Shooter said to be veteran Afghan air force pilot fired on US military mentors, killing eight soldiers and a civilian contractor Eight Nato soldiers and a foreign civilian contractor have been killed after a shootout in Kabul between an Afghan air force officer and his US military mentors. The incident, which happened at about 11am on Wednesday, is one of the worst episodes yet involving Afghan soldiers turning their weapons on their foreign colleagues. The Afghan defence ministry claimed the shooting broke out following an argument. However, a Taliban spokesman has claimed the shooter was an insurgent sleeper who had infiltrated the force. The killings occurred in a management office responsible for overseeing air traffic control on the second floor of a building in the Kabul headquarters of Afghanistan’s air force, where the officer had been working. The man, who a pilot contacted by the Guardian named as 50-year-old Ahmad Gul, was killed during the shooting. Because it happened in an office environment in a secure building, none of the Nato soldiers – almost certainly all Americans – would have been wearing protective body armour, although they all would have had personal firearms. A spokesman for the air force said that people in other offices in the building thought the huge facility that shares the same runway as Kabul’s civilian airport was under attack. “Some of the other officers thought it was a suicide bombing and they jumped out of second-floor windows to try to escape,” said Lieutenant Colonel Badur. The incident, which happened as most of the country’s pilots and top brass were meeting elsewhere to discuss plans for Thursday’s Victory Day national celebrations, is yet another setback for western hopes of handing over security duties to the Afghan army. It follows a series of incidents where foreign soldiers have been killed, either by angry Afghan servicemen , undercover insurgents or Taliban wearing illegally acquired uniforms. The government said the shooter, who had 20 years’ experience flying planes under the various regimes that have ruled Afghanistan, was shot and killed during the fight. But according to the pilot contacted by the Guardian, Gul only rejoined the force five months ago having been out of work for nearly a decade. In the 1980s he flew helicopters during the regime of communist president Mohammad Najibullah but did not participate in the country’s civil war in the 1990s. Afghanistan Nato US military United States US foreign policy Jon Boone guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Full details of what may or may not happen on the big day, including special version of TV Go Home, seating chart, memo about Prince Philip and poem to the couple
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Entwistle has been acting director since the end of January and will be paid £270,000 George Entwistle has been appointed to one of the most senior jobs at the BBC, director of BBC Vision, the person responsible for the BBC’s television channels. Entwistle has been acting director since the end of January, following the departure of Jana Bennett to the BBC’s commercial arm BBC Worldwide. He will be paid £270,000 and becomes one of the key internal contenders to eventually succeed Mark Thompson as director general. The job of director of BBC Vision is one of the biggest in the corporation and includes overseeing more than 20,000 hours of programmes. Entwistle who was the BBC’s controller of knowledge commissioning and controller of editorial standards for BBC Vision told the Guardian in February that he was applying for the job on a permanent basis. His previous roles include editing Newsnight, launching The Culture Show on BBC2 and acting controller of BBC4. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook . BBC Television industry Mark Thompson Jana Bennett Tara Conlan guardian.co.uk
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Foreign secretary says president Bashar al-Assad is viewed as a potential reformer – and may be persuaded to go down the right ‘prong in the fork’ The foreign secretary, William Hague, has said it is not too late for Syria to “do the right thing” by implementing the reforms its people are calling for. EU countries are discussing imposing sanctions on Syria if the regime continues its violent suppression of pro-democracy protests. Opposition activists have reported continuing government attacks in the southern town of Deraa and mass arrests and the use of tanks in areas including Douma, near the capital, and Baniyas, on the coast. Hague said a “major diplomatic effort” was under way to try to persuade the Syrian authorities to go down the right “prong in the fork” to avoid sanctions being imposed. The foreign secretary signalled that the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, is still viewed as a potential reformer of his country and, as such, is not being urged to quit – unlike Muammar Gaddafi in Libya. But he added that Assad may be hampered from taking the reforming route because of other figures in his regime. Contrasting the “very different situation” in Syria compared with Libya, which already faces diplomatic, economic and military sanctions, Hague told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme that Syria was at a “very different stage” and could still choose the path of reform. “President Assad has made two major speeches on reform in Syria – one of them was, in the eyes of most of us, too weak, and the other one was too late, but nevertheless he has made those speeches and committed himself to important reforms,” Hague said. “It is not too late for him to say he really is going to do those reforms and additional reforms.” Refusing to be drawn