Children killed as 'monster truck' crashes into crowd

A “monster” truck, outfitted with tractor-sized wheels, has crashed into a crowd during a show in the Netherlands, killing two people and injuring at least a dozen.
Video footage of the incident (which veiwers may find distressing)shows the truck veering off course after driving over the top of a row of cars, then knocking down a guardrail and driving into a group of onlookers.
Dutch national broadcaster NOS says the mayor of the eastern city of Haaksbergen, Hans Gerritsen, reports that two children were killed in the incident and 15 people injured.

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White House intruder Omar Gonzalez, 42, had 800 rounds of ammunition, court told

White House Security Break Spurs Review

THE troubled Iraq war veteran who scaled the White House fence had a dangerous fixation on the president, stockpiling weapons and ammunition and carrying a map to the White House stuffed in a Bible during an earlier arrest, a federal prosecutor said on Monday. 

When he was arrested, Omar Jose Gonzalez had two hatchets, a machete and 800 rounds of ammunition in his car parked near the White House, said Assistant US Attorney David Mudd.
A judge granted the government’s request to hold Gonzalez, 42, for 10 days without bail.
He faces up to 10 years in prison.
“Mr Gonzalez’s preoccupation with the White House and accumulation of large amounts of ammunition in an apparently short period of time renders him a danger to the president,” Mudd said.
There was no indication he had a gun on Friday night, however, when he was arrested after evading the outer layer of security around the US presidential residence and making it inside carrying a folding knife with a 3.5-inch blade.
The Copperas Cove, Texas, man served two tours of duty in Iraq with the US Army.
Described as “homeless and penniless,” he was assigned a public defender who declined an opportunity to seek a psychiatric assessment of his client.
WHITE HOUSE INTRUDER: Watch how it unfolded

White House intruder

Family members said Gonzalez, an Army combat veteran, was wounded by an improvised bomb in Iraq and struggled with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder after returning to Texas. He became increasingly paranoid, they said, hiding guns behind every door in the house and saying that people were watching him and trying to poison him.
Gonzalez complained bitterly about his treatment at the now-scandal-plagued Department of Veterans Affairs, according to his family. They said his disability claim was stuck in a backlog for more than a year. Eventually he became homeless and lived in his 1996 Ford Bronco.
By this summer, according to authorities, Gonzalez had begun to focus on the White House and the president.
On July 19, a Virginia State Police trooper attempted to stop him for reckless driving in the Bronco. Gonzalez refused to pull over, police said, and led them on a 20-mile pursuit on Interstate 81 in southwest Virginia. He was arrested on felony charges of possession of a sawed-off shotgun and attempting to elude police.
Ten other weapons were found in his vehicle, including a sniper rifle and five handguns, Virginia police records show. Tucked inside a Bible was a map with a hand-drawn circle around the George Washington Masonic National Memorial in Alexandria and “a line drawn to the White House,” authorities said.
Gonzalez was held in New River Regional Jail and released a week later on $5000 bail, according to a jail spokesman. He said records did not indicate who paid it. Police held the guns pending the outcome of the case, which is not yet resolved.
On August 25, Gonzalez was stopped again, this time by the Secret Service, while walking along the southern fence of the White House with a hatchet in his rear waistband. He gave agents permission to search his Bronco, where they found camping gear and two dogs, but no guns or ammunition, Mudd said. He was not charged.

Increased patrols ... Secret Service officers on the perimeter of the White House after the security breach. Source: AP

The latest incident happened a few minutes after US president Barack Obama and his daughters had left the White House by helicopter for a weekend at his official retreat at Camp David in Maryland.
Obama is “concerned” about the incident, officials said Monday. The US Secret Service is reviewing new security measures inside and outside the White House fence after the man made it all the way inside the presidential mansion on Friday before being tackled.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Obama had been repeatedly briefed on the massive security breach, and had expressed disquiet about the incident.
“His family lives in the White House, and so he is obviously concerned by the incident that occurred on Friday evening,” Mr Earnest said.
The agency’s chief, Julia Pierson, who launched an investigation into the security failure, also ordered increased patrols and surveillance around the fence line of the White House complex.
US media reported the Secret Service was considering setting up checkpoints for tourists and other visitors several blocks from the building, rather than on the grounds.
The fence jumper caused a rare evacuation of much of the staff and journalists on the White House grounds.
Less than 24 hours later, another security scare took place when Kevin Carr, 19, tried to enter the area with his car despite barricades.
After his arrest, Gonzalez told a Security Service agent “he was concerned that the atmosphere was collapsing and needed to get the information to the president of the United States so that he could get the word out to the people”, according to an affidavit.

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Could Putin be in Obama's 'broad coalition' against ISIS?

Sometimes geography gets in the way of power politics. Just when you thought that Ukraine was miles away from Syria, bang -- you find out that they're actually bordering each other.

