Bravo, Narine back for T&T vs Windwards
Darren Bravo and Sunil Narine returns to the T&T national team, as they leave on Thursday to take on the Windward Islands in two T20 matches in Dominica.
The games are scheduled for September 6 and 7 and the team returns on September 8. Over the last weekend T&T drew a two-match rubber with their Guyanese counterparts in Guyana.
Narine and Bravo were both given time off to deal with personal stuff but returns to begin their preparations.
Making way for them are Nicholas Sookdeosingh and Imran Khan.
T&T is preparing for the Champions League T20 which starts later this month in India.
Manager of the team Omar Khan is happy with the preparations so far.
“So far things have gone well. We had two games on the weekend in Guyana and it was great to see players from both teams play with such intensity.
“We are hoping for more of the same this weekend when we play the Windwards.
“It was good to see the players gel together and begin this very important phase of the preparations.
“This is our last Champions League and the players are very focussed and committed to performing well.”
T&T Squad: Evin Lewis, Adrian Barath, Nicholas Sookdeosingh, Darren Bravo, Jason Mohammed, Denesh Ramdin, Rayad Emrit, Khesan Ottley, Nicholas Pooran, Ravi Rampaul, Sherwin Ganga, Sunil Narine, Navin Stewart, Shannon Gabriel and Samuel Badree.
Staff: Omar Khan (Manager), David Williams (Coach), Kelvin Williams (Assistant Coach), Oba Gulston (Physio) and Dinesh Mahabir (Video).
Windies name women’s squad
The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) has announced a 17-member West Indies Women’s squad to begin preparations for a series of One-day and Twenty20 International against England and New Zealand next month.
Right-handed batter Chinelle Henry is the only uncapped player in the squad and left-handed all-rounder Stacy Ann King has been recalled after missing recent engagements.
“Chinelle is a capable player and strikes the ball very nicely. We expect some good things from her in the future. She has been around the Jamaica team for a long time, but she is still very young,” said Chairman of the West Indies Selection Committee Clyde Butts.
Asafa/Sherone doping investigation stalled
The criminal doping investigation into former 100-meter world record-holder Asafa Powell, Jamaica teammate Sherone Simpson and their trainer has been delayed by bureaucratic problems.
Udine prosecutor Andrea Gondolo told The Associated Press on Tuesday that his office has been unable to contact the athletes to ask whether they want to observe the testing of substances sequestered during a police raid in July on their training base in northern Italy.
The athletes can observe the testing themselves or designate a lawyer to do so.
They have 20 days to respond once contacted.
"The problem has been finding an address to deliver the notification to see if they want to observe the tests, because some of the tests cannot be repeated," Gondolo said.
"But I think we should be able to move forward within a month."
If the athletes cannot be contacted, prosecutors could go to the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association instead.
The Canadian trainer, Christopher Xuereb, was already contacted.
Milton Samuda, a who represents Powell and Simpson, did not respond to emails or calls seeking comment.
Following the hotel raid in July in Lignano Sabbiadoro, where the Jamaicans have been training for years, the athletes and Xuereb were formally placed under criminal investigation for violating Italy's doping laws.
The raid came after it was announced that Powell and Simpson had tested positive for the banned stimulant oxilofrine at the Jamaican championships in June.
The athletes blamed Xuereb, their newly hired trainer, and said new supplements he provided caused the positive tests. Xuereb said he didn't give the sprinters performance-enhancing drugs and suggested he was a scapegoat.
Italy's doping laws include sections for use, administration of banned substances and importation of banned substances.
Administration and importation carry more severe sentences and therefore Xuereb risks harsher punishment, Gondolo said. He added the athletes do not risk prison time.
The confiscated substances appear to be from the United States, according to the containers they were found in, Gondolo said.
Powell and Simpson also risk bans from sports authorities. They have already stopped competing and missed last month's world championships in Moscow.
Source-AP
Australia's economic growth better than forecast
Australia has reported better-then-forecast growth numbers for the April to June quarter, boosted by gains in consumer spending.