on a timeframe, he added: “It is not too late for him to do those things, to say the deaths that occurred will be investigated so there is a major diplomatic effort going on to try to persuade the Syrian authorities to go down that prong of the fork, the right way.” The Syrian human rights organisation Sawasiah said at least 400 civilians had been killed during a month of protests, including at least 35 in Deraa since Monday. It said 500 people had been arrested in the past few days after the abrogation of the country’s decades-old emergency law, one of several concessions by Assad widely dismissed as too little, too late. Of Assad, with whom Hague met in January, the foreign secretary said: “You can imagine him as a reformer. “One of the difficulties in Syria is that President Assad’s power depends on a wider group of people in his own family and, of course, other members of government, and I am not sure how free he is to pursue a reform agenda, even if he wanted to do so.” The foreign secretary denied the government’s tone was far softer than that adopted towards Libya. “We are not so gentle,” he said. “My statement [in the House of Commons] yesterday condemned utterly the violence and killings. “It called for violent repression to stop, for individuals to be held accountable for the violence, for President Assad to respond to the legitimate demands of his people, that words are not enough and actions are necessary. This wasn’t regarded diplomatically as gentle language, I can assure you.” Hague said diplomacy was about talking to people you disagree with and insisted he would keep the lines of communication with the Syrian regime open. “We will urge them to do the right thing,” he said. “They are being urged to do so by many other countries, including in our own region, and I appeal to them again to respect the legitimate grievances and not to engage in this repression and violence against their own people.” The difficulties of concerted international action were illustrated when members of the UN security council debated a statement criticising Syria as Russian diplomats sought to water down a European draft. The statement would not have the legal force or direct impact of earlier resolutions against Libya. Diplomats said the Syrian government had more defenders on the international stage, and – having endured years of US sanctions already – was less vulnerable to new pressure. Syria Middle East Arab and Middle East unrest Foreign policy William Hague Hélène Mulholland Julian Borger Ian Black guardian.co.uk
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Army, navy and RAF practise roles for wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton to ensure nothing is left to chance Up to a thousand members of the military carried out a pre-dawn royal wedding dress rehearsal today. The full-scale walk-through in preparation for Friday’s big day involved the army, navy and RAF. The eyes of the world will be on Prince William and Kate Middleton when they begin their journeys to and from Westminster Abbey. And it falls in no small part to the military to ensure the couple’s occasion has all the pomp and grandeur it deserves. So nothing was left to chance with the dry run in which timings were tested to the second and all armed forces taking part got the chance to practise their role in their service uniforms and ensure nothing is left to chance. The day began very early – about 2am for those involved. Forces left Westminster’s Wellington Barracks shortly before 5am to begin their way along the route. Some of the soldiers, sailors and airmen practising their duties were Prince William’s colleagues. First to arrive at the abbey were two of the royal fleet cars – Rolls-Royces – which arrived at about 4.50am. Shortly after 5am the action began. It was audible only at first as the sounds of orders being barked out emerged from the final stretch of the route running down from the Houses of Parliament to the abbey. Several companies of the Royal Navy lined the end of the route, preceded by the army along Parliament Street. Soldiers lined up beside the Cenotaph, outside the entrance to Downing Street. From there the RAF lined the road up to Horse Guards Parade which the royal convoy will pass through on Friday. An RAF officer walked the line. “On the day you’ll have your heels on the white line (of the road markings),” he told them, making sure they knew to take an extra step back closer to the crowds. When the Ministry of Defence announced the Armed Forces’ extensive ceremonial role, General Sir David Richards, head of the military, described it as a “huge honour” for those involved. When the couple leave the abbey as man and wife, two groups of 12 military personnel will line their route as they make their way to their horse-drawn coach.The tribute is traditionally performed at many military weddings. Dozens of soldiers on horseback from the Household Cavalry made their way to Westminster Abbey via a different route from the wedding cars this morning. The cavalry, who led the cars and carriages back to Buckingham Palace through the arch of Horse Guards Parade and along the Mall, performed a loop, parading down Buckingham Palace Road and along Victoria Street to get them to the Abbey. Royal wedding Monarchy Military Weddings Prince William Kate Middleton guardian.co.uk
