Body of Missing Mom Reportedly Found in Turkey

The body of an American woman who went missing while on a solo trip to Turkey has been pulled from a bay in Istanbul, and nine people have been held for questioning, according to local media.

Sarai Sierra, 33, was last heard from on Jan. 21, the day she was due to board a flight home to New York City.

The state-run Andolu Agency reported that residents found a woman's body today near the ruins of some ancient city walls in a low-income district, and police identified the body as Sierra.

Rep. Michael Grimm, R-NY, who with his staff had been assisting the Sierra family in the search, said he was "deeply saddened" to hear the news of her death.

"I urge Turkish officials to move quickly to identify whomever is responsible for her tragic death and ensure that any guilty parties are punished to the fullest extent of the law," he said in a statement.

Courtesy Sarai Sierra's family

Footage Shows Missing New York Mom in Turkish Mall Watch Video

NYC Woman Goes Missing While Traveling In Turkey Watch Video

New York Mother Goes Missing on Turkish Vacation Watch Video

The New York City mother, who has two young boys, traveled to Turkey alone on Jan. 7 after a friend had to cancel. Sierra, who is an avid photographer with a popular Instagram stream, planned to document her dream vacation with her camera.

"It was her first time outside of the United States, and every day while she was there she pretty much kept in contact with us, letting us know what she was up to, where she was going, whether it be through texting or whether it be through video chat, she was touching base with us," Steven Sierra told ABC News before he departed for Istanbul last Sunday to aid in the search.

Steven Sierra has been in the country, meeting with U.S. officials and local authorities, as they searched for his wife.

On Friday, Turkish authorities detained a man who had spoken with Sierra online before her disappearance. The identity of the man and the details of his arrest were not disclosed, The Associated Press reported.

The family said it is completely out of character for the happily married mother, who met her husband in church youth group, to disappear.

She took two side trips, to Amsterdam and Munich, before returning to Turkey, but kept in contact with her family the entire time, a family friend told ABC News.

Further investigation revealed she had left her passport, clothes, phone chargers and medical cards in her room at a hostel in Beyoglu, Turkey.

Read More..

VA study finds more veterans committing suicide

Every day about 22 veterans in the United States kill themselves, a rate that is about 20 percent higher than the Department of Veterans Affairs’ 2007 estimate, according to a two-year study by a VA researcher.

The VA study indicates that more than two-thirds of the veterans who commit suicide are 50 or older, suggesting that the increase in veterans’ suicides is not primarily driven by those returning from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“There is a perception that we have a veterans’ suicide epidemic on our hands. I don’t think that is true,” said Robert Bossarte, an epidemiologist with the VA who did the study. “The rate is going up in the country, and veterans are a part of it.” The number of suicides overall in the United States increased by nearly 11 percent between 2007 and 2010, the study says.

As a result, the percentage of veterans who die by suicide has decreased slightly since 1999, even though the total number of veterans who kill themselves has gone up, the study says.

VA Secretary Eric K. Shinseki said his agency would continue to strengthen suicide prevention efforts. “The mental health and well-being of our courageous men and women who have served the nation is the highest priority for VA, and even one suicide is one too many,” he said in a statement.

The study follows long-standing criticism that the agency has moved far too slowly even to figure out how many veterans kill themselves. “If the VA wants to get its arms around this problem, why does it have such a small number of people working on it?” asked retired Col. Elspeth Cameron Ritchie, a former Army psychiatrist. “This is a start, but it is a faint start. It is not enough.”

Bossarte said much work remains to be done to understand the data, especially concerning the suicide risk among Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. They constitute a minority of an overall veteran population that skews older, but recent studies have suggested that those who served in recent conflicts are 30 percent to 200 percent more likely to commit suicide than their ­non-veteran peers.

An earlier VA estimate of 18 veterans’ suicides a day, which was disclosed during a 2008 lawsuit, has long been cited by lawmakers and the department’s critics as evidence of the agency’s failings. A federal appeals court pointed to it as evidence of the VA’s “unchecked incompetence.” The VA countered that the number, based on old and incomplete data, was not reliable.

