Diamond in royal crown is ours

Diamond in royal crown is ours - British Prime Minister David Cameron says a giant diamond his country forced India to hand over in the colonial era that was set in a royal crown will not be returned.

Speaking on the third and final day of a visit to India aimed at drumming up trade and investment, Cameron ruled out handing back the 105-carat Koh-i-Noor diamond, now on display in the Tower of London. The diamond had been set in the crown of the current Queen Elizabeth's late mother.

Reuters/Reuters - Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron visits the holy Sikh shrine of Golden temple in Amritsar February 20, 2013. REUTERS/Munish Sharma

One of the world's largest diamonds, some Indians - including independence leader Mahatma Gandhi's grandson - have demanded its return to atone for Britain's colonial past.

"I don't think that's the right approach," Cameron told reporters on Wednesday after becoming the first serving British prime minister to voice regret about one of the bloodiest episodes in colonial India, a massacre of unarmed civilians in the city of Amritsar in 1919.

"It is the same question with the Elgin Marbles," he said, referring to the classical Greek marble sculptures that Athens has long demanded be given back.

"The right answer is for the British Museum and other cultural institutions to do exactly what they do, which is to link up with other institutions around the world to make sure that the things which we have and look after so well are properly shared with people around the world.

"I certainly don't believe in 'returnism', as it were. I don't think that's sensible."

Britain's then colonial governor-general of India arranged for the huge diamond to be presented to Queen Victoria in 1850.

If Kate Middleton, the wife of Prince William, who is second in line to the throne, eventually becomes queen consort she will don the crown holding the diamond on official occasions.

When Elizabeth II made a state visit to India to mark the 50th anniversary of India's independence from Britain in 1997, many Indians demanded the return of the diamond.

Cameron is keen to tap into India's economic rise, but says he is anxious to focus on the present and future rather than "reach back" into the past. ( Reuters )

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Is Russia's Orthodox Church privileged or persecuted?

Is Russia's Orthodox Church privileged or persecuted? - The Russian Orthodox Church's ties with the government are facing push back. Church leaders have decried recent incidents, including a punk band's protest inside a church.

Tens of thousands of people attended special services across Russia yesterday – about 50,000 in Moscow alone – to pray in defense of the Russian Orthodox Church, which insists that it is facing an unprecedented attack from irreligious social forces that are out to destroy its reputation and undermine the nation's faith.

The Moscow prayer meeting at the cavernous Cathedral of Christ the Savior, a stone's throw from the Kremlin, was led by Patriarch Kirill, whose lifestyle, formerly off-limits, has become the subject of public scrutiny and a roiling controversy over his alleged job perks and wealth.

Kirill told the huge crowd that the church had to respond to a spate of sacrilegious challenges that began in February when a women's punk rock group entered the same cathedral – which was almost empty at the time – and performed an obscenity-laced "punk prayer" to protest the church's alleged support for the electoral campaign of Vladimir Putin.

"We are under attack by persecutors," Kirill said. "The danger is in the very fact that blasphemy, derision of the sacred is put forth as a lawful expression of human freedom which must be protected in a modern society."

Three members of the band were arrested, and could face up to seven years in prison for the impromptu performance. The incident, and the subsequent trial of the women, has blown open a long-simmering debate about the social role of the church, its allegedly cozy links with the Kremlin, and the way Russia's "anti-extremist" laws are often invoked to protect the church from criticism or artistic commentary that would pass largely unnoticed in most Western societies.

"This incident with the punk group opened the floodgates of public discussion about the church, and it has taken forms that are new for Russia," says Viktor Michaelson, a political scientist with the Russian State University for the Humanities in Moscow. "People on both sides feel deeply engaged in it. Liberal and secular people feel one way, religious people feel another way. It's far from over."

Liberal critics say the punk band, provocatively named Pussy Riot, violated no laws at all, and that the only reason the women now face stiff jail sentences is because the church is able to get its way in Russian courts and wants a tough example set in order to deter any repetition.

"Pussy Riot performed in an empty church. They left peacefully when a priest ordered them to go. The only violation they committed was of a church rule that no woman can penetrate the altar space," says Yevgeny Ikhlov, an expert with For Human Rights, a Moscow-based public movement. "People understand these women have been imprisoned for purely political reasons. This is about the church splitting society to prove it is stronger, has more followers than supporters of a secular state do. In fact, the church is behaving as part of a repressive state machine."

