Washington - Regulators on Friday shut down small banks in Florida, Michigan, Wisconsin and California, lifting to 18 the number of bank failures this year. The weak economy and bad debt brought down 157 banks nationwide in 2010.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. seized the banks: Sunshine State Community Bank of Port Orange, Fla., with $125.5 million in assets; Peoples State Bank, based in Hamtramck, Mich., with $390.5 million in assets; Badger State Bank of Cassville, Wis., with $83.8 million in assets; and Canyon National Bank, based in Palm Springs, Calif., with $210.9 million in assets.
Miami-based Premier American Bank agreed to assume the assets and deposits of Sunshine State Community Bank. First Michigan Bank, based in Troy, Mich., is acquiring the assets and deposits of Peoples State Bank. Royal Bank, based in Elroy, Wis., is assuming the assets and deposits of Badger State Bank. Pacific Premier Bank, based in Costa Mesa, Calif., is assuming those of Canyon National Bank.
In addition, the FDIC and First Michigan Bank agreed to share losses on $331 million of Peoples State Bank's loans and other assets.
The failure of Sunshine State Community Bank is expected to cost the deposit insurance fund $30 million; that of Peoples State Bank is expected to cost $87.4 million; that of Badger State Bank, $17.5 million; Canyon National Bank, $10 million.
Society's Child
© AP
The attacks began after an argument between the suspect and his mother
The attacks began after an argument between the suspect and his mother
The man, alleged to be Ukrainian-born Maksim Gelman, 23, was armed with five knives when he went on a stabbing spree early on Friday, officials said.
Four other people were knifed but survived the attacks.
Mr Gelman was finally arrested on a train on Saturday morning after an all-night manhunt.
Charges against him are pending.
"It's so horrendous and bizarre. We have no reason to know why he did this," said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.
He said had not recalled seeing "anything like this" in the decades he had worked for the New York police department.
Swiss No campaign poster against banning firearms
It means that the voters decided during the referendum to retain the current system, which allows army-issued weapons to be kept at home.
Supporters of the tighter curbs wanted to have weapons kept in armouries and demanded stricter checks on gun owners.
Opponents said the move would undermine trust in the army. The final result of the vote is expected soon.
Near-complete results show at least 14 out of 26 Swiss cantons rejected the proposal in Sunday's vote.
© Massimo Di Nonno/Getty Images
Supporters of Silvio Berlusconi protest in Milan against the charges of bribery, corruption and under-age prostitution against the prime minister.
Supporters of Silvio Berlusconi protest in Milan against the charges of bribery, corruption and under-age prostitution against the prime minister.
A beleaguered Silvio Berlusconi is due to meet the president, Giorgio Napolitano, for urgent talks on Friday as tensions grew between his supporters and opponents over the prospect of his being committed to trial on sex charges.
The prime minister claimed in an interview he was the target of an attempt to oust him by undemocratic means. But any hopes he may have had of getting his position endorsed by the head of state were dashed when Napolitano pointedly remarked that Italy's constitution included "the guarantees for a fair trial".
Demonstrations are to be held on Sunday in 257 Italian and foreign cities, including London and New York, in defense of the dignity of Italy's women. The slogan for the rallies comes from the title of Primo Levi's novel of wartime resistance, If Not Now, When?
Followers of the prime minister are planning to take to the streets of Milan on Saturday. On Thursday about 100 Berlusconi supporters, led by a junior minister in his rightwing government, staged a protest outside the courthouse in Milan where Berlusconi may be tried. Some carried placards reading "Silvio must resist, resist, resist".
© Rocky Sawyer 2010
Julian Assange
Julian Assange
Swedish authorities want to extradite the whistleblower for alleged sex offences but his lawyer argued the comments made this week could damage his chance of a fair trial.
Speaking on the final day of his extradition hearing, Geoffrey Robertson QC, told Belmarsh Magistrates' Court in south east London that Sweden's prime minister had made an attack on Assange and his defence counsel.
He said: "He has effectively been denounced as an enemy of the people."
Prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt's remarks were said to include claims that Assange and his lawyers had been "condescending and damaging to Sweden" and to have implied that they thought women's rights were worthless.
Mr Robertson said: "In a small country...it has created a toxic atmosphere, media are reporting it and it is a basis for comment.
© Schreiber/Ericson/AP
Former WikiLeaks spokesman Daniel Domscheit-Berg will launch a rival site to Julian Assange's.
Former WikiLeaks spokesman Daniel Domscheit-Berg will launch a rival site to Julian Assange's.