To calculate the veterans’ suicide rate, Bossarte and his sole assistant spent more than two years, starting in October 2010, cajoling state governments to turn over death certificates for the more than 400,000 Americans who have killed themselves since 1999. Forty-two states have provided data or agreed to do so; the study is based on information from 21 that has been assembled into a database.

Bossarte said that men in their 50s — a group that includes a large percentage of the veteran population— have been especially hard-hit by the national increase in suicide. The veterans’ suicide rate is about three times the overall national rate, but about the same percentage of male veterans in their 50s kill themselves as do non-veteran men of that age, according to the VA data.

Read More..

Israeli raid hit Syrian missiles, buildings: US official

WASHINGTON: An Israeli air raid in Syria this week struck surface-to-air missiles and a nearby military complex on the outskirts of Damascus, as Israel feared the weapons would be transferred to Hezbollah, a US official said Friday.

Earlier reports had suggested Israeli warplanes may have targeted two separate locations in Wednesday's raid in Syria: a military site outside of the capital and a weapons convoy near the Lebanese border.

But the US official said the strike was confined to one location.

"It was in the suburbs of Damascus," the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP.

"There were surface-to-air missiles on vehicles" that were targeted by the Israel aircraft, he said, adding that they were believed to be Russian-made SA-17 anti-aircraft missiles.

The planes also bombed an adjacent military complex of buildings suspected of housing chemical agents, the official said.

The Israelis suspected the weapons would be transferred to Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah group, he said.

The Syrian regime has accused Israel of launching a dawn strike Wednesday on a military research centre in Jamraya, near Damascus, and threatened to retaliate.

But the Israeli government has maintained a public silence on the strike.

Israel has repeatedly expressed concern that Syria's stockpile of chemical weapons could fall into the hands of Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah group, which is an ally of the Damascus regime, or other militant organisations.

- AFP/jc

Read More..

Centre wants others to follow Surat’s self-financing model for road building

NEW DELHI: At a time when municipal bodies are facing huge funds crunch for infrastructure projects, Surat has come out with a model where the proposed outer ring road (ORR) around the industrial city would be self-financed by the project.

Moreover, it would generate additional revenue for the city. The Centre has now issued an advisory to states to identify such projects and follow this model for their own bypasses and ORRs.

Union urban development secretary Sudhir Krishna in a letter addressed to all principal secretaries in urban development departments in states has said that instructions should be issued to "all concerned authorities for identifying the possibilities of ring roads on the Surat City Ring Road model, getting a proper study done on various aspects of Ring Road development and Ring Roads in their cities for overall development of the city."

Under the model, Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) and Surat Urban Development Authority (SUDA) have jointly come up with the model to generate about Rs 11,960 crore from the development of proposed road over five years. This will mean that these bodies would get the entire project cost of Rs 5,796 crore. The additional revenue can be used for projects such as high-speed transit system.

To execute the project, SUDA and SMC would set up a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) and will generate infrastructure fund by sale of FSI (floor space index) and commercial plots around the 66-km-long and 90 meter wide road.

The project envisages modern infrastructure for transport, mass rapid transport and dedicated provision of services such as water supply, sewerage, drainage and electricity.

As per the plan, 60% of the land acquired for this project would be returned to the land owners as final plot with all infrastructure in place. About 40% of the land will be acquired for development of infrastructure such as parks, playgrounds, public utilities, for sale of residential, commercial and industrial use.

Read More..

Best Science Pictures of 2012 Announced

Image courtesy Pupa U.P.A. Gilbert and Christopher E. Killian, U.W. Madison via Science/AAAS

A micrograph, or microphotograph, of a sea urchin's crystalline tooth won first place and people's choice for photography in the 2012 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge.

Colors applied with Photoshop reveal the interlocking crystals that form the choppers of Arbacia punctulata. The biomineral crystals, captured by biophysicists from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, grow and intertwine to reinforce and sharpen a sea urchin's teeth. Made of calcite, which is also found in limestone and seashells, the crystals are tough enough to grind holes in rocks to create shelters.

