Monday, April 25, 2011

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?r? Satya Sai Baba, one of India’s most prominent spiritual leaders and revered by millions of followers worldwide, died Sunday in a Puttaparthi hospital, following a cardiac arrest. He was 84 and had been in hospital since last month, suffering from kidney failure and respiratory problems.

Followers and devotees of ?r? Baba considered him to be the manifestation of a “living God” on Earth and believed he had powers of magic, such as being able to pull things from out of thin air.

Former Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was one of ?r? Baba’s followers, as was international test cricketer Sachin Tendulkar.

Worshippers carried Baba’s image through the streets of Bangalore and extra police were deployed in his hometown of Puttaparthi. In Delhi, masses gathered in temples and some refused to accept Baba’s death.

With an estimated six million followers, Baba saw donations allow for the expansion of his home village to include many temples, a hospital offering free medical care, a university, and an airport. His first permanent facility opened 60 years ago.

Born Sathyanarayana Raju, Baba decided at the age of fourteen that he was the reincarnation of 19th-century guru Sai Baba of Shirdi. The legend runs that Baba was stung by a scorpion and then sang religious chants in a language previously unknown to him. He predicted his death in 2019, as well as a third and final reincarnation in Karnataka state in 2023.

Nobody has been appointed to take over running the trust that promotes the faith, which has over 1,200 centres worldwide. There are fears the family and trust could argue, leading to a government takeover. “If the government has to take over the affairs of Sai Baba’s mission that could spell its end,” warned one devotee.

“Some people out of their mean-mindedness are trying to tarnish the image of Sai Baba,” said Baba in 2000, after allegations of sexual abuse were made against him by young men, claims the BBC highlighted in 2004. “I am not after name and fame. So, I do not lose anything by their false allegations. My glory will go on increasing day by day,” Baba added.

Claims that ?r? Baba was a charlatan and allegations of sexual abuse dogged him constantly. In 1993, six people “died violently in the spiritual leader’s private rooms,” The Guardian reported. No full explanation has ever been given for the deaths, though speculation of a money dispute has been raised.

In a statement, current Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said that the death of the guru was an “”irreparable loss” to India, adding, “He was a spiritual leader who inspired millions to lead a moral and meaningful life even as they followed the religion of their choice.”

The guru’s body is being kept at the hospital amid appeals for his devotees not to flood them to see his body. The public viewing of ?r? Baba’s body will take place Monday and Tuesday, and a funeral will follow. There are to be four days of mourning in his home state, Andhra Pradesh, by decree of the state government.

Friday, October 26, 2007

Matthew Locke, an Australian special forces soldier with the Special Air Service Regiment (SAS) has been shot and killed while taking part in a 300-man special operatives attack against the Taliban in Afghanistan. The death, Australia’s third combat soldier death since the Vietnam War, is the second to occur in October.

The soldier, believed to be employed in Perth, Australia in the State of Western Australia and married with an unknown amount of children, was immediately lifted from the scene by the aero-medical helicopter evacuation team and was pronounced dead early this morning after suffering critical wounds throughout his chest. It is reported that he had received “high bravery honors” just before the battle.

Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston was quoted saying fine details of the operation, which took place in the Or?zg?n Province, would not be released as it would “aid the Taliban [and] … add to the dangers already facing our special operations troops.”

“The soldier’s mates reacted to the incident by extracting the soldier from further danger and providing immediate first aid. Their courage under fire and their determination to help a fallen mate is to be commended,” added Houston who also stated that no other soldiers were injured or wounded during the fighting.

Thursday, March 31, 2005A report Tuesday from a United Nations-backed project, consulting more than 1,300 scientists from 95 countries, and written over the last four years, warns that 60 percent of the basics of life on Earth — water, food, timber, clean air — are currently being used in ways which degrade them. Furthermore, fisheries and fresh water use-patterns are unsustainable, and getting worse.

“The harmful consequences of this degradation could grow significantly worse in the next 50 years,” according to a press release from the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA), a massive four-year study begun in 2001.

“We’ve had many reports on environmental degradation, but for the first time we’re now able to draw connections between ecosystem services and human well-being,” Cristian Samper, director of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington and a chief architect of the study, told the Christian Science Monitor.

The project’s Synthesis Report, first in a series of eleven documents and published yesterday, explains the objective: “to assess the consequences of ecosystem change for human well-being and to establish the scientific basis for actions needed to enhance the conservation and sustainable use of ecosystems and their contributions to human well-being.”

It then goes on to report on four main findings:

• Changes over the last 50 years to meet rapidly growing demands for food, fresh water, timber, fiber and fuel, have effected substantial and largely irreversible loss in the diversity of life on Earth.