Its gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 2.6% during the quarter, from a year earlier. Compared with the previous quarter, growth was 0.6%.
Most forecasts were for an annual growth closer to 2.5%.
Analysts said the data was likely to see the Australian central bank hold back on easing its policies further.
"This is probably a touch above what the Reserve Bank of Australia was expecting and this would decrease the probability of a near term rate cut," said Matthew Johnson, an interest rate strategist at UBS.
Australia's central bank, which has lowered borrowing costs to a record low in recent months, kept rates unchanged as it met on Tuesday.
Australia's economy, which enjoyed robust growth in recent years, has seen its growth rate slow of late.
One of the biggest drags has been the slowing demand for its natural resources such as iron ore.
The sector has been hurt by a decline in demand from countries such as China, triggering concerns that Australia's economic growth may dip further.
At the same time, other sectors of the economy have not picked up enough speed to offset the slowdown in mining.
Analysts said that while the latest numbers had helped allay some fears of a sharp slowdown, the economy was still under pressure.
Brian Redican, a senior economist at Macquarie Bank, said the latest numbers were a continuation of "this distinctly sub-trend growth that we've seen over the last nine months now".
"It doesn't suggest that the economy is falling into a hole yet, but there aren't really signs that we're going to break out of this rut either."
Oil rises as Obama gets support in Syria effort
Oil rose above US$108 a barrel yesterday as President Barack Obama won the support of the top Republican in Congress for US military intervention in Syria. House Speaker John Boehner said acting against Syria was something “the United States as a country needs to do.” Obama said yesterday that he’s confident Congress will authorise a military strike in Syria.
By midday, benchmark crude for October delivery was up 54 cents to $108.19 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Nymex floor trading was closed Monday because of Labour Day. Obama is trying to drum up support for military strikes against the regime of President Bashar Assad to respond to an attack in the Damascus suburbs last month that the US says killed at least 1,429 civilians. A vote could come once Congress returns from its summer break, which is scheduled to end September 9.
While Syria is not a major oil producer, it straddles a region that is. The possibility of a wider conflict, one that could interrupt production and shipping routes in the region, has pushed oil prices higher in the past week. Besides the uncertainty over developments in the Middle East, oil prices have been supported as well in recent days by stronger-than-expected manufacturing data from China and the European Union.
Brent, the benchmark for international crudes, was up 81 cents to $115.14 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange in London.
Source-AP
S&P says US lawsuit is 'retaliation' to ratings downgrade
Ratings agency Standard and Poor's (S&P) has claimed the lawsuit filed against it by the US Justice Department was "retaliation" against its decision to downgrade the US credit rating.
The agency was sued in February over its assessment of mortgage-backed securities before the financial crisis.
The suit alleged that S&P turned a blind eye to risks in the products, and gave them ratings that were too high.
The US government is seeking $5bn (£3bn) in penalties.
In a court filing on Tuesday, S&P, which had previously said the case was without merit, claimed that it was being sued in retaliation for its downgrade of the US credit rating in 2011.
S&P downgraded the US rating in August 2011 one notch from AAA to AA+, amid a standoff in Congress over whether to raise the country's borrowing limit.
It had cited concerns about budget deficits as the reason behind the downgrade.
"Only S&P Ratings downgraded the United States and only S&P Ratings has been sued by the United States," S&P said in the court filing.
The lawsuit is the first to be brought against a ratings agency for alleged wrongdoing connected to the financial crisis.
Olympus to be prosecuted by UK fraud agency
Japanese camera and medical equipment maker Olympus and its UK subsidiary Gyrus Group will be prosecuted by UK's Serious Fraud Office.
They have been charged with providing "misleading, false or deceptive" material in accounts for Gyrus Group.
Olympus's acquisition of Gyrus was one of the deals called into question as a $1.7bn (£1.1bn) accounting fraud came to light in 2011.
Three former executives have been given suspended jail terms over the scandal.
It is one of the biggest financial frauds in Japan's history.
Raghuram Rajan takes charge of Reserve Bank of India
A former International Monetary Fund chief economist is taking over as the head of India's central bank, as it works to revive the falling rupee.