"These winners continue to amaze me every year," said Monica M. Bradford, executive editor of the journal Science, in a statement. "The visuals are not only novel and captivating, but they also draw you into the complex field of science in a simple and understandable way."

Sponsored by Science and the National Science Foundation (NSF), the international competition honors recipients who use visual media to promote understanding of scientific research. Judging criteria included visual impact, effective communication, freshness, and originality. (See some of the 2011 winners.)

—Lacey Gray and Katia Andreassi

Published February 1, 2013

Read More..

Arias Trial Puts Mormon Sex Rules in Spotlight

The murder trial of Jodi Arias has been filled with salacious details of phone sex, graphic text messages, and an erotic sexual relationship between her and her devout Mormon ex-boyfriend, Travis Alexander.

Arias, 32, converted to Mormonism when she began to date Alexander, then 29, in 2006. Though they were both outwardly devout, they immediately developed a sexual relationship.

The trial has cast a spotlight on the tight-knit Mormon community in Mesa, Ariz., and its strict social mores, including a ban on premarital sex. According to Patrick Mason, a professor of religion who specializes in Mormon studies at Claremont Graduate University in California, the trial shows the difficulty Mormons face in coping wiith the church's demand for chastity.

"The LDS church puts a really high priority on complete chastity," Mason said. "They define that as no sexual relations of any kind outside of marriage between a man and a woman, no premarital sex and no extramarital sex either, and there's actually a lot of time and attention paid to this."

Arias is on trial for murdering Alexander, whom she dated for a year and then continued to have sex with for a year after that. Prosecutors allege she killed him in a fit of jealousy in June 2008, after taking graphic sexual photos with him and having sex earlier in the day.

Jodi Arias Murder Trial: Former Boyfriend Takes Stand Watch Video

Jodi Arias Murder Trial: Defense's First Day of Witnesses Watch Video

Arias claims she shot and stabbed Alexander in self defense, and her attorneys have focused on Alexander's secret sex life as proof that he was a "sexual deviant" who was abusive and controlling toward Arias.They claim Alexander, who was considered a church elder, kept Arias his "dirty little secret" because sex outside of marriage was against church rules.

See Full Coverage of Jodi Arias Trial

See Jodi Arias Trial Videos
More than anything, Mason said, this case shows the shockwaves sent through Arizona's Mormon community when those values were breached so flagrantly with a violent killing and the web of lies surrounding it. "Mesa is one of those concentrated areas of historic Mormon settlement."

"Were you shocked to learn (Alexander) was not a virgin?" defense attorney Jennifer Willmott asked Lisa Daidone, who dated Alexander after he broke up with Arias. Alexander and Arias continued to sleep together while he dated Daidone.

"Yes," Daidone said on the stand Wednesday. "I believed he was a virgin."

"Was Mr. Alexander living in accordance with his Mormon principles?" defense attorney Kirk Nurmi asked another witness, Daniel Freeman, a Mormon friend of Alexander's in Arizona.

"Yes," Freeman said on the stand Thursday.

"Was there any reason to believe Mr. Alexander was not living up to his Mormon principles as a church elder?"

"No," Freeman said.

Freeman said that Alexander never told him or other church members that he had a sexual relationship with Arias. In fact, Freeman's sister, Desiree Freeman, testified that Alexander made it known he was a virgin when in social settings, and "he joked about it."

The stakes are high for Mormons who choose to have sex, Mason said. They can face excommunication or a tarnished reputation among their closest friends and family members.

"In Mormonism, if you're not married, your social capital is largely defined by preserving your virginity. If it is known that you've had sex before marriage, even if people try to be compassionate and not judgmental, there is no doubt that in Mormon communities and the eyes of other Mormons... it lessens your social standing."

The conflict between Alexander's outer appearances and his secret sexual trysts with Arias is key to the defense's strategy of painting him as an abusive lover. But the testimony has also shown, conversely, how sexually conservative and pure many young Mormons in America are.

