Meerkats actively teach their young how to catch and eat their prey, British researchers said in a study that is one of the first to prove that animals show such complex behaviour. While animals are known to learn from one another by watching, the team at Britain’s University of Cambridge said they had demonstrated that the animals actually teach, as defined by clear principles.
It costs a pretty penny to mint one United States cent. With the prices of zinc and copper going through the roof, the smallest US denomination is now worth more as a commodity than a currency, prompting Americans to wonder whether they should drop the little coin with Abraham Lincoln on its face down the well for good.
As competition between Boeing and European aviation rival Airbus heats up, the two groups may see a new dogfight over the issue of government subsidies, analysts say. The prospect of a new political row is looming as Boeing is gaining on Airbus due to the success of its 787 ”Dreamliner” programme.
International companies and local elites in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are pocketing revenues from copper and cobalt production instead of sharing it with local communities or spending it to reduce poverty, a watchdog group charged this week.
Former Enron chairperson and chief executive Kenneth Lay, awaiting sentencing after being convicted of fraud and conspiracy charges, has died, United States media reported on Wednesday. ”Ken Lay passed away early this morning in Aspen,” said a family statement read out on CNN.
The White House on Monday unveiled plans to sell Pakistan up to 36 F-16 fighters in a deal that could total -billion and which drew an unhappy response from United States ally India. Washington had blocked the sale of F-16s to Pakistan for 15 years to protest its nuclear weapons programme, but gave the green light in March 2005 to reward the South Asian ally for its help in the ”war on terror”.
The United States government is stepping in to wash potty mouths and clothe exposed bodies on the national airwaves, with new fines that increase penalties tenfold for violating decency standards. The new measures, signed into law in mid-June by President George Bush, culminate years of pressure from religious conservative groups to ”clean up” the airwaves.
The White House on Monday dismissed North Korea’s threat of a nuclear strike in the event of United States attack as ”deeply hypothetical” and urged Pyongyang to rejoin nuclear negotiations. North Korea vowed on Monday to counter any strike by the US with its ”mighty nuclear deterrent”, accusing Washington of raising tension on the Korean peninsula.
The Central Intelligence Agency of the United States authenticated a new audio-taped message on Friday in which al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden vows to wage holy war in Iraq and Africa, while the White House brushed off the message as old news. In the fourth tape this year, Bin Laden hails Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the slain al-Qaeda leader in Iraq, as a ”lion of Islam”.
The Bush administration has refused to abandon military tribunals for Guantánamo Bay inmates despite the United States Supreme Court ruling the ”war on terror” trials illegal, which leading newspapers called a victory for law. The court ruled on Thursday that President George Bush had no authority to order such tribunals.
Hurricane Katrina fraudsters who billed the United States government for fictitious services and filed claims for phantom hotel guests, and even Dom Perignon champagne, have managed to cost taxpayers up to -billion, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.
Visions dawned on Monday of a new golden age of philanthropy with Bill Gates atop a mammoth $60-billion charity machine, with a global punch to rival world aid bodies and even governments. Investment guru Warren Buffett’s $31-billion donation to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will double the size of Gates’ fund and make it by far the world’s largest charitable foundation.
Torrential rain has triggered flooding and power outages throughout the Washington region, shutting down some federal offices and disrupting transport links to the United States capital on Monday. Commuters faced long delays around Washington after rain pounded the east coast overnight.
A braided leather whip, a sniper rifle, six jars of fertiliser and a copy of the Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook were among the presents foreign leaders have given United States President George W Bush. They are clearly trying to tell him something. The inventory of official gifts from 2004, published recently by the State Department, reads like the wish list of a paranoid survivalist.
The United States government has secretly monitored banking transactions around the globe since the September 11 2001 attacks, officials said on Friday, defending the programme as a crucial part of the war on terror. It is the latest in a series of covert measures that is likely to spark fresh concerns about potential privacy infringements and Americans’ civil liberties.
The United States military is relying ever more on space satellites to help wage combat in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, though analysts say that Washington’s space supremacy could be threatened by rivals in the future. The Pentagon is using sophisticated satellites that orbit Earth in a bid to track down its enemies and keep a round-the-clock watch on unfriendly foes.