Confused? I bet you are. But here's the deal: the civil war in Ukraine, which most sensible people tend to classify these days as a direct stand-off between Russia and the U.S., is now having a direct impact on the conflict in Syria.

The so-called "Islamic State" (ISIS) -- it's better to keep it in quotation marks and add "so-called," so as not to give these terrorists legitimacy -- has emerged as a force that has created a so-called caliphate and vows to spread its borders way beyond Syria and Iraq, where it is currently operating.

Alexander Nekrassov

Russia is supporting President Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria, while America and its allies are backing the anti-government rebels there -- some of whom have at some point developed into ISIS and started to get all sorts of crazy ideas.

Since it is Assad's troops who are actually doing the fighting on the ground against ISIS and since it so happens that this new menace is now the number one target of America, it follows that Ukraine is very close to Syria when it comes to international power-play.

This week, out of the blue, the already-disbanded Ukrainian parliament voted to provide special status for Donetsk and Lugansk -- the two rebellious regions in eastern Ukraine -- offering them autonomy for three years and allowing them to hold their own elections for their local authorities, in addition to offering an amnesty for people who have not been directly involved in fighting Ukrainian government troops.

Initially this was received with caution in Moscow -- especially given what has been going on for the past nine months in Ukraine -- but if that is not a signal from Barack Obama that he is ready to play ball with Russia, then I don't know what is.

The view in Moscow is that the Obama Administration is telling the Kremlin that it needs help in dealing with ISIS. But as it can't just say it publicly, it is using Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to do the honors.

Obama: No ground troops to combat ISIS

Peshmerga battle ISIS with aid from above

De Gucht: Russia not pleased with pact

American troops arrive in Ukraine

I am told that the initial reaction in the Kremlin to Obama's plan to fight ISIS was not exactly a kind one. The suspicion was that Washington, together with its allies, was planning to use the campaign against ISIS in Syria to dispose of Assad through the back door, so to speak. An anti-terrorist operation targeted at ISIS "gets out of control" and all sorts of wrong targets get hit, like, say, Syrian army positions. One thing leads to another and, lo and behold, we have Assad going down the route of Colonel Gadhafi, and Syria descends into the same kind of chaos that is now gripping Libya. But after the "border" between Ukraine and Syria emerged all of a sudden, that attitude is changing.

But the broad anti-ISIS coalition that Obama is hoping to build is not exactly shaping up as planned. Turkey is openly hesitant to get involved, and the Saudis are not exactly over the moon with the whole concept. So Obama's best bet to get the ball rolling, as it is now seen from Moscow, would be to discreetly work with Russia. Although it may be tempting for Washington to overthrow Assad, such a move could backfire on the White House, giving ISIS a boost instead of a kick and turning those pesky U.S. midterm elections into a total nightmare for the Democrats. (Incidentally, Russian experts believe that Obama will lose the Senate and will being to resemble a late-term Bill Clinton, who improved his golf swing dramatically in his last years in office.) So it made sense for Washington to wave the white flag -- albeit a very small one -- at the expense of the Ukrainian regime in Kiev, in order to signal to the Kremlin that it is time to do some business together.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has his own plan for Syria. Sergey Lavrov, his top diplomat, has made a point of stressing the point that without the Syrian regime on board, any attempt to defeat ISIS won't work. A similar scenario to the one that had been used to prevent the U.S. bombing Syria last year is shaping up nicely in Moscow. Russia will ask the U.S. to cooperate with Assad in the battle against ISIS, without the Syrian President having to fear that he might be bumped off along the way. The hawks in Washington might not like this script, but hey, stranger things have happened in power politics in the past.

What will Putin ask for in return for helping to defeat ISIS? That's the question that is probably being mulled over in the White House as you read this. Well, it just so happens that sorting out the mess in eastern Ukraine is Putin's personal project -- just like Syria was last year. He will want some sort of guarantee that Kiev will stick to the new deal about the special status of Donetsk and Lugansk which should help calm things down in the eastern provinces, at least until next spring. That would be a deal that the Kremlin would consider worthwhile.

But the funniest thing of all is that the "broad coalition" Obama proposed may never see the light of day -- and at that point, the only countries that will actually be able to help the U.S. fight ISIS would be Iraq, Iran, Syria and Russia, with the latter mostly providing the weaponry to the Syrians. Which is not really all that surprising if you consider how closely Ukraine and Syria are intertwined.

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Jordan Finds Energy Sources in Unlikely Places

When the oil gusher lottery came to the Middle East, Jordan seemed to have drawn a losing ticket. And now that some of the neighbors it depended on for fuel supplies, like Iraq and Egypt, have convulsed with political or sectarian strife, Jordan is frantically looking for other sources — and finding them in unexpected places.This month, Jordan, a crucial yet energy-poor Western ally, announced a landmark 15-year deal to import vast amounts of natural gas from Israel. The plan, worth $15 billion, would make Israel Jordan’s largest gas supplier,according to the Israeli business daily Globes. It represents a remarkable economic tie for two countries with a history of tension, and reflects just how badly Jordan needs energy.