Read More..

Candidates to head WTO clear hurdle

GENEVA: The last of a record nine candidates to lead the World Trade Organization finished defending their candidacies on Thursday, but the real campaign is only just getting started.

"This is a procedure that is all but unique in the world -- a selection rather than an election that takes several months to complete," a source close to the process told AFP.

The candidates -- six men and three women mainly from developing nations -- are all considered confirmed global trade specialists and are vying to replace Frenchman Pascal Lamy, who finishes his second four-year term in August.

This past week, they have all gone before the WTO's general council for gruelling questioning about their merits and visions for the organisation, which oversees global trade practices and is trying to reduce tariffs that hobble exchanges.

The interviews took place behind closed doors, but in subsequent news conferences all the candidates stressed the urgency in addressing the WTO's main challenge: jump starting the stalled Doha Round of trade talks that was launched in 2001.

"The reality is that the round at this point in time is paralysing the system, and we have to solve it," insisted Brazil's envoy to the WTO Roberto Azevedo, who was one of three candidates from Latin America -- a heavily-tipped region to land the organisation's top job -- and the last of the nine to face the fire.

South Korean Trade Minister Taeho Bark, the only other candidate who spoke Thursday, agreed, insisting that "there's a need to rebuild trust."

On Wednesday, New Zealand Trade Minister Tim Groser, the only candidate from an advanced economy and therefore considered a longshot since the UN's trade body appears set on picking someone from a developing nation, stressed that the WTO was facing a "problem of relevance."

Mexican economist and former minister Herminio Blanco Mendoza also cautioned Wednesday that the WTO risked "losing relevance" if the next Doha-round talks in Bali at the end of the year failed.

Former Jordanian trade minister Ahmad Thougan Hindawi, the only Middle Eastern candidate, also spoke Wednesday of a need of "a fresh outside look" to get the process moving.

"After 12 years of stalled negotiations, to think of modernising," agreed high-level United Nations executive Amina Mohamed of Kenya, one of two candidates from Africa -- a region also thought likely to provide the organisation's next leader.

While insisting that her candidacy was purely based on merit, Mohamed said that "it would send a very, very powerful signal ... if this organisation decided that a woman, preferably an African woman, should take over at the helm of the WTO."

Indonesia's current tourism minister and former trade minister Mari Elka Pangestu, who might have less of a chance given that Lamy's predecessor Supachai Panitchpakdi comes from neighbouring Thailand, also told media on the first day of interviews Tuesday that the WTO would be well-served by having a woman at the top.

The third woman who has thrown her hat in the ring, Costa Rica's Foreign Trade Minister Anabel Gonzalez, meanwhile said she was a "cautious optimist" that the WTO would get the Doha round on track.

Ghana's former trade minister Alan John Kwadwo Kyerematen, who was the first to make his case on Tuesday, also spoke of the need to "revitalise an extremely important organisation."

As the interview process wrapped up Thursday, the candidates were preparing three months of world travel to convince the 158 WTO member states of their merits.

The final selection will be made by a "troika" composed of the yet-to-be-picked presidents of the WTO's general council, its Dispute Settlement Body and its Trade Policy Review Board.

Once the three leaders have been chosen, something that must happen by the end of February, the troika will ask each member state to provide their two favourite candidates, as well as the one they are most opposed to.

Based on the responses they receive, the three WTO leaders will gradually begin dropping candidates, with the ones who stand little chance of being selected expected to withdraw of their own volition.

The decision must be made no later than May 31, and the nominee is to take over at the WTO on September 1.

- AFP/jc

Read More..

Singapore to look into 'hair cutting issue' of Sikh prisoners

AMRITSAR: Singapore prison services department has assured to look into the issue of cutting of head and facial hairs of Sikh jail inmates in the prisons there.

Former prison volunteer for Singapore Anti-Narcotics Association, Madan Mohan Singh, told TOI on Thursday that the quality service manager of Singapore prison services, Kok Weng Chew, has promised him on January 29 that he would look into the matter.

