A dummy US Hellfire missile was mistakenly shipped from Europe to Cuba in 2014, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.
The inert missile did not contain any explosives, the Journal reported, but there are concerns that Cuba could share the technology with potential US adversaries such as North Korea or Russia.
The Journal report was attributed to anonymous people familiar with the matter.
A US official with knowledge of the situation, who wasnt authorised to speak publicly on the matter and demanded anonymity, confirmed its veracity to the Associated Press (AP).
Related: US-Cuba thaw, one year later: historic breakthroughs, but when will they trickle down?
According to the defense department, the Hellfire is a laser-guided, air-to-surface missile that weighs about 45kg (100lb). It can be deployed from an attack helicopter such as the Apache or an unmanned drone such as the Predator. It is manufactured by Lockheed Martin.
The US official told the AP that Lockheed was authorised to export the dummy missile for a Nato training exercise. The official attributed the shipping error to Lockheeds freight forwarders, and said the US was working with Lockheed to get the device back.
The official said the US did not want any defense technology to remain in a proscribed country, whether that country can use it or not. The official said there is greater concern that Cuba could give more technically advanced countries access to the dummy.
According to the Journal report, the missile was properly shipped to Spain, where it was used in the training exercise. It was then taken on a somewhat roundabout journey through Spain, Germany and France before winding up at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris.
From there, it was supposed to have been shipped back to Florida; instead, it was loaded onto an Air France flight to Havana.
US officials have been urging the Cuban government to return the missile, the Journals sources said. The US and Cuba restored diplomatic relations in July 2015 after more than 50 years of hostility.
The Journal reported that the US is also investigating whether the missiles disappearance was a deliberate act of espionage.
Acceptance Speech by Mother Teresa Media Player at Nobelprize org Mother Teresa (Picture: Getty)
Mother Teresa is on the verge of being canonised by the Vatican.
Some might wonder why its taken this long after all, most of us have grown up with tales of her fight against poverty and her general air of goodness.
However, academics at the University of Montreal suggest things are not as they seem.
After analysis of a vast amount of papers about the woman born Anjez Gonxhe Bojaxhiu in Macedonia in August 1910, Serge Larive and Genevieve Chenard came to the conclusion that Blessed Teresa of Calcutta was anything but a saint, with her rather dubious way of caring for the sick, her questionable political contacts, her suspicious management of the enormous sums of money she received, and her overly dogmatic views regarding, in particular, abortion, contraception, and divorce.
Mother Teresa to be made a saint
They are far from the first to criticise the saint-in-waitings works.
Christopher Hitchens published The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practicein 1995 and to say he held negative views about his subject is an understatement, to say the least.
He wrote: she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan.
Where did that money, and all the other donations, go?
The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself and her order always refused to publish any audit.
But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?
So what other reasons are there to argue against this imminent sainthood?
Secret baptism of the dying
Mother Teresa believed it a duty to baptise the dying, regardless of their religious beliefs.
Susan Shields, a former member of the Missionaries of Charity, was quoted by Hitchins as saying: Sisters were to ask each person in danger of death if he wanted a ticket to heaven. An affirmative reply was to mean consent to baptism.
The sister was then to pretend that she was just cooling the patients head with a wet cloth, while in fact she was baptising him, saying quietly the necessary words.
Secrecy was important so that it would not come to be known that Mother Teresas sisters were baptising Hindus and Muslims.
Her perception of the poor
Mother Teresa apparently believed that suffering was a gift from G*d.
The problem is not a lack of money the Foundation created by Mother Teresa has raised hundreds of millions of dollars but rather a particular conception of suffering and death.
There is something beautiful in seeing the poor accept their lot, to suffer it like Christs Passion. The world gains much from their suffering, was her reply to criticism, cites Hitchens.
Nevertheless, when Mother Teresa required palliative care, she received it in a modern American hospital.
Mother Teresa blesses a child in 1993 (Picture: AFP/Getty)
Politics and use of charity funds
Aroup Chatterjees book Mother Teresa: The Final Verdictwill also make surprising reading for those who see the missionary as the epitome of goodness.