It is “potentially an enormous deal, but one that makes Jordan partially dependent on Israel, which is politically very problematic for Jordan in both domestic and regional politics,” Curtis Ryan, an expert on Jordanian politics at Appalachian State University in North Carolina, said in an email.

Plenty of uncertainties remain in the Israeli deal, and further approvals are needed from both countries. For the agreement to succeed, the pipeline route must be secure and the political leadership in Jordan must remain stable, said Amy Myers Jaffe, executive director of energy and sustainability at the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Davis. Already, the deal has infuriated some members of the Jordanian Parliament, although power largely resides with the king.

The plan, Dr. Ryan said, is “a difficult political sell in Jordanian politics under any circumstances — but especially right now,” in the wake of Israel’s strikes on the Gaza Strip.

Israel once shared Jordan’s position as an energy-poor nation (the joke in Israel was that Moses led his people to one of the few places in the region without oil). But with the discovery in 2010 of a vast offshore natural gas field, Israel has been looking for export opportunities.

Because Jordan has neighbors — which also include Saudi Arabia and Iraq — that are awash in oil or natural gas, a conspiracy theory of sorts has developed that Jordan is hiding its oil, according to Zu’bi Al-Zu’bi, dean of the business school at the University of Jordan.

Jordan imports about 95 percent of its energy, according to Dr. Al-Zu’bi and other experts. In recent years, its natural gas imports had come mostly from Egypt (before that, Jordan had relied heavily on cheap oil from Saddam Hussein’s Iraq). Repeated attacks on the Egyptian pipeline following the 2011 ouster of President Hosni Mubarak during the Arab Spring uprisings forced Jordan to look for alternatives.

The pipeline attacks were “devastating for Jordan’s economy,” Dr. Ryan said. The nation “was already in an economic downturn and deeply in debt, and the constant sabotage of the pipeline effectively turned off Jordan’s supply dozens of times.”

Compounding the challenge, the country’s population has soared, in part because of refugees from Syria, Iraq and other nations. International institutions have leaned on Jordan to cut energy subsidies even as the costs of reliable sources of energy have risen. The Jordanian government has increased energy prices for consumers, but that is never a popular move.

Continue reading the main story

Continue reading the main story

Jordan’s electricity is now generated mostly from a mix of Saudi oil and Egyptian gas, Dr. Al-Zu’bi said. Jordan is “in a very vulnerable situation,” he added, likening it to Lebanon, another relatively energy-poor country, which is trying to import liquefied natural gas.

As it tries to rapidly diversify its energy mix, Jordan hopes — controversially— to build its first nuclear power plant, which could draw from a reserve of underground uranium ore close to the Israeli border. Jordan is also looking at renewable sources like solar energy, an abundant resource in the desert nation.

“Jordan would be well placed to make great use of both solar and wind power, but needs the internal push and the external support to make that really happen,” Dr. Ryan said Jordan has set a target of getting 7 percent of its energy from renewable sources by next year, and 10 percent by 2020, and international groups are eager for the nation to push ahead. Last week, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development approved a $30 million loan to support an energy-efficient system for heating and cooling buildings at a commercial center in Amman, the Jordanian capital. Last year, the International Finance Corporation, an arm of the World Bank, led a project to obtain $221 million in financing for the construction of Jordan’s first privately owned wind farm.

It also turns out that the conspiracy theorists are right, and that Jordan has been hiding its oil: Shale rock containing vast quantities of oil underlies much of the country, but extracting it is likely to be technologically challenging and expensive. Nevertheless, Jordan wants in the coming years to build a power plant that runs on shale oil And Jordan will always be looking for new suppliers. This month, it held talks with Cyprus about importing gas Jordan’s predicament shows the importance for a country not to be “over reliant on a particular type of energy source,” Dr. Ryan said. Given the region’s volatility, he added, countries should also avoid being “over reliant on any one country as a supplier.”

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United State increased non-immigrant visa application fees

NEW YORK: United State increased non-immigrant visa application fees in various categories from $400 to $2,350. 

But the US government decreased visa fees in some categories also to attract investors and businessmen. 

Foreign Ministry of the country said that the fee increased due to rising costs for providing visa services the new fees, which was charged worldwide, were based on a recent assessment of service costs. 

Sources said that the fee for K or Fiance (e) visas, a non-immigrant visa category processed by the Immigrant Visa Unit, will increase from $240 to $265.

Changes in new immigrant visa processing fees include:

- Immediate relative and family preference applications: $230 to $325

- Employment-based applications: $405 to $345

- Other immigrant visa applications: $220 to $205

- Determining returning resident status: $275 to $180

- Waiver of two-year residency requirement: $215 to $120

- Affidavit of support review, when reviewed domestically: $88 to $120.

Besides, the fee for E visas for treaty-traders and treaty-investors was fixed at $250 which was $270. 

All non immigrant visa applicants’ fees will be effected from September 12

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