Singh had "exposed" the cutting of head and facial hairs of Sikh jail inmates by labeling them as "non-practicing" and "non-traditional" Sikhs.

There had been three known cases of Sikh inmates, whose head and facial hairs were cut, after labeling them as "non-practicing" Sikhs in prisons.

"On behalf of the Sikh community, I have demanded withdrawal of the practice of labeling Sikh inmates as non-practicing and also stop the cutting of long hair and beard of Sikh inmates," he said.

Following a complaint lodged with Akal Takht by Sikhs, the jathedar of Akal Takht had also issued directions to initiate an inquiry, which is yet to be completed. He informed that despite prison directives on regular hair grooming, the jail authorities in Singapore cut head and facial hairs of Sikh jail inmates.

"The jail directives say that Sikh inmates will be allowed to keep their hair as at the point of admission, that is, if they enter prison with a full head of hair, the prison will allow them to keep their hair. If their hair is already shorn at the time of admission, they will not be allowed to keep hair during their sentence," he said. Contrary to directives, he said Sikh jail inmates were made to believe and accept by senior jail officers that if they had been taking drugs, smoking and drinking alcohol, it constitute them to be classified as "non-practicing Sikh" and as per prison standards on regular hair grooming, their hair would be cut.

Read More..

14 Pygmy Elephants Die Mysteriously in Borneo

Fourteen endangered Borneo pygmy elephants have recently been found dead in a Malaysian forest, presenting a mystery for wildlife officials and conservationists.

The recent deaths highlight the vulnerable status of the species, which now numbers about 1,500 animals. Scientists don't know how many pygmy elephants previously existed on the island, although it's likely the population wasn't much higher than it is today, said Barney Long, head of Asian species conservation at WWF-US.

This week Malaysian authorities discovered a group of elephant carcasses close together in the Gunung Rara Forest Reserve, located in the northeastern corner of Borneo (map), a Southeast Asian island shared by Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei.

"We don't know officially yet how they died, but what we do know is this is an area of forest that is being cleared for plantations, and it's very common that when the forest is cleared, conflict between humans and elephants spikes," said Long.

For instance, in agricultural areas in neighboring Sumatra, people have put out poisoned fruit for elephants to eat, causing a whole herd to drop dead in one area. The poison is usually whatever is locally available, such as rodenticide, he said.

"The presumption here is that [the recent deaths are] similar to that. Obviously that is complete guesswork until we have results of the autopsies," Long said.

The Malaysian government is performing autopsies on the dead elephants, although it's unknown when they will release the results, he added.

Cute Elephant Dwindling in Number

Pygmy elephants were isolated about 300,000 years ago from their relatives on mainland Asia and Sumatra and evolved their small size to adapt to forest living.

With their baby faces, oversize ears, and plump bellies, "Walt Disney himself couldn't have crafted a cuter elephant," according to WWF's website. (Visit National Geographic's elephant hub.)

But the population of this charismatic mini-elephant is dwindling in number as large tracts of Borneo's forests are cleared to make way for palm oil plantations, restricting the animals to increasingly smaller areas and forcing them into closer contact with people. (Get more elephant news on the National Geographic blog A Voice For Elephants.)

For example, the mammals need about 115 square miles (300 square kilometers) in which to find enough food, water, and minerals, according to WWF's studies of elephants fitted with radio collars.

"When you chop down part of their habitat, they're still going back there looking for resources that used to be there," Long said.

And if that happens to be a plantation, that's when run-ins with people occur.

Pygmy Elephants Need Protection

Whatever caused the recent deaths, the incident has prompted WWF to call on the Malaysian government to better protect pygmy elephants. (Also see "'Extinct' Pygmy Elephants Found Living on Borneo.")

For one, the species needs to be listed as "totally protected" by law in Malaysia, which has been recommended by scientists but not yet enacted by the government, WWF-Malaysia executive director Dionysius S.K. Sharma said in a statement.