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Libyan delegation arrived several days ago to discuss solution to end Nato’s ‘crazy’ bombing, Venezuelan president adds Envoys from Muammar Gaddafi’s government have flown to Venezuela to discuss ways to resolve Libya’s conflict, President Hugo Chávez has said. The visitors arrived in Caracas several days ago to discuss a solution that would put an end to Nato’s “crazy” bombing, Chávez said during a televised speech on Tuesday. “A delegation sent by Gaddafi has arrived in Venezuela and we are seeking a peaceful outcome.” The Venezuelan president, who has remained loyal to his embattled Arab ally, did not elaborate on the delegation’s visit but repeated his calls for talks between Libya’s government and the rebels. He also repeated his condemnation of Nato military strikes. “Who gave them the right to do this? It’s crazy. Because they don’t like the leader Gaddafi, because they want to take Libya’s oil and water … they are throwing bombs everywhere.” Speaking during a meeting of Latin American and Caribbean foreign ministers, Chávez said he wanted to find “a political solution to the drama the Libyan people were living”. He spoke amid growing concern in Moscow and Beijing that Nato was trying to assassinate Libya’s leader . An air strike damaged Gaddafi’s compound in Tripoli on Monday. “We’ve had enough abuse, wars and invasions directed against third world countries,” said Chávez. He has frequently accused the US of plotting to assassinate him to grab Venezuela’s oil. Last month he proposed that an international commission visit Libya to broker a truce but the idea was rejected by both sides. On Monday Chávez expressed support for Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, in the wake of a crackdown on pro-democracy protests that has reportedly left hundreds dead . Venezuela’s president blamed “terrorists” for the protests in the Syrian city of Deraa. Hugo Chávez Muammar Gaddafi Venezuela Libya Middle East Syria Nato Arab and Middle East unrest Rory Carroll guardian.co.uk
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AThe Office for National Statistics official figures show the economy grew 0.5% in the first quarter of the year 10.02am: The EEF, which represents manufacturers, says, “while a double dip has been avoided the first estimate for Q1 growth is unlikely to settle nerves about the health of the recovery.” They’re not kidding – the next quarter’s data will be all over the place, because of the Bank Holiday and the Royal Wedding, so it’ll be very hard to take the temperature. 9.56am: City economists have also been reacting to the data (which was bang in line with the consensus). Many are concerned that the UK economy has effectively stagnated since last September. Hetal Mehta of Daiwa Capital Markets says that “underlying growth in the UK economy is virtually non-existent”, while Ross Walker of RBS called the data “not disastrous … a bit lacklustre”. Some economists, though, are questioning whether the construction sector really fell by 4.7%, as the ONS estimated. Philip Shaw of Investec is taking today’s preliminary numbers “with a pinch of salt”. George Buckley of Deutsche Bank is encouraged that the services sector enjoyed its best rise since the end of 2006. 9.55am: The pound has strengthened on the back of the GDP figures – up by more than half a cent at $1.6552. Little reaction on the FTSE 100, though, which is now down 15 points at 6053. 9.54am: Reaction is starting to come in – Schroders describes the figures as “very stagflationary,” Capital Economics points out that, exactly as Joe Grice, the chief statistician said, underlying growth is flat. It seems the UK is the economy that’s running to stand still. 9.52am: Strongest quarterly contribution to growth? Business services and finance: thanks, banks. Manufacturing was strong, at 1.1%, but overall production up just 0.4% because of the offset from falling energy production and mining. Some of that will be weather related, reflecting households turning off their heating in the milder new year weather; but how important is oil here, I wonder? Is our great manufacturing revival going to be cancelled out in the GDP figures because of declining North Sea production? One to investigate later … 9.49am: The press conference is breaking up now, after a couple more techy questions on the difference between arithmetical catch-up – the simple bounce back effect from the loss of GDP in the fourth quarter – and postponed output, which was lost in the fourth quarter and made up in the New Year – shopping trips put off in the Christmas snow, for example. Joe Grice explains that given that the overall figure is still just 0.5%, if there was any postponed activity, it must have been offset by falls elsewhere. 9.42am: There’s no immediate effect from the Japanese earthquake, the number-crunchers say. 9.40am: Hugh Pym from the BBC says many business organisations and surveys would have pointed to a higher figure; but Joe Grice points out, rightly, that 0.5% is bang on the City’s forecast. 9.38am: Retail was flat over the quarter, spokesman Harry Duff reminds us – though it’s felt worse for many on the high street, with profit warnings galore. Looking at the breakdown for the figures, which is sketchy at this stage, services output has actually been quite strong, at 0.9%, but not strong enough to offset a 4.7% decline in construction – which some of the analysts are sceptical about. However, the ONS insists the margin of error in these early estimates of GDP is 0.2% either way. 9.36am: “What we have is an economy that has not been declining, but has not been growing either over that period,” says Grice. Hardly the spring bounce the government had been hoping for, and puts the lie to George Osborne’s claim that the fourth quarter decline was caused solely by the snow. 9.34am: It’s 0.5% growth. And Joe Grice, ONS chief statistician, says we have an economy that has now been ‘on a plateau’ for the past three quarters, Heather Stewart writes. 