Longest bridges in world

The world's longest cross-sea bridge, spanning 36.48 kilometers across the mouth of the Jiaozhou Bay in China's eastern Shandong province, opened to traffic four years after construction started. Here's a peek into some of the world's longest bridges.

Strong earthquake hits New Zealand city of Christchurch

CHRISTCHURCH: A 5.2-magnitude earthquake hit New Zealand's quake-hit city of Christchurch on Monday, prompting the evacuation of a building holding an inquest into February's deadly tremor.

The USGS measured the quake, which hit just 10 kilometres from Christchurch, at 5.2-magnitude and a depth of 11 kilometres.

Police said they had received some reports of damage in the city, including flooding, but they were not aware of any injuries.

The Christchurch Press reported a building had collapsed, with some people believed to be trapped inside.

Much of central Christchurch remains closed off since February's 6.3-magnitude quake which levelled buildings, killing 181 people in the country's deadliest earthquake for 80 years.

An inquest into the collapse of one of these buildings, which began Monday, was briefly evacuated following the latest tremor, an AFP correspondent said.

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Top LTTE leader apologizes to India for Rajiv's killing

NEW DELHI: A top LTTE leader Kumaran Pathmanathan has apologised to India for V Prabhakaran's "mistake" of killing former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

He said Rajiv's assassination was "well planned and done actually with Prabhakaran and (LTTE intelligence chief Pottu Amman). Everyone knows the truth".

In an interview to CNN-IBN Firstpost, Pathmanathan, who was Treasurer of LTTE and its chief arms procurer, said "I want to say to the Indian people and especially to the Gandhi family...I want to apologise for Prabhakaran's mistake. Please forgive us. We beg you....Sorry for all this. We know the feelings of the son (Rahul) of Rajiv Gandhi....How father and daughter are attached (reference to Rajiv's daughter Priyanka)".

He said Tamils in Sri Lanka should be helped to live as humans as "we have already paid a high price. We don't have anything to lose".

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India in touch with other nations over selection of IMF chief

NEW DELHI: As the race for the next IMF chief hots up, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee today said he was in touch with his counterparts from developed and emerging economies on the issue and was keeping a close watch on the developments.

"Our executive directors (in IMF) are meeting and exchanging views. And I am regularly being informed what is happening. I am also in touch with other Finance Ministers (of other IMF member nations)", he told reporters on the sidelines of a conference here.

The post of the IMF managing director fell vacant following the exit of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who is being tried for charges of sexual assault.

Although the chorus is growing that the next chief should be from an emerging nation, several leaders from European countries have extended their support to Christine Lagarde, Finance Minister of France.

When asked about the possibility of new chief from a developing country, Mukherjee said, "there are set procedures. We did not face this type of problem earlier. Normally, we decide through the process of consensus building and we have the consensus.

"But at the same time, we shall have to keep in mind that it (IMF) is a financial institution. Shareholding and voting power are relevant factors", he added.

Besides Lagarde, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia and former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown figure in the list of probables for the top IMF job.

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Implicating ISI in terror, Headley says hatred of India after 1971 war drove him to LeT

CHICAGO/WASHINGTON: Hatred of India arising from Pakistan's defeat in the 1971 war drove him to the terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba, David Coleman Headley, the Pakistani expatriate who involved in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack told a Chicago court on Monday while implicating Pakistan's spy agency ISI in nurturing terrorism.

Headley, who took the stand as a prosecution witness on the opening day of the trial of his once close buddy Tahawwur Hussain Rana, told the court that he disliked Indians for "dismembering" Pakistan and was haunted by memories of his junior school being bombed. He and Rana shared room at a military boarding school where he said India and Indians were frequently discussed. He also mentioned that in the early speeches about Jihad, he heard it mentioned that, "one second conducting Jihad was equal to one hundred years of praying."