In it he explains that Mother Teresas friendship with Indira Gandhi and the Congress Party was widely believed to have been behind such assertions as People are happier. There are more jobs. There are no strikes.
This was after the suspension of civil liberties in 1975.
From the Montreal paper: Mother Teresa was generous with her prayers but rather miserly with her foundations millions when it came to humanitys suffering.
During numerous floods in India or following the explosion of a pesticide plant in Bhopal, she offered numerous prayers and medallions of the Virgin Mary but no direct or monetary aid.
On the other hand, she had no qualms about accepting the Legion of Honour and a grant from the Duvalier dictatorship in Haiti.
Millions of dollars were transferred to the MCOs various bank accounts, but most of the accounts were kept secret, Larive says.
Given the parsimonious management of Mother Teresas works, one may ask where the millions of dollars for the poorest of the poor have gone?
The dubious matter of the miracle
Quoting the Montreal paper again:
The miracle attributed to Mother Theresa was the healing of a woman, Monica Besra, who had been suffering from intense abdominal pain.
The woman testified that she was cured after a medallion blessed by Mother Theresa was placed on her abdomen.
Her doctors thought otherwise: the ovarian cyst and the tuberculosis from which she suffered were healed by the drugs they had given her.
The Vatican, nevertheless, concluded that it was a miracle.
Interestingly, Mother Teresa herself had issues with her own faith.
This from a posthumous collection of her personal papers (her request to have them destroyed after her death was roundly ignored). Emphasis is mine:
Lord, my G*d, you have thrown [me] away as unwanted unloved, she wrote in one missive.
I call, I cling, I want, and there is no one to answer, no, no one. Alone. Where is my faith? Even deep down right in there is nothing. I have no faith. I dare not utter the words and thoughts that crowd in my heart.
Some might say that Mother Teresa was simply following the tenets of her religious beliefs and this is a valid point, although one could argue that other religious figures have managed to do with it in a more sensitive fashion.
When I spoke with Catholic friends about writing this piece, they were already well aware of the issues surrounding the potential canonisation and suggested thatif they were to choose a candidate of their own it would be scar Romero, whose story is well worth investigating.
Even the Montreal academics admitted that If the extraordinary image of Mother Teresa conveyed in the collective imagination has encouraged humanitarian initiatives that are genuinely engaged with those crushed by poverty, we can only rejoice.
It is likely that she has inspired many humanitarian workers whose actions have truly relieved the suffering of the destitute and addressed the causes of poverty and isolation without being extolled by the media.
Nevertheless, the media coverage of Mother Teresa could have been a little more rigorous.
So Mother Teresas existence as an icon may well have led to others helping where it is needed, and that can only be a good thing.
But whether she is deserving of sainthood is another matter entirely.
Donald Trump Wins GOP Caucus On The Northern Mariana Islands
Donald Trump added another nine delegates to his arsenal early Tuesday morning by winning in the Northern Mariana Islands. Trump won the U.S. territory with 73 percent of the vote.
I encouraged CNMI GOP voters to come out and exercise their right and vote for their preferred presidential nominee. I am overwhelmed by the turnout and their support for my endorsement of Mr. Donald Trump. I thank all the voters for participating in this important process. The attention the CNMI has received this presidential cycle from all the candidates has truly shown that our votes matter,"Ralph Torres,governor of the Northern Mariana Islandssaid.
Washingtonians, get ready to walk, pedal or Uber it. Officials from the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authoritythats the agency that runs the buses and trains of the nations capital cityare about to close the citys metro system, second-busiest in the country, for 29 hours. Underground electrical cables caught fire Monday, and WMATA brass says they cant guarantee it wont happen again.
We cannot send trains out in this system knowing full well that something could go wrong, said Jack Evans, director of Metros board of directors, in a Tuesday afternoon press conference. We believe the most prudent thing is to close down the system, find it, and fix it.