Father Vsevolod Chaplin, a leading church spokesman, denies the church has any influence over the outcome of the trial of the punk rock group and he does not personally favor tough punishment for it. But he adds that "the feelings of religious believers must be protected…. The law must make certain that this sort of desecration is not repeated."

Mr. Chaplin argues that Western attitudes, which take a lenient view of "blasphemous" artistic expressions, are wrong and not suitable for Russia. "We survived mass desecrations in Soviet times, and it's clear that [the atheism] of Soviet leaders contributed to the collapse of the USSR," he says. "The West is wrong to allow actions that cast down public morality. . . Rules protecting sacred objects and places must be strict. Such crimes are extremely dangerous because they can lead to a breakdown in public order."

Since the punk rock incident, according to Kirill, there has been a string of "hooligan attacks" on priests and churches, including one case in the northern Russian town of Veliky Ustug, where a man allegedly chopped up 30 icons with an axe, and another in the southern town of Nevinnomyssk, where a priest was assaulted and an altar desecrated.

Critics allege that religious leaders are really upset about growing public criticism of the church and recent scrutiny of the lavish lifestyles of top church officials, including Kirill.

Though the Russian government has quietly handed back to the church vast amounts of land, property, and artifacts formerly held by state museums, the Russian media recently gave unexpectedly critical coverage to a decision that would give half of a functioning Moscow-area children's hospital to the church for inclusion in a monastery.

The press also ran embarrassing stories this winter about Patriarch Kirill's court battle with former health minister Yury Shevchenko over an allegedly botched renovation of Kirill's sumptuous downtown Moscow apartment, which resulted in Mr. Shevchenko having to pay the Patriarch nearly $700,000 in damages. For most Russians, who still inhabit cramped little Soviet-era flats, the revelations about the scale and sheer luxury of Kirill's private accommodations were eye-popping.

"These revelations in the media are viewed by believers as part of an orchestrated campaign against the church," says Mr. Michaelson. "For many Russians, the church is much more than just a political institution, and they feel very insulted by this [media attention]."

Perhaps most painful – because it was largely self-inflicted – was a blogger's allegation that Kirill owned a $40,000 Breguet watch, a claim that the Patriarch initially denied. Then bloggers found a photo of Kirill wearing the watch on an official church website. The timepiece was subsequently airbrushed out of the photo by a church technician. It was a sloppy job – while Kirill's wrist appeared clean, a clear reflection of the watch remained in the polished oak table and the retouched picture went viral.

"All this activity, with the church trying to mobilize its parishioners to support it, is not about the [punk rock] case, but something much larger," says Alexei Makarkin, deputy director of the independent Center for Political Technologies in Moscow.

"The Russian Orthodox Church is terrified that there will be a real process of secularization here, such as has happened in Europe. It's not impressed with the results the Catholic Church has obtained in Europe, by compromising with civil society and embracing more tolerance. The Russian Church wants to preserve its historic identity, side by side with the Russian state, in which it supports the state and the state supports it. It doesn't want to embrace any change, or accept any new trends. Increasingly, it sees the modern, or liberal part of society as its adversary," Mr. Makarkin says. ( Christian Science Monitor )

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Arrest in 54-year-old murder mystery

Arrest in 54-year-old murder mystery — Charles "Chuck" Ridulph always assumed the person who stole his little sister from the neighborhood corner where she played and dumped her body in a wooded stretch some 100 miles away was a trucker or passing stranger — surely not anyone from the hometown he remembers as one big, friendly playground.

And, after more than a half century passed since her death, he assumed the culprit also had died or was in prison for some other crime.

On Saturday, he said he was stunned by the news that a one-time neighbor had been charged in the kidnapping and killing that captured national attention, including that of the president and FBI chief. Prosecutors in bucolic Sycamore, a city of 15,000 that's home to a yearly pumpkin festival, charged a former police officer Friday in the 1957 abduction of 7-year-old Maria Ridulph after an ex-girlfriend's discovery of an unused train ticket blew a hole in his alibi.

Jack Daniel McCullough, 71, has been held in Seattle on $3 million bail. A judge overseeing a Saturday court appearance for him said he had been taken to a regional trauma center but did not elaborate. She rescheduled his bail hearing for 12:30 p.m. Monday.