The United States plans to keep pressing for an international force in Sudan’s war-torn Darfur province, despite fierce opposition from Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir. On Tuesday, al-Beshir rejected the deployment of an international force for Darfur, declaring that his country would not be ”recolonised”.
A United States court of appeals has struck down a lower court ruling requiring a sex offender to undergo periodic sexual-arousal testing, saying such a practice was ”Orwellian”. In its decision handed down Tuesday, the US 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said it could not agree with the March 2005 judgment by a Los Angeles district court.
Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick, the architect of United States-China policy and Washington’s point man on Sudan, resigned on Monday to take up a position with Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs. "It is time for me to step down," Zoellick told a news conference at the State Department, with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice by his side.
A handful of Mentos candy dropped in a Diet Coke bottle produces an explosive soda geyser — and a multitude of internet videos of giddy people trying the experiment in backyards and bathtubs. Hundreds of videos have sprung up of people slipping Mentos into soda bottles and watching the Coke fountain jet about 2m high.
From the hangman whose rope snaps to paramedics who can’t find a vein for a lethal injection, death penalty executions in the United States have sometimes been sorry affairs. To the end of the 19th century executions were largely carried out by hanging. When done properly the condemned falls and snaps his neck, dying instantly
Two United States astronomers have discovered huge quantities of carbon gas mixed with a cloud of dust surrounding a young, yellow star that could resemble our own solar system at its inception, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) said.
The United States Senate blocked on Wednesday a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, defeating a measure strongly backed by President George Bush and Christian conservatives. With a 49-48 vote, the measure fell well short of the two-thirds majority needed to move to a formal vote in the 100-member Senate.
Six years after barely losing the most contested presidential race in recent United States history, Al Gore has ridden a popular new film on global climate change to the centre of American politics. Former vice-president Gore denied again Sunday that he intended to contest the Democratic nomination for president in 2008 — which could pit him against his former boss’s wife, Senator Hillary Clinton.
A major wrestling match in the United States’ Congress over control of the internet features some strange alliances — rockers and evangelists vs phone companies and the Bells’ usually biggest adversary, cable TV companies. The most far-reaching telecommunications Bill in a decade has as its main purpose making it easier for phone companies to compete against cable companies in offering the equivalent of cable TV.
The White House insisted on Friday that Iran had to suspend sensitive nuclear fuel work as a ”non-negotiable” element of a deal hammered out by world powers to limit its atomic ambitions. As Tehran came under growing pressure to accept the proposals, White House spokesperson Tony Snow said European nations would make a detailed presentation over ”the next couple of days”.
The man already on death row for terrorising the Washington area in a 2002 sniper rampage was found guilty this week on six counts of murder in Maryland and sentenced to six life terms in prison on Thursday, United States media reported. The jury’s verdict came after a drama-filled trial.
South African left-hander Cassius Baloyi knocked out Mexican veteran Manuel Medina in the 11th round in Washington on Wednesday for the vacant International Boxing Federation junior lightweight crown. Baloyi appeared to be outboxed for much of the fight but then came alive in the 11th and dropped Medina three times to end it.
The United States, in a policy shift, is ready to join direct talks on Iran’s nuclear programme if Tehran suspends all uranium-enrichment activities, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday. These would be the first substantive talks with Iran since diplomatic relations were broken off 26 years ago.
Outgoing Treasury Secretary John Snow was seen as a loyal but uninspired cheerleader for a roaring United States economy that has been one of the few bright spots for US President George Bush in his second term. Snow’s impending departure has been one of Washington’s worst-kept secrets.
Imagine an invisibility cloak that works just like the one Harry Potter inherited from his father. Researchers in the United Kingdom and the United States think they know how to do that. They are laying out the blueprint and calling for help in developing the exotic materials needed to build a cloak.
Hollywood stars Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have a baby girl, United States media reported on Saturday. People magazine cited an official spokesperson for the actors as saying the child named Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt was born on May 27, at night, in Namibia