Beginning at midnight, inspectors will fan out across 118 miles of track to inspect 600 jumper cables, which connect portions of the transit systems electrical third rail to the train tracks, for signs of wear that could allow moisture into the cable. Its not especially complicated, or new technology. Care must be taken to prevent damage by water, which may result in short circuits, the American Railway Engineering Association wrote about jumpersin 1917.
Deterioration of those cables caused a fire at the LEnfant Plaza station in February 2015 that killed a 61-year-old woman and injured 69 others. Later that year, after the National Transportation Safety Board stepped in, Metro inspected the cables and replaced 125 of them. The fire on Monday raised fears among Metro officials that maybe their inspection wasnt all it could have been.
Its happened twice in a year, said Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld (who took the job in November 2015). I cant wait for a third time. Making safety a priority, he said, sometimes means making tough, unpopular decisions.
And this is going to be pretty unpopular. The shutdown will affect more than 700,000 passengers in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia. Metro opened in 1976, and this is the first time the system has shut down for safetyapparently the first time any system of comparable size has shut down like this. But for many riders, it doesnt come as a shock.
Their dismay isnt limited to delays and crowds, those perpetual (and totally justifiable) complaints of the straphanger. In December 2015, the Federal Transit Administration ordered Metro to fix more than 200 safety issuessome dating back to 2008ranging from out-of-date fire extinguishers to derailments and collisions that the agency kept quiet. After last years fire, Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx moved safety enforcement authority from Metro to the Federal Transit Administration, and told the governors of Maryland and Virginia and mayor of DC to create a new Metro safety agency. That still hasnt happened, and Foxx said last month that he might withhold additional funds from the troubled system.
In 2015, Metros own safety report found a 70 percent increase in passengers getting doors slammed on them while trying to get out of the railcars, while employee injuries rose 30 percent over 2014. In the meantime, Metro ridership has dropped 10 percent since 2010 as Washingtonians have abandoned underground transit for cars and an increasingly popular bike share system.
The shutdown is embarrassing and seriously inconvenient, but perhaps not a calamity. Cities have coped with similar disruptions to their transportation networks. Los Angeles closed a chunk of the 405 freeway in July 2011 and again in September 2012, prompting fears of a carmageddon. Instead, so many people stayed home, traffic was better than average. San Francisco and Oakland have closed the Bay Bridge for weekend-long stretches several times in the past decade to accommodate construction. When a major strike crippled New Yorks transit system in 2005, city officials converted busy streets into temporary HOV lanes. Cars with fewer than four occupants werent allowed into Manhattan south of 96th street.
So, think of it as a snow day? Student absences and tardiness from school will be excused. Federal employeesa big chunk of the DC working populationare allowed to telecommute or take unscheduled leave. Stay home. Carpool. Take the bus. (Metro will add extra service). Metro may need serious repairsto its operations and infrastructure as well as its budget and reputationbut at least its riders will survive.
RALEIGH- Republican businessman Donald Trump and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz both drew support of North Carolina voters upset about the country"s direction, while more than half of the Democrats casting ballots Tuesday in the state"s other presidential primary favored a continuation of President Barack Obama"s policies, according to preliminary exit poll results.
Democrats who wanted Obama"s policies continued were strongly behind Hillary Clinton, while those who wanted more liberal policies preferred Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, according to the early data from exit polling conducted by Edison Research for The Associated Press and television networks.
About 3 in 10 North Carolina Democratic voters were black, and about 8 in 10 of them were supporting Clinton, the initial results showed. Almost 7 in 10 Republican voters were over 45 and tended to back Trump. About 6 in 10 Democrats were over 45 and they favored Clinton.
Here are more details of what exit polls found out about voters in the Tar Heel State:
CLINTON, SANDERS: WHO SUPPORTS THEM?
Clinton was being backed by a majority of women, voters age 45 and over, and those in households making more than $100,000 or under $30,000, preliminary results showed.
Sanders was being supported by white men, independents, a majority of voters under 30, and those who cared most about income inequality.