The grave site of Maria Ridulph at Elmwood Cemetery is shown in Sycamore, Ill., on Saturday, July 2, 2011. DeKalb County prosecutors charged Jack Daniel McCullough, 71, on Friday with murdering Ridulph, a 7-year-old Illinois girl who was last seen playing with a friend near her home in Sycamore, about 50 miles west of Chicago in 1957. (AP Photo/ Barbara Rodriguez)

"I just can't believe that after all these years they'd be able to find this guy," Chuck Ridulph told The Associated Press at his duplex in Sycamore, about 50 miles west of Chicago.

A 65-year-old minister who mainly serves his area's senior citizens, Ridulph once shared a bedroom with his sister and already has his headstone placed on a burial plot next to her grave. With McCullough's arrest, he worries about a drawn-out legal process that will dredge up bad memories but also perhaps answer some nagging, stomach-churning questions about what happened to the little girl who loved to play dress up.

"It's in my every thought, even in my dreams," he said of his sister's death. "It was just like it was yesterday. It comes up all the time in conversation."

Sycamore Police Chief Donald Thomas was reluctant to discuss the case when found at home Saturday. But he said, "we believe we know who did it. We believe we have a strong case."

His department's breakthrough was a long time coming.

Maria disappeared Dec. 3, 1957, while doing what kids in Sycamore did then — playing. Maria's friend, Kathy Chapman, who was 8 at the time, recalled that she and Maria were under a corner streetlight when a young man she knew as "Johnny" offered them a piggyback ride. Chapman, now 61 and living in St. Charles, Ill., told the AP she ran home to get mittens and that when she returned, Maria and the man were gone.

"She was my best friend," Chapman told the AP on Saturday. "We played every day. We were always together."

The search for Maria grew to involve more than 1,000 law enforcement officers and numerous other community members, ultimately catching the eye of President Dwight D. Eisenhower and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, who requested daily updates.

"Things never went back to normal," Chapman said. "It was always a struggle. I didn't have a normal childhood after that."

Christmas came and went, with a pogo stick wrapped as a gift for Maria remaining unopened, her brother remembered. Then in April 1958, two people foraging for mushrooms found her remains.

Police suspected McCullough, who lived less than two blocks from the Ridulphs and who fit the description of the man said to have approached the girls, Thomas said Friday. But McCullough seemed to have an alibi, claiming he took the train from Rockford to Chicago the day of the abduction.

His story fell apart last year after investigators reinterviewed a woman who dated him in 1957 and asked her to search through some personal items, the Seattle Times reported, citing court documents. She found an unused train ticket from Rockford to Chicago dated the day the girl went missing.

"Once his alibi crumbled, we found about a dozen other facts that helped us build our case," Thomas said.

The Times reported investigators also determined a collect phone call McCullough purportedly made to his then-girlfriend from Chicago actually came from his Sycamore home the day Maria vanished — and he gave a ride to a relative when he should have been on the train.

Chapman said police never showed her a photo of McCullough in the days and months after Maria was kidnapped. But in September of last year, she said investigators came to her with a photo of a teenage McCullough. She identified him as the "Johnny" who approached her and Maria the night her friend vanished. At the time, McCullough's name was John Tessier.

Chapman was shocked to learn the case was still being investigated. She said she had received information some years before about it being closed.

When she got the news that McCullough was charged, she said she was "just ecstatic, could not be happier."

"We've been waiting a long, long time for this," said Chapman, who has three children and three grandchildren.

By Saturday, word of McCullough's arrest had swept throughout Sycamore, its main street adorned by American flags tethered to parking meters and lined by mom-and-pop shops. The prospect of reliving one of the most upsetting moments in the town's history during a trial was already weighing on Dick Larson, a rural mail carrier who went to school with Chuck Ridulph.

"It breaks my heart to think we have to go through this again. This is 54 years ago. It just brings back a whole river flow of memories," the 65-year-old said before crying.

He doesn't believe a conviction will bring closure or help the town heal.

"That's a standard way of thinking, that there's justice and closure," he said. "The people who go through it, they deal with it forever." ( Associated Press )

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How to Evaluate a Job Offer

How to Evaluate a Job Offer - Choosing the right job when you have a number of offers is a very taxing decision. There will a number of reasons why you should be taking each of those jobs, and your choice changes every minute.