Though the animals are already protected from hunting, the huge swaths of habitat they rely on also need to be set aside from logging.

What's more, the local wildlife department needs to invest more resources in patrolling the area for illegal activities, Sharma said.

"Frequent and large-scale patrolling is critical to avoid such conflict from happening again," he said.

Though the killings won't be disastrous for the population overall, noted WWF-US's Long, what it is showing "is a huge pressure on elephants."

"If this is a case of poisoning, [it shows] how easy it is for one individual to wipe out a significant number [of elephants]."

Read More..

Arias' Ex-Boyfriend Kept Affair Secret

Accused murderer Jodi Arias was kept away from the Mormon friends of her lover Travis Alexander and their torrid sex affair was kept secret by Alexander, even as he sent lewd photos of himself to her online, according to court testimony today.

The testimony in Arias' trial for killing Alexander in 2008 was intended to bolster the defense's argument that she killed him in self defense, that Alexander was a sexual deviant who treated Arias as his "dirty little secret."

Arias' attorneys introduced as evidence photos that Alexadner took of his penis and sent to Arias, part of a string of graphic messages and sexual phone calls the two engaged in while Alexander, an elder in the Mormon church, was supposed to be chaste.

Today's witness was the latest in a string called by the defense, including Alexander's former girlfriend Lisa Daidone, who told the court that Alexander had professed to be a virgin.

Daniel Freeman continued his testimony today, describing how he was a friend of both Arias and Alexander but that Alexander kept Arias distanced from his Mormon pals.

"Travis had made more friends at (the Mormon) ward, and had (Ultimate Fighting Championship) fight nights at his house many times, and Jodi was in town, but she wasn't there," Freeman said.

"There was that group of friends, them and Jodi, two different groups, and so Lisa [Daidone] and friends from church were there, but Jodi wasn't there," Freeman said.

Jodi Arias Murder Trial: Former Boyfriend Takes Stand Watch Video

Jodi Arias Murder Trial: Defense's First Day of Witnesses Watch Video

Alexander's behavior, the defense hopes to prove, shows that he mistreated Arias.

Arias, 32, is on trial for murdering Alexander, whom she dated for a year and continued to have a sexual relationship for a year after that. Her attorneys claim that Alexander was abusive and controlling toward Arias, and that she was forced to kill him.

Freeman described how he took a trip with his sister, Alexander, and Arias, and how Alexander had asked him to come along so that he and Arias "would not get physical."

"I don't know that I can say he didn't want to be alone with her, but he liked that when I was there, and my sister was there. They weren't as physical," Freeman said.

Freeman admitted that he had no idea Alexander and Arias had been having a sexual relationship the entire time they were together. He said Alexander never mentioned that to his friends.

In fact, Freeman noted that Alexander was considered to be a church elder when he baptized Arias into the Church of Latter-Day Saints. Both a church elder and a convert were expected to abide by the church's strict law of chastity, which banned any sexual relations outside of marriage.

"One thing people give up in this baptism process was sex," prosecutor Juan Martinez said. "Did you know she was having oral sex with Mr. Alexander at the time of her baptism? Would that be an insincere baptism?"

"She would not be ready to be baptized in that case," Freeman said.

"You were asked about Miss Arias, whether she was worthy of baptism if she was performing oral sex, but what about the elder receiving oral sex?" defense attorney Kirk Nurmi said.

"They would not be worthy of performing that ordinance at that time until they had gone through repentance," Freeman said. "They would go to a discipline council and could face excommunication or a probation period or have their priesthood removed."

Freeman said that Alexander never confessed to having a sexual relationship with Arias.

Freeman's testimony came on the third day of the defense's attempt to paint Alexander as a controlling, sex-obsessed liar who was cruel to Arias. Other witnesses have said that Alexander cheated on other women he dated with Arias, and lied to his friends and family about their relationship.

The defense also had Freeman point out that Alexander was strong and fit. They are expected to conclude that Alexander was physically threatening Arias when she killed him.

Read More..