9.30am: And here’s the data, hot off the Reuters terminal. UK GDP grew by 0.5% in the last quarter. Up by 1.8% on a year-on-year basis. Now over to Heather at the ONS briefing. 9.24am: Time for a quick look at the markets before 9.30am — the pound has been losing ground this morning, and is currently trading at $1.6442 against the US dollar. The FTSE 100 has lost 20 points to 6048, partly due to disappointing corporate results from Barclays and Associated British Foods this morning. 9.15am: The consensus among economists is for GDP to have expanded by around 0.5% in the quarter. However, the City’s finest minds do not have an unblemished record on such predictions (three months ago they expected growth of 0.5%, and were most surprised when the ONS reported a 0.5% contraction). In a normal quarter, 0.5% growth would be OK. But these are unusual times — that 0.5% contraction in Q4 2010 was caused by the awful wintery weather last December [growth was otherwise flat]. So growth of 0.5% last quarter would only mean that Britain had clawed back the output lost in the snow, and effectively have stagnated for six months. What would be a “good number”, then? Duncan Weldon , the economist and blogger, has written a good post looking at this question. Here’s his conclusion: I think it’s fair to say, that any number below 0.5% would be terrible, 0.6% to 1.2% would be merely bad, 1.3% to 1.7% would be reasonable (i.e. what we should expect but nothing to get excited about) and over 1.7% would be good. What this really brings home is how important it is to consider the severe disruption the quarter before when looking at tomorrow’s figure. For example if growth comes out at 1.2%, it will in reality mean that the economy has managed an average pace of growth over the past six months (ahead of the cuts). But that would also be the strongest quarter on quarter growth since 1999 and well ahead of the OBR forecast, something I’m sure certain observers would be very quick to point out. 9.08am: Today’s GDP number will be used (fairly?) as a report card on George Osborne ‘s performance as chancellor. Weak growth (or worse) will be seized on by his critics as proof that his rapid assault on the UK deficit through spending cuts and tax rises is strangling the recovery. A decent performance, though, will bolster Osborne and his allies – who are likely to argue that the drive to rebalance the UK economy is working. Osborne was given an early peek at the GDP figure yesterday. As my colleague Patrick Wintour reported , Osborne went on to brief the cabinet that “the economy was on the right course” but that “returning to balanced growth was always going to be difficult.” Labour has already argued that a weak growth figure will not be enough. Here’s Angela Eagle , the shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, last night: George Osborne’s confident declaration that the recovery is on the right track should be taken with a pinch of salt given his complacent claim last autumn that Britain was ‘out of the danger zone’. Our economy should not just be making up all the lost ground from the end of last year but growing strongly on top of that. We will need to compare growth over the last six months, since George Osborne’s spending review and VAT rise but before the bulk of the cuts have really kicked in, with growth of 1.8% over the previous six months. The Office for Budget Responsibility, which has already downgraded its forecast for 2011 three times, is predicting growth of just 0.8% in the first quarter. That would mean growth of just 0.3% over the last six months, which would be a very weak recovery indeed. Before George Osborne ripped up our plan to halve the deficit over four years growth in 2011 was forecast by the OBR to be 2.6%. We will need to see very strong figures tomorrow if the Chancellor is to get back on to that track. 9.03am: This is the first time that the ONS has done a press briefing immediately after releasing quarterly GDP data since January 2010, when Britain officially came out of recession ( here’s Heather’s live-blog of the event ). This is the agenda for this morning: 9.25am : Informal welcome to the briefing 9.30am : ONS chief economist Joe Grice will announce the 1st Quarter 2011 Preliminary Estimate for GDP 9.33am : ONS press officers will distribute hard copies of the GDP bulletin to attending journalists 9.35am : Joe Grice and a senior statistician will answer questions from the floor from attending journalists 10am : Joe Grice and a senior statistician will be available for one-to-one broadcast interviews 8.50am: Good morning, and welcome to our live coverage of the release of the UK GDP figures for the first quarter of 2011. At 9.30am we’ll learn how well the economy performed in the last three months – did Britain bounce back strongly from its disappointing contraction at the end of 2010, or only manage a limp recovery? Or did the economy continue to shrink, throwing us back into recession? My colleague Heather Stewart is embedded at the Church House Conference Centre in Westminster, where the Office for National Statistics will hold a press briefing immediately after the figures are released. I (Graeme Wearden) will bring you the City’s reaction to the data, as economists and politicians argue over the strength of the British economy. Economic growth (GDP) Economic policy George Osborne Economics Graeme Wearden Heather Stewart guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Publish and be doomed? The digital revolution is in fact giving books and music a beautiful new life The most fetching book I’ve come across for ages wasn’t in a traditional bookshop but on a recent visit to the South London Gallery in Peckham. It was Thackeray’s Vanity Fair, but not the Penguin Popular Classic. This one was pale pink and