairs.

"The opposite parties agreed to pay the repair amount directly to the service center, but failed to pay the repair bill... The complainant has no alternative except to pay the amount," the order took note of the complaint.

The decision was moved ex-parte and the Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum asked the company to pay the car-repair amount along with a compensation for "harassment, tension and mental agony" to the complainant.

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Pope shows lifetime jobs aren't always for life

The world seems surprised that an 85-year-old globe-trotting pope who just started tweeting wants to resign, but should it be? Maybe what should be surprising is that more leaders his age do not, considering the toll aging takes on bodies and minds amid a culture of constant communication and change.

There may be more behind the story of why Pope Benedict XVI decided to leave a job normally held for life. But the pontiff made it about age. He said the job called for "both strength of mind and body" and said his was deteriorating. He spoke of "today's world, subject to so many rapid changes," implying a difficulty keeping up despite his recent debut on Twitter.

"This seemed to me a very brave, courageous decision," especially because older people often don't recognize their own decline, said Dr. Seth Landefeld, an expert on aging and chairman of medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Age has driven many leaders from jobs that used to be for life — Supreme Court justices, monarchs and other heads of state. As lifetimes expand, the woes of old age are catching up with more in seats of power. Some are choosing to step down rather than suffer long declines and disabilities as the pope's last predecessor did.

Since 1955, only one U.S. Supreme Court justice — Chief Justice William Rehnquist — has died in office. Twenty-one others chose to retire, the most recent being John Paul Stevens, who stepped down in 2010 at age 90.

When Thurgood Marshall stepped down in 1991 at the age of 82, citing health reasons, the Supreme Court justice's answer was blunt: "What's wrong with me? I'm old. I'm getting old and falling apart."

One in 5 U.S. senators is 70 or older, and some have retired rather than seek new terms, such as Hawaii's Daniel Akaka, who left office in January at age 88.

The Netherlands' Queen Beatrix, who just turned 75, recently said she will pass the crown to a son and put the country "in the hands of a new generation."

In Germany, where the pope was born, Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is 58, said the pope's decision that he was no longer fit for the job "earns my very highest respect."

"In our time of ever-lengthening life, many people will be able to understand how the pope as well has to deal with the burdens of aging," she told reporters in Berlin.

Experts on aging agreed.

"People's mental capacities in their 80s and 90s aren't what they were in their 40s and 50s. Their short-term memory is often not as good, their ability to think quickly on their feet, to execute decisions is often not as good," Landefeld said. Change is tougher to handle with age, and leaders like popes and presidents face "extraordinary demands that would tax anybody's physical and mental stamina."

Dr. Barbara Messinger-Rapport, geriatrics chief at the Cleveland Clinic, noted that half of people 85 and older in developed countries have some dementia, usually Alzheimer's. Even without such a disease, "it takes longer to make decisions, it takes longer to learn new things," she said.

But that's far from universal, said Dr. Thomas Perls, an expert on aging at Boston University and director of the New England Centenarians Study.

"Usually a man who is entirely healthy in his early 80s has demonstrated his survival prowess" and can live much longer, he said. People of privilege have better odds because they have access to good food and health care, and tend to lead clean lives.

"Even in the 1500s and 1600s there were popes in their 80s. It's remarkable. That would be today's centenarians," Perls said.

Arizona Sen. John McCain turned 71 while running for president in 2007. Had he won, he would have been the oldest person elected to a first term as president. Ronald Reagan was days away from turning 70 when he started his first term as president in 1981; he won re-election in 1984. Vice President Joe Biden just turned 70.

In the U.S. Senate, where seniority is rewarded and revered, South Carolina's Strom Thurmond didn't retire until age 100 in 2002. Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia was the longest-serving senator when he died in office at 92 in 2010.

Now the oldest U.S. senator is 89-year-old Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey. The oldest congressman is Ralph Hall of Texas who turns 90 in May.

The legendary Alan Greenspan was about to turn 80 when he retired as chairman of the Federal Reserve in 2006; he still works as a consultant.

Elsewhere around the world, Cuba's Fidel Castro — one of the world's longest serving heads of state — stepped down in 2006 at age 79 due to an intestinal illness that nearly killed him, handing power to his younger brother Raul. But the island is an example of aged leaders pushing on well into their dotage. Raul Castro now is 81 and his two top lieutenants are also octogenarians. Later this month, he is expected to be named to a new, five-year term as president.

Other leaders who are still working:

—England's Queen Elizabeth, 86.

—Abdullah bin Abd al-Aziz al-Saud, king of Saudi Arabia, 88.

—Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah, emir of Kuwait, 83.

—Ruth Bader Ginsburg, U.S. Supreme Court associate justice, 79.

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Associated Press writers Paul Haven in Havana, Cuba; David Rising in Berlin; Seth Borenstein, Mark Sherman and Matt Yancey in Washington, and researcher Judy Ausuebel in New York contributed to this report.

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Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP

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Could an African Cardinal Be the Next Pope?

Feb 12, 2013 9:09am

Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson attends a Mass for Pope John Paul II in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, in this April 13, 2005 photo. (Pier Paolo Cito/AP Photo)

By BAZI KANANI and PHOEBE NATANSON

ROME – After Pope Benedict XVI became the first pope in hundreds of years to voluntarily resign, the Roman Catholic Church could be in for another first in recent history—an African pope.

Two African cardinals are rumored to be among the top candidates to succeed Pope Benedict, and many Vatican watchers believe the election of a non-European pope is a very real possibility at a time when the majority of the church’s growth is in the developing world.

Cardinal Peter Turkson, 64, of Ghana, is considered to be near the top of the short list of likely successors.  (British bookmakers offering odds on the next pope have already made Turkson their 3 to 1 favorite.)

After serving for more than 30 years as an ordained priest, Turkson was made a cardinal by Pope John Paul II in 2003.  He currently serves as president of the Vatican’s Council for Justice and Peace.  Colleagues describe him as a “people person” with excellent communication skills.  He is considered a conservative who is unlikely to steer the church in a new direction on issues such as contraception, abortion and gay rights.

Turkson outlined for ABC News Monday the challenge facing Benedict’s successor.

“The new pope has to be very sensitive to the present condition of humanity and yet recognize the task of having to still keep the Gospel in its pure form. That’s a big challenge that we all pray for,” he said.

“I think what we should be looking for, probably what we should be doing rather is recognizing the nature of the church… pray God will provide us with the leadership that can confidently lead the humanity in the church in the year ahead. The challenges are not going to cease. They’re going to be increasing and we need somebody with God’s guidance to get us through all this,” Turkson said.

Cardinal Francis Arinze, 80, of Nigeria is again being mentioned as a possible pope, as he was in 2005 when Pope Benedict was elected.  Arinze served as a priest for 27 years and became one of the world’s youngest bishops before Pope John Paul II elevated him to cardinal in 1985.

He was appointed to lead the Vatican’s Council for Interreligious Dialogue, and colleagues compliment his ability to cooperate with people of other faiths.  Arinze is also considered a conservative.

If the conclave of the College of Cardinals were to choose either Turkson or Arinze, it would be the first selection of an African pope in more than 1,500 years.  Scholars say in the first five centuries of the church there were three popes from North Africa. But the selection of Turkson or Arinze would be the first pope from sub-Saharan Africa and the first-ever black pope.

Vatican watchers also believe it is possible a Latin American pope could be selected.  The cardinals considered leading candidates from Latin America are said to be Leonardo Sandri from Argentina, Oscar Maradiaga from Honduras, Odilo Scherer from Brazil, and Joao Braz de Aviz from Brazil.

SHOWS: World News

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