Headley was still being questioned sequentially about his involvement in terror and the nexus between the Pakistani intelligence agency ISI and the terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba when the court broke for lunch, but his initial answers appeared to implicate ISI in planning and fostering terrorism.

He chronologically mentioned his handlers in LET, including the others charged along with Rana, in a recent second superceding indictment, including Pasha, Kashmiri, Saajid and Major Iqbal. He also related various types of camps he attended in different regions of Pakistan, ranging from essential espionage, to arms training, surveillance training and hand to hand combat.

"These groups operate under the umbrella of the ISI... They coordinate with each other," Headley told the court, recalling that one time, when he suggested that LeT sue the U.S government for designating it as a terrorist organization, LeT leader Zaki-ur Rehman said "he would have to consult the ISI."

Headley also related how his LeT handler Ali took his phone number and told him that a "Major Iqbal" would be calling him about an operation in India. The prosecution case mentions a "Major Iqbal," believed to be a serving ISI officer, who is alleged to have coordinated the Mumbai attacks.

Much of what Headley said is related in the prosecution's chargesheet but his elaboration under oath from the witness box puts Pakistan's terrorism sponsorship under the arclights. At many points during his testimony, Headley provided graphic details of his interactions with ISI and LeT personnel and their close ties.

Headley spoke of attending LeT lunches with the organization's supremo Hafiz Saeed, currently under state protection, and operations commander "Zaki," presumably Zaki-ur Rehman Lakhvi, currently under arrest. He said he told them he wanted to fight in Kashmir but "I was told they (LET) would find something better and more suitable for me." That assignment turned out to be scouting Mumbai for the 2008 terrorist attack.

Wearing a casual grey jacket over a grey T-shirt, Headley began testifying after both the prosecution and the defense completed opening arguments that each lasted 45 minutes. In appearance, he looked more Caucasian than Pakistani, a fact that he himself remarked about when he spoke of the circumstances under which he changed his name.

Headley said when he was arrested in 2005 near Peshawar, the Pakistanis did not believe him when he said he was one of them. "They thought I was a foreigner." Subsequently, prior to the Mumbai attack, he said he changed his name, under "Zaki's advice," so that "nobody would be able to tell I was a Muslim or a Pakistani."

Earlier, maintaining that "not every player carries a weapon" in the terror game and supporters are equally as critical, the prosecution portrayed the defendant Rana as a maniacal plotter who was heard saying after the Mumbai carnage that the dead terrorists "should get Pakistan's highest military honor."

But the defense responded with a picture of Rana as a model student who went on to medical school and served as a doctor in the army, even as Headley, previously known as Daood Gilani, went astray. "David Headley is a master manipulator who made a fool of Doctor Rana," defense attorney Charlie Swift maintained.

Swift described Rana as "a master manipulator, manipulating three different organizations, the LeT, the ISI and the DEA (American Drug Enforcement Authority) all at the same time, while also manipulating several relationships and wives." Finally he sought to manipulate the government to secure his own life in return for 'betraying' Rana, he said, adding "Headley now needed a home run or a touchdown, so he changed his story and said Rana knew everything.

The courtroom drama aside, disclosure of ISI-LeT nexus and their involvement in the Mumbai attack comes at a time Pakistan's role in terrorism is under worldwide scrutiny, particularly after the US elimination of Osama bin Laden, even as the country itself is under attack from terrorists it has allegedly fostered. Headley's initial testimony, as widely expected, is seen to have exposed Pakistan as a state perpetrator of terrorism, even though its people are also victims of the same menace.

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Former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn wins bail, indicted on all sex charges

NEW YORK: Former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn was granted bail by a New York court shortly after he was formally indicted on all sexual assault charges.

The court agreed to free Strauss-Kahn from a New York City jail on bail terms of $1 million in cash and also on the condition that he would remain under house arrest in a Manhattan apartment under the watch of armed guards.

Strauss-Kahn is allowed to stay with his wife in the apartment.

On June 6, the court will hold an arraignment hearing in which the exact charges will be revealed.