Raghuram Rajan, 50, assumes the top job at the Reserve Bank of India on Wednesday.
He arrives at a time when the rupee has plunged nearly 20% since May and the economy is slowing.
The new bank chief, known for having predicted the 2008 global financial crisis, will replace D Subbarao.
Mr Rajan will also have to contend with India's current account deficit, a broad measure of trade, and the economy growing at its slowest pace in 10 years.
In the April-to-June quarter, the economy grew at a rate of 4.4%, compared with the same period in the previous year, the slowest quarterly expansion in four years.
On Tuesday Goldman Sachs cut its GDP growth forecast for India to 4% from 6%.
August also saw India's manufacturing sector shrink for the first time for four years.
Many believe Mr Rajan has raised expectations of adopting unconventional ways to revive the rupee and boost growth.
"Economic policymakers require an enormous dose of humility, openness to various alternatives (including the possibility that they might be wrong), and a willingness to experiment," Mr Rajan wrote in a column on the Project Syndicate website last month.
He has also said that "all options were on the table" to stabilise the currency.
Mr Rajan is a well-known academic and writer of a prize-winning book, Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy.
Rajeev Malik, a Singapore-based economist, says Mr Rajan's "rock star academic image could be a hindrance".
"That is because it has generated unrealistic hope that he has some magical prescription to fix our problems," he wrote in the Business Standard newspaper on Tuesday.
Source-BBC
Cleveland kidnapper Ariel Castro found hanged in cell
Ariel Castro, who kept women captive at his home in Cleveland, Ohio, has died after being found hanging in his cell.
Prison officials said he died in hospital late on Tuesday, after prison medical staff failed to revive him.
Castro, 53, held three women against their will for about a decade until May this year. He kept his victims chained up and raped them.
He was sentenced on 1 August to life imprisonment without parole plus 1,000 years. The house was demolished.
The former school bus driver abducted Michelle Knight, 32, Amanda Berry, 27, and Gina DeJesus, 23, from the Cleveland streets between 2002-04.
A spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, JoEllen Smith, said: "He was housed in protective custody which means he was in a cell by himself and rounds are required every 30 minutes at staggered intervals.
"Upon finding inmate Castro, prison medical staff began performing life saving measures. Shortly after he was transported to [the prison medical facility] where he was pronounced dead at 10:52 pm."
"A thorough review of this incident is under way," she added.
US Inaction on Syria Will Lead to Greater War says Kerry
Secretary of State John Kerry says he has no doubt that U.S. inaction on Syria will lead to a greater war and more use of chemical weapons.
Kerry spoke to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday, in an attempt to persuade lawmakers to back a military strike on Syria. He said Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has a lust for power that led him to drop poison gas on civilians outside Damascus last month.
President Barack Obama has said he will seek congressional approval before making any decision about attacking Syria. Kerry told senators a military strike against Syria is definitely in the U.S. national interest, but that doing nothing is what Iran, Hezbollah and North Korea are hoping for.
In response to questions from committee members, Kerry stressed there is no way any U.S. troops would go to Syria. He added it is up to the Syrian people to destroy the Assad regime.
The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, told the committee that Mr. Assad sees chemical weapons as just another part of his arsenal. Dempsey said the U.S. mission for Syria is to deter and degrade Mr. Assad's ability to use those weapons.
Secretary Kerry said it is beyond any reasonable doubt that the Assad regime used chemical weapons on civilians. He said there is solid evidence the military carefully prepared for the attack, and he called it common sense that the rebels were not responsible, as Syria's government has alleged.
Committee Chairman Robert Menendez, a Democrat, opened Tuesday's hearing by saying a vote on Syria is not a political decision by the Senate but a matter of what is best for U.S. national security.
Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner and Democrat Senate Leader Nancy Pelosi both say they back Mr. Obama.
But others in Congress say the president's goals for Syria are still unclear. They say past experience, including the Bush administration's insistence 10 years ago that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, makes them leery about taking military action.