• Net gains in human well-being and economic development are offset by growing costs, in the form ecosystem degradation, the possibility of abrupt and unpredictable ecosystem changes, and worsened poverty for some groups. Unless addressed, these problems will substantially diminish the benefits that future generations obtain from ecosystems.

• Ecosystem degradation could grow significantly worse over the next 50 years, presenting a barrier to meeting UN Millennium Development Goals.

• The challenge of reversing the degradation while meeting increasing ecological demands can be partially met under some scenarios, but only with significant changes in policies, institutions and practices — changes that are not currently under way.

Walter Reid, the study’s director, speaking at yesterday’s London launch of the report said it shows that over the last 50 years “humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in any comparable time in human history.”

“This has resulted in substantial and largely irreversible loss in the diversity of life on Earth,” he said.

It is unclear what this will mean to future generations or the possible emergence of new diseases, absence of fresh water and the continuing decline of fisheries and completely unpredictable weather.

With half of the urban populations of Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean suffering from several diseases associated with these problems, the death toll is reaching 1.7 million people a year. Entire species of mammals, birds and amphibians are disappearing from the planet at nearly 1,000 times the natural rate, according to the study. Oxygen-depleted coastal waters and rivers result from overuse of nitrogen fertilizer – an effect known as “nutrient loading” which leads to continuing biodiversity loss.

With the United States’ non-participation in the Kyoto Treaty, former U.S. Senator Timothy Wirth, president of this U.N. Foundation, says “U.S. leadership is critical in providing much-needed expertise, technological capabilities and ingenuity to restore ecosystems.

“We can take steps at home to reduce our nation’s adverse impact on the global environment.”

“At the heart of this assessment is a stark warning,” said the 45-member board.

Monday, June 21, 2010

Sweden’s first royal wedding since 1976 took place Saturday when Crown Princess Victoria, 32, married her long-time boyfriend and former personal trainer, Daniel Westling, 36. The ceremony took place at Stockholm Cathedral.

Over 1,200 guests, including many rulers, politicians, royals and other dignitaries from across the world, attended the wedding, which cost an estimated 20 million Swedish kronor. Victoria wore a wedding dress with five-metre long train designed by Pär Engsheden. She wore the same crown that her mother, Queen Silvia, wore on her wedding day 34 years previously, also on June 19. Victoria’s father, King Carl XVI Gustaf, walked Victoria down the aisle, which was deemed untraditional by many. In Sweden, the bride and groom usually walk down the aisle together, emphasising the country’s views on equality. Victoria met with Daniel half-way to the altar, where they exchanged brief kisses, and, to the sounds of the wedding march, made their way to the the silver altar. She was followed by ten bridesmaids. The couple both had tears in their eyes as they said their vows, and apart from fumbling when they exchanged rings, the ceremony went smoothly.

Following the ceremony, the couple headed a fast-paced procession through central Stockholm on a horse-drawn carriage, flanked by police and security. Up to 500,000 people are thought to have lined the streets. They then boarded the Vasaorden, the same royal barge Victoria’s parents used in their wedding, and traveled through Stockholm’s waters, accompanied by flyover of 18 fighter jets near the end of the procession. A wedding banquet followed in the in the Hall of State of the Royal Palace.

Controversy has surrounded the engagement and wedding between the Crown Princess and Westling, a “commoner”. Victoria met Westling as she was recovering from bulemia in 2002. He owned a chain of gymnasiums and was brought in to help bring Victoria back to full health. Westling was raised in a middle-class family in Ockelbo, in central Sweden. His father managed a social services centre, and his mother worked in a post office. When the relationship was made public, Westling was mocked as an outsider and the king was reportedly horrified at the thought of his daughter marrying a “commoner”, even though he did so when he married Silvia. Last year, Westling underwent transplant surgery for a congenital kidney disorder. The Swedish public have been assured that he will be able to have children and that his illness will not be passed on to his offspring.

Westling underwent years of training to prepare for his new role in the royal family, including lessons in etiquette, elocution, and multi-lingual small talk; and a makeover that saw his hair being cropped short, and his plain-looking glasses and clothes being replaced by designer-wear.

Upon marrying the Crown Princess, Westling took his wife’s ducal title and is granted the style “His Royal Highness”. He is now known as HRH Prince Daniel, Duke of Västergötland. He also has his own coat-of-arms and monogram. When Victoria assumes the throne and becomes Queen, Daniel will not become King, but assume a supportive role, similar to that of Prince Phillip, the husband of the United Kingdom’s Queen Elizabeth II.