"Winnipeg: A busy church food bank, known for offering warm drinks and snacks to its regulars, has announced it's closing because it is attracting too many poor people.

"'It's attracting a lot of street people that make it uncomfortable,' said Charlotte Prossen, Unity Truth Centre minister Thursday, 'It's creating social unrest in the church'

"'A food bank is a social service and that is not who we are'

"Ms. Prossen said the program is being cancelled to focus on more church-specific activities. The church's board of trustees made the decision to cancel the bimonthly food bank after receiving an e-mail from a sister church in Victoria.

Over 60 mothers were charged with murdering their babies across Russia in the first half of 2011, a government daily said.

Twenty of the sixty four suspected murders took place in the central federal district, which includes Moscow, the Rossiiskaya Gazeta paper said.

Psychiatrists quoted by the paper say many of the women killed their children after going temporarily insane following labor. Other experts suggest, however, that the killings have their roots in social ills.

The paper suggested that problems faced by non-Muscovites with the country's notorious registration system meant it was hard for them to receive prenatal medical attention in the capital.

The summer of 2011 has been a long, hot one for Israeli and international companies complicit in human rights violations in the occupied West Bank.

Facing an intense Europe-wide boycott campaign, Israel's largest produce exporter, Agrexco, filed for bankruptcy. French multinational Veolia, an urban systems corporation contracted with the Israeli government to provide light rail services for Israeli settlers in the West Bank, announced massive losses due to sustained pressure by activists around the world.

Meanwhile, in Sweden, the Israeli maker of home carbonation devices, Sodastream, took a direct hit when the Coop supermarket chain announced on 19 July that it would stop all purchases of its products due to the company's activity in illegal Israeli settlements. This marked another important victory for the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, as Sweden is Sodastream's largest market, with an estimated one in five households owning a Sodastream product ("Coop Sweden stops all purchases of Soda Stream carbonation devices," 21 July 2011).

The Israeli company has been the target of a two-year campaign by Swedish activists who seek to highlight the company's complicity with the Israeli occupation. The main production facilities for Sodastream are located at Mishor Adumim, the industrial zone of the Israeli settlement Maaleh Adumim in the occupied West Bank.

Sodastream, whose products are sold in 41 countries, has repeatedly attempted to deflect attention from the factory in the occupied West Bank, claiming that it is just one of many around the world.

In an interview last March with the Israeli financial daily The Marker (published by Haaretz), Sodastream CEO Daniel Birnbaum went so far as to say that "all Sodastream products sold in Sweden are made in China, not Israel" ("Sodastream setting up plant within Green Line," 3 March 2011).

The former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell pledged Tuesday to testify against former Vice President Dick Cheney if he is ever tried for war crimes.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson told Democracy Now's Amy Goodman that he would participate in a trial even if it meant personal repercussions.

"I, unfortunately - and I've admitted to this a number of times, publicly and privately - was the person who put together Colin Powell's presentation at the United Nations Security Council on 5 February, 2003," Wilkerson said. "It was probably the biggest mistake of my life. I regret it to this day. I regret not having resigned over it."

The grisly discovery of a human foot that washed ashore in Vancouver Tuesday afternoon marks the latest chapter in a mystery that has been going on since 2007.

Since that time, eight human feet have been found on the B.C. coast. Three more have turned up in nearby Washington state.

Here is a brief timeline of BC's foot mystery:

August, 2007: A man's foot was found on Jedediah Island, northeast of Nanaimo, B.C. The foot was associated with a deceased man whose name police withheld at the request of his family.

August 2007: An unidentified man's right foot found on Gabriola Island.

July 2008: Two feet believed to belong to the same man are discovered on Valdez and Westham islands.

More than 100 baby sharks have washed up on Waiheke Island minus their fins, sparking a Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries investigation.

Two visitors to the Waiheke Winter Blues Festival made the gruesome discovery while walking the coastal route around Owhanake Bay on Sunday.

At the western end of Owhanake Beach the two men, Keith Chaplin and Nigel Brunt from Whangaparaoa, found more than 100 dead baby sharks measuring "about a foot long".

"The seagulls had been at them a bit but it was obvious all their backs were missing," Chaplin says.

The two men reported it to Waiheke police on Monday as they had only been able to leave an answerphone message to MAF on Sunday.

A police spokesperson says it will be investigated by a fisheries officer.

A fugitive rapist who went on the run after a frail spinster was murdered in a hammer attack at her home once told a victim: 'I am your everyday psychopath.'

Graeme Jarman, 47, was jailed for seven years for the horrifying rape at gunpoint of his 17-year-old victim who later described him as an 'evil and cunning' predator.

'I suffered seven hours at the hands of that man,' she said. 'He told me to shut up and do what he said, adding, "I am your everyday psychopath". Those words will live with me for ever.'

Jarman, a former civil servant, is now at the centre of a nationwide manhunt mounted by detectives investigating the killing of 77-year-old pensioner Judith Richardson.

"A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another." ~Mao Zedong

First of all, don't worry, I am not advocating violent overthrow of the Robber Class in this piece - now that your mind is eased (or disappointed), I will go on.

Today, Peace of the Action, and our Re-Creating Revolutionary Communities or Bust Tour is wrapping up near Yosemite in bucolic (and hot), Oakhurst. We began in Eugene, Or. and stopped in Hood River and Newport before heading down to California where we had events in Arcata, Garberville, Fresno and soon in Oakhurst.

At each stop, a community potluck was included and I observed and heard many revolutionary acts being planned by members of each community stemming from the mere act of building community

President Barack Obama's uncle was stopped on suspicion of drunken driving in Massachusetts, told police he planned to arrange bail through the White House and is being held without bail by federal immigration officials, authorities said Monday.

Onyango Obama, 67, was arrested last week in Framingham, about 20 miles west of Boston, after police said he made a rolling stop through a stop sign and nearly caused a cruiser to strike his sport utility vehicle.

Police said that after being booked at the police station, Obama was asked whether he wanted to make a telephone call to arrange for bail. "I think I will call the White House," he stated, according to a police report filed in Framingham District Court.

Police said Obama, who is originally from Kenya and is the half-brother of the president's late father, pleaded not guilty Friday and is being held without bail on a detainer from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In a court document, ICE said Onyango Obama had an earlier deportation or removal order.

His immigration status couldn't immediately be confirmed, but such orders are generally reserved for people living in the country illegally. A spokesman for ICE declined to comment on Onyango Obama's immigration case, and the White House had no comment.

Obama was charged with operating under the influence of alcohol, negligent operation of a motor vehicle and failure to yield the right of way.

Michael Rogers, a spokesman for Cleveland immigration attorney Margaret Wong, said Wong will represent Obama. He confirmed that Onyango Obama is the half-brother of Obama's father and the full-blooded brother of another relative, Zeituni Onyango, of Boston.

A Texas prison official says polygamist leader Warren Jeffs has been hospitalized after not eating or drinking enough since his recent conviction on child sexual assault charges.

Michelle Lyons with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice told The Associated Press on Monday that the head of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is in critical but stable condition.

Jeffs attorney Emily Detoto told the AP that Jeffs was taken Sunday night to East Texas Medical Center in Tyler. She says he "hasn't been feeling well" but wouldn't elaborate.

The 55-year-old was convicted earlier this month on charges that he sexually assaulted underage followers he took as spiritual brides.

Jeffs has been housed at the Powledge Unit outside Palestine, about 100 miles (160 kilometres) southeast of Dallas.

Source: The Canadian Press