Those wanting a candidate who would bring change or who "tells it like it is" favored Trump. The billionaire businessman also was strongest among older voters, men, those without a college degree, those who said they are somewhat conservative, and those in households making less than $50,000 a year. Also supportive of Trump: those who say the most important issue facing the country is immigration.
Cruz was strongest among those who are very conservative, those in households making between $50,000 and $99,000 a year and those who want a candidate who shares their values.
Born-again Christians were dividing about evenly between Trump and Cruz.
Nine out of 10 Republicans said they were very worried or somewhat worried about the direction of the U.S. economy in the coming years. Nearly 4 in 10 Republicans said the economy was the most important issue facing the country, ahead of terrorism, government spending or immigration.
Just one out of 20 Republicans said they were satisfied or enthusiastic about how the federal government is working. Those who said they were angry about the government favored Trump.
Democrats very worried about the direction of the economy numbered only about 7 in 10.
Six in 10 Republicans said they believe foreign trade is more likely to cost U.S. jobs. Those voters favored Trump. Voters who said international trade mostly created jobs appeared more likely to support Cruz.
About four in 10 GOP voters said they"d consider voting for a third-party candidate if the presidential choice in November was between Trump and Clinton. They were most likely to favor Cruz.
Six in 10 of those who said they had previously voted in a Democratic primary were supporting Clinton, while two-thirds of new primary voters were supporting Sanders.
Democrats said they would be satisfied if either Sanders or Clinton won their party"s nomination. Two-thirds said Clinton"s positions on the liberal-conservative spectrum were about right, while just over half said the same about Sanders.
Clinton was backed by voters who said they care most about having a candidate who can win in November or who has the right experience, Sanders by those looking for a candidate who is honest.
The survey was conducted for The Associated Press and television networks by Edison Research as voters left their polling places at 35 randomly selected sites in North Carolina. Preliminary results include interviews with 1,744 Democratic primary voters, including 342 absentee or early voters who were interviewed by phone before election day, and with 1,550 Republican primary voters, including 234 absentee or early voters interviewed by phone. The results have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.
AP News Survey Specialist Emily Swanson contributed to this report from Washington, D.C.
Scranton St. Patrick"s Day Parade Fight 2016 MASHANTUCKET, Conn.--(Business Wire)--FoxwoodsResort Casino has reported slot revenue of $36.2 million for the month of February 2016. This figure is up 14.7 percent compared to $31.6 million in February of 2015. Handle for the month was $441.3 million, up 15.3 percent from the $382.9 million wagered in the same month in 2015.
Foxwoods contribution to the Connecticut Special Revenue Fund in February 2016 is $9.2 million, bringing the cumulative contribution to the state since Foxwoods opened in 1992 to over $3.8 billion.
Foxwoods brought the heat in February with a dynamic entertainment lineup bolstered by top comedians Paula Poundstone, Jim Norton and Bill Burr as well as the multi-talented William Shatner. The fun continued with mesmerizing performances by international pop star Enrique Iglesias and American singer, song writer and actor Adam Lambert. Not to be outdone, hip-hop sensation Future rocked Foxwoods state-of-the-art Grand Theater for two unforgettable nights. Disneys FANTASIA: Live in Concert brought the family fun with an assist from the Czech National Symphony Orchestra. Hard rock fixture-turned-country-star Aaron Lewis and beloved comedy band, The Dan Band rounded out Foxwoods musical guests for the month. February ended on a high note as Lion Fight 28 returned to the property for a night of world class Muay Thai action.
Elsewhere on property, Foxwoods and celebrity chef Robert Irvine introduced the second annual Savor, A celebration of Wine, Food & Spirits with a private press event at VUE 24, Foxwoods recently opened fine dining experience.