The former IMF chief, who was indicted on all seven counts, is accused of groping and mauling a Guinean maid in his room at Sofitel hotel in Times Square and forcibly tried to have oral sex with her.

Since, prosecutors have argued that he is at flight risk, Strauss-Kahn has to wear an electronic monitoring device and he will be monitored by armed guards--at his own expense.

Strauss-Kahn, however, has to spend one more night at the Rikers Island prison where he being held since Monday. He also has to provide $5 million as collateral and turn over all his travel documents.

62-year-old Strauss-Kahn looked tired as he sat in court wearing a blue shirt and gray jacket without a tie. His wife, Anne Sinclair, a French TV journalist, was present in court along with their daughter.

Prosecutors had cited the example of film director Roman Polanski, who fled from the US in 1977 after admitting to engage in unlawful sex with a minor. Strauss-Kahn, however, has given up his extradition rights, which he is granted as a French citizen.

On Saturday, he was pulled off a Paris-bound flight minutes before take-off and was taken into custody at New York's JFK airport.

Strauss-Kahn denied wrongdoing and is expected to plead not guilty. His lawyers have also said that the sex was consensual.

Yesterday, Strauss-Kahn resigned from the IMF. Strauss-Kahn, a socialist politician, was seen as a possible contender in the 2012 presidential elections in French.

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IMF chief denied bail in sex assault case

NEW YORK: IMF chief Dominique Strauss- Kahn was on Monday denied bail on charges of attempted rape and criminal assault of a hotel maid here in a case that has ravaged his reputation and sent tremors in French politics.

Appearing in the court presided over by Judge Melissa Jackson for the first time after his arrest on Sunday, the 62-year-old IMF chief refuted the charges levelled by the 32-year-old chambermaid of New York Sofitel Hotel.

The IMF chief pleaded not guilty to the charges of attempted rape, sexual assault and unlawful imprisonment.

Strauss Kahn's lawyers sought his release on bail for $1 million and also offered to surrender all his travel documents, but the judge was not convinced.

The judge said Strauss-Kahn is a "flight risk" and remanded him in judicial custody till May 20 when the matter will come up for hearing.

If convicted, Strauss-Kahn, father of four children, could face a prison term of 15 to 20 years.

A grim-looking Strauss-Kahn appeared drained out during the court proceedings.

His lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, said the IMF chief would be exonerated as there was no wrong doing on his part.

Strauss-Kahn, a likely French presidential candidate for 2012, was picked up out of a police lineup last night by the chambermaid, who has accused him of molesting her.

The IMF chief, who was handcuffed and looked shaken, has agreed for a medical examination over charges of serious sexual assault.

Billed as the man who could hand out a poll defeat to French President Nicholas Sarkozy, Strauss-Kahn was made to deboard a Paris-bound flight and arrested yesterday by the New York police which said he had no diplomatic immunity.

New York Times reported that his DNA evidence has been taken from his $3000 a day hotel suite.

The French financial wizard's arraignment was put off for a day after he agreed to forensic testing requested by the police as his attorney Brafman vowed that his client proposed to fight charges of sexual assault.

"Our client has willingly consented to a scientific and forensic examination," his other lawyer William W Taylor III said.

Wearing a black overcoat over a blue shirt and black trousers, Strauss-Kahn avoided looking at the cameras as he walked to a police car.

The maid, who has not been named by the police, said she had entered the spacious Sofitel hotel suite thinking it was unoccupied when Strauss-Kahn sprang on her naked from the bathroom, ran after her and dragged her into his bedroom before assaulting her.

He then dragged her into the bathroom where he forced himself on her again before she broke free, the maid told the police.

New York Police alleged that following the assault in the Manhattan hotel, Strauss-Kahn quickly headed off to New York airport to board a Paris-bound flight but left his cellphone behind.

The IMF chief called the hotel from the airport, inquiring about the phone, and this helped police track him to the first class section of the Paris-bound flight.


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