Kristinn Hrafnsson, a spokesman for WikiLeaks, confirmed that the organisation intends to sue Daniel Domscheit-Berg, a German transparency campaigner who - until his departure last September - was one of the few public faces of the secretive whistle-blowing platform.
Mr. Domscheit-Berg, who is launching his own whistle-blowing websites OpenLeaks, has written a warts and all memoir of his time at WikiLeaks in which he accuses Mr Assange of being an irresponsible and autocratic leader who once threatened to kill him.
"Inside WikiLeaks", which went on sale in Germany today and will be published in Britain next week, is one of just a number of recent memoirs from people who have worked with Mr Assange that portray the WikiLeaks founder in a poor light.
In some of the most damaging passages, Mr Domscheit-Berg describes his former colleague as an intensely paranoid man who began travelling with bodyguards, ruled over his followers as an "emperor" and had a particular fondness for young women, money and power.
© Getty Images
Plans to add fluoride to tap water in Southampton were endorsed by a judge yesterday
Plans to add fluoride to tap water in Southampton were endorsed by a judge yesterday
Mr Justice Holman rejected claims that the decision-making process was defective and dismissed a legal challenge to the scheme in Southampton.
Hampshire council and three quarters of residents oppose the plans drawn up by the strategic health authority. But dentists say the scheme will cut tooth decay in children.
Just 10 per cent of England's water is fluoridated, covering 5.5million people, mainly in the North East and West Midlands. The last fluoridation scheme was introduced in 1985.
Refusing a claim for judicial review by Southampton mother-of-three Geraldine Milner, the judge said there had been no illegality.
'It is important to stress that our democratic Parliament decided long ago that water can, in certain circumstances, be fluoridated,' he added.
This is not looking good folks
China's state media reported Feb 7 that the country's major wheat producing provinces in the north were facing their worst drought in 60 years. It also reported Feb 8 that Shandong Province, a cornerstone of Chinese grain production, was bracing for its worst drought in 200 years unless substantial precipitation came by the end of Feb'11.
But with $2.85 trillion in foreign exchange reserves, nearly three times that of Japan, the country with the world's second-largest reserves, China has ample buying power to prevent any serious food shortages, noted the nytimes.com report.
"They can buy whatever they need to buy, and they can outbid anyone," it quoted Robert S. Zeigler, the director general of the International Rice Research Institute in Los Baños, in the Philippines, as saying. That will obviously mean serious trouble for other developing food-importing countries.
© Reuters
Out of favour: Bolivian President Evo Morales is under fire over rising prices, with protesters throwing dynamite at a march in Oruro yesterday
Out of favour: Bolivian President Evo Morales is under fire over rising prices, with protesters throwing dynamite at a march in Oruro yesterday
Mr Morales was due to speak on the anniversary of a colonial uprising in Oruro but canceled plans to participate in a march yesterday after demonstrations against rising food prices and shortages.
There were also protests in the Bolivian capital of La Paz, and the cities of Santa Cruz and Cochabamba.
The Bolivian populace are angry over a near doubling in the price of sugar after the government lifted subsidies.
The president's popularity has plummeted since he tried to lift subsidies on gasoline, flour and sugar in December.
He subsequently abandoned the effort - but did remove price controls on sugar.
As he prepared to deliver a speech in Oruro yesterday, the capital of his home province, protesters set off explosions to voice their unhappiness at the price rises.
Food convoys are delivering emergency aid to desperate people - in Devon.
A charity that normally helps starving orphans in Romania and Bulgaria is on a relief mercy mission in Okehampton after the town's two biggest employers closed.
People queued down the street outside a food distribution centre yesterday.
Local councillor Christine Marsh said: "This is a dire emergency. Families don't have any food or money to buy food."
The town of 7,000 people was rocked when a pie factory closed suddenly a week ago with the loss of 260 jobs. Workers had not been paid since mid-January.
Days earlier a large dairy had shut, chopping 70 jobs.
Dad-of-six Karl Jansz, 47, who lost his pie factory job, said: "I worked there for 25 years. My wife also worked there. We were left in a mess."
A charity that normally helps starving orphans in Romania and Bulgaria is on a relief mercy mission in Okehampton after the town's two biggest employers closed.
People queued down the street outside a food distribution centre yesterday.
Local councillor Christine Marsh said: "This is a dire emergency. Families don't have any food or money to buy food."
The town of 7,000 people was rocked when a pie factory closed suddenly a week ago with the loss of 260 jobs. Workers had not been paid since mid-January.
Days earlier a large dairy had shut, chopping 70 jobs.
Dad-of-six Karl Jansz, 47, who lost his pie factory job, said: "I worked there for 25 years. My wife also worked there. We were left in a mess."