as big as a box , newly typeset, accompanied by 30 gorgeous illustrations and available at the very reasonable hardback price of £16.99. Even as the big beasts of publishing struggle, and their traditional retailers lurch from crisis to crisis, there are reasons to be hopeful. Some publishers are doing well by producing objects beautiful enough to be collectible. That Vanity Fair I saw is from Four Corners Books , a tiny east London publisher with two employees; as well as new books, Four Corners knocks out “Familiars” by inviting contemporary artists to create fresh editions of classic novels and short stories. In music, independent stores like Rough Trade East in London and Truck Store in Oxford have begun to reverse the tide of closures. Shops like this sell themselves on the expertise of their staff, and live events, but much of the trade they do is in vinyl as beautifully produced artwork rather than invisible download. For some years, sales of old-fashioned vinyl albums have been growing steadily on both sides of the Atlantic, while CD sales fall through the floor. This new publishing ecosystem is brimming with exotic minutiae in the most unusual places. Even when publishers are working online, they’re learning to produce things in different shapes and sizes. As music is produced for digital storage, songs are expanding beyond the three-minute limit. And with the ebook , the definition of a book is becoming more fluid. Take Amazon’s Kindle Singles outlet – a showcase for nonfiction between 10,000 and 30,000 words, capable of being read in a few sittings. Publishing like this might put paid to the padding out – or squeezing – of ideas into the 70,000 words of a traditional book. It can certainly be quicker and more responsive than conventional publishing. Only two days after the story broke of Greg Mortenson’s alleged embellishment of his memoir Three Cups of Tea , a tiny online publishing company called Byliner published a short ebook by an investigative journalist presenting the case against Mortenson. Three Cups of Deceit was downloaded 50,000 times in its first three days. Just as Rolling Stone inspired a new kind of narrative nonfiction in the 1960s and 70s, this kind of publishing might be the catalyst for new kinds of writing and literary forms – all as lovingly edited and worked on as the traditional book, but with a price to match the meal. Kindle Singles sell for justa few dollars, a fraction of the cost of a full-length book. But it isn’t only the book that is changing its form. Many of us, it turns out, don’t want to spend all our time consuming random gobbets of electronic information. We’re hungry for longer things to get our teeth into – as new things sprout up in different shapes and sizes, our diet is growing more diverse. The same people who snack on bite-sized nuggets of online video at work might revel in a long HBO serial like The Wire an episode at a time in the evening, a richer story than anything they’re likely to encounter on mainstream TV. Just as novels evolved in the 19th century to cope with the demands of newspaper serialisation, television is liberating itself from stale old formats and stretching out into sprawling, more intricate kinds of story. It’s hardly a coincidence that the concept album, that creature of the 1970s, is making a comeback. When everything is granulated into digital bits, some bands have discovered, lavish and involved storytelling becomes even more important as a way of holding everything together. The future may belong to grand operatic conceits and epic, gravity-defying feats of storytelling that defy traditional categorisation. Rather than being written out of history, books and music may only be getting brand new containers, and some beautiful new wrapping. Publishing James Harkin guardian.co.uk
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Advertising watchdog says use of bikini-clad model to promote spring flights was misleading as destinations would all be cold The advertising watchdog has banned a campaign by Ryanair featuring a bikini-clad model and the promise of spring sun after most of the destinations on offer had maximum temperatures under a nippy 10C. Budget airline Ryanair, no stranger to flexing its interpretation of advertising regulation in the past , ran a national press campaign promoting cheap tickets in February and March “To The Sun Now!”. The press ad featured a model in a bikini, lying on a beach wearing sunglasses while sipping a cocktail. The Advertising Standards Authority received a complaint that the campaign was misleading because none of the destinations on offer – which included 11 locations such as Rimini, Lourdes, Derry, Glasgow and Oslo – would be warm in February or March. Ryanair protested that despite the image used on the ad it meant destinations that had significant amounts of daytime sunshine during those months. The ASA said that the maximum temperatures for the majority of the destinations – seven of them – were between 6C and 9C. The warmest three averaged 11C and 14C while the coldest, Oslo, managed 0C and 4C. “We considered that the average consumer would infer from the claim ‘Book to the sun now’ and the image of the woman sunbathing, in a bikini, with a cocktail, that the promotion included fares to destinations warm enough to sunbathe in swimwear during the promotional period,” the ASA said. “Because we understood this was not the case, we concluded that the ad was misleading.” The airline will not be allowed to run such adverts again. •
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Masdar City, being built near Abu Dhabi, will rely entirely on solar energy and renewable sources
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