We make that decision easier for you by bringing you two human resource consultants who give you the criteria for evaluating a job offer.

Will you profit?

You want to make sure that the salary is good enough for the amount of experience and qualifications that you have. Compare yourself to others in the same profession and position. Try negotiating the salary if you have reasons to demand a higher salary. Also, make sure the company is giving you at least a 25 to 30 per cent hike.


Reaching the top

Will the new job give you scope to grow? "First, check out the kind of responsibilities the manager above you has. If there is a significant amount of difference you want to take the job because you will have the opportunity to grow bigger in the company," says Suresh Goel, an HR consultant.


CV matters

The new job should add a good deal of weight to your resume. According to HR consultant Adarsh Shetty, a job adds value to you if it presents a number of challenges and lets you assume a number of roles. "You should be able to present your work as an achievement," he adds.


Moving to a new city?

A new job may take you to another city or even another country. "The right option here depends on your priorities," says Goel. If you would rather give up a better job in another city so that you can live with your family, then do it.


Brand name

"If a big brand is making a job offer, you don't want to ignore it," says Shetty. Sure, you get more responsibilities in smaller organisations, but a brand name adds sheen to your resume. There's a lot to learn from others when you join a big organisation.

Obviously, the one criterion you don't want to miss is whether you will love your job. If you don't like your job, our pointers won't make a very big difference. Be sure you'll like the new job and then re-read this article. ( idiva.com )

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Porn Industry Wants To See Bin Laden's Porn Stash

Porn Industry Wants To See Bin Laden's Porn Stash - Politics makes strange bedfellows indeed -- especially when pornography is involved.

A lawsuit by the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch that is demanding President Obama release photos of Osama Bin Laden is gaining an unlikely ally from the porn industry press.

Ever since word got out that Bin Laden kept a secret porn stash at his compound in Pakistan, the adult industry trade publication XBIZ has been wanting to find out exactly which films were in his collection.

"Will we ever find out the studios, video titles, directors or genres of the films Bid Laden's alleged to have possessed?" pondered XBIZ's Rhett Pardon. "The answer is maybe."

The maybe depends on the success of Judicial Watch's suit, which, according to the National Journal, requests "all photographs and/or video" taken from bin Laden's compound during the raid.

"If the FOIA lawsuit is granted, nearly all information relative to Bid Laden's porn stash, as well as all other details of his compound and belongings, could be released," Pardon said.

Judicial Watch filed its FOIA request to the Department of Defense May 3 and filed an identical request last week, the Atlantic Wire reported. Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton believes that Obama's desire to not "spike the football" is not a reason to withhold basic information about this historically important raid.

Experts like Scott Hodes, a former Justice Department lawyer in the office of information and privacy, believe Judicial Watch's suit runs the risk of being swiftly dismissed.

However, the possibility that the terrorist leader may have been watching them perform is definitely arousing the interest of porn actresses like Amber Peach.

"I have no interest in, say, seeing Bin Laden's death photo, but I have a morbid curiosity in knowing what films he was watching," Peach told AOL Weird News. "I'd like to know if he watched older or newer films, and even if I was in any of the films."

Peach, who canvassed door-to-door for Obama in 2008, won't speculate on what adult genres Bin Laden watched, and says she isn't surprised at all that he watched porn.

"It's typical that hardcore religious leaders are often watching in porn in private," she said.

Actress Joanna Angel, who also owns Burning Angel, which specializes in alt-porn featuring punkish women with tattoos, is also curious -- even though she doubts Bin Laden appreciated her work.

"I have a feeling he wasn't watching my films," she said. "Although I'd be oddly flattered if he was. You see, I own my own company -- and it's small. So to know I could reach someone without an internet connection in Pakistan would mean I was really good at marketing."

Dave Cummings, who started his porn career at the age of 54 after serving in the Army as a Lieutenant Colonel, believes the porn stash is probably a lower priority than the other information found in the compound, but says knowing the titles does have value for intelligence officials.

"Even though the porn might have been merely for masturbatory purposes, or possibly used to review for potentially tempting martyrs to fantasy about what 'virgins' might look like, it's a piece of the intel and just might provide insight and value into the mindset of the jihadist planners," Cummings said, before adding a caveat. "Keep in mind that Arab culture and religion also comes into play, and the analysts need to relate findings to those aspects." ( aol.com )

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