To kick off March, Foxwoods unveiled its brand new gourmet pastry shop, Cake by Franck. Helmed by the propertys renowned Executive Pastry Chef Franck Iglesias, Cake by Franck offers classic New England and seasonal desserts with a twist. The unprecedented reveals did not stop there, as Foxwoods announced FoxPerx, the propertys brand new real-time slots bonusing program. Guests can learn more about FoxPerx and sign up for rewards by visiting https://www.foxwoods.com/fox-perx/
This month, the Fox and Grand Theaters have already played host to uproarious comedians Piff the Magic Dragon, Bob Saget and Kathy Griffin as well as iconic pop punk rockers, Fall Out Boy. The dynamic entertainment line-up continues with upcoming appearances from comedians Tracy Morgan and David Cross, country singer Steve Daggett and R&B 90s Remix 3 with Blackstreet, Dru Hill and Jagged Edge.
If youre looking to celebrate St. Patricks Day in style, don your green attire and join the Get Shamrocked pub crawl at 10 of Foxwoods participating bars on March 17. Participants can redeem their commemorative coaster for $17 off a tattoo of their choice at King Ink through the end of the month. For more details, visit https://www.foxwoods.com/st-patricks-2016/
About FoxwoodsResort Casino
Foxwoods Resort Casino is the premier resort destination in the Northeast. As the largest resort casino in North America, Foxwoods offers a vast array of gaming in six casinos; AAA Four-Diamond hotels, restaurants from gourmet to quick service, world-renowned spas, award-winning golf, state-of-the-art theaters, and exclusive retailers. Perfect for both recreation and business, Foxwoods provides modern and versatile convention and meeting space to infuse new life into any meeting or event. Foxwoods Resort Casino is owned and operated by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation. For a comprehensive look at Foxwoods Resort Casino and Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation visit Foxwoods.com.
About the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation
The Mashantucket Pequots are a native Algonquin people in southeastern Connecticut who endured centuries of conflict and survival on the oldest continuously occupied reservation in the U.S. (est. 1666). As the first native people within the continental United States to survive attempted genocidal massacre by European immigrants (1637), the Mashantucket Pequots have an unprecedented story of restoration, which is exhibited at their world-class Museum and Research Center (www.pequotmuseum.org). For more information, visit www.mashantucket.com.
View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160315005302/en/
"Sausage Party" - Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg discuss the project"s origin Ever wondered what happens to the food in a supermarket when the lights go out? No, obviously not, nobody has ever thought about that. Nobody, that is, except Seth Rogen, who has now released the first image from his upcoming star-studded animation Sausage Party, which follows the exploits of a hot dog sausage named Barry (Michael Cera) and features the voices of Ed Norton, Salma Hayek, Paul Rudd, James Franco and more.
He falls from a basket and is lost in the supermarket, so enlists the help of his anthropomorphised pals two hotdogs voiced by Jonah Hill and Workaholics star Anders Holm, along with a sexy hotdog bun voiced by Kristen Wiig in a bid to return to his aisle. He"s desperate to be back for the American holiday extravaganza of July 4th (Independence Day), when he"s sure to be bought. Why is this so important to Barry? Doesn"t he know he"s gonna eaten?
Readers, he does not. Barry has been fed a quasi-religious line about life outside the supermarket, and he anticipates some kind of transcendence, believing something close to heaven awaits him beyond the car park. According to his randy hot dog sausage mates, this afterlife is a paradise in which they can pork as many sexy hot dog buns as they can handle.
This is what first image looks like:
It kinda looks like a Pixar movie, right? Right! Speaking on shock jock Howard Stern"s radio show last year, Rogen explained: "We thought it would be funny to do an R-rated [meaning under-17-year-olds must be accompanied to the cinema by a grown-up] Pixar-style movie. It"s f*****g filthy! It"s really, really, really dirty, but it looks like a Pixar movie."
You had us at "f*****g filthy", Seth. He promised Stern bucket-loads of s*x and violence; a truly horrifying thought. Imagine a feature-length film of the dude from the Peperami adverts s******g his way through a supermarket. Or, as Rogen put it: "There"s violence, it gets very sexual... There is a food orgy in the movie one of the most filthy things I"ve ever seen in my life."
Ever the interrogative interviewer, Stern had one question that, in retrospect, should have been on all our minds: will it just be hot dogs and hot dog buns having s*x with each other, or, like, could a cucumber also theoretically have s*x with a hot dog bun in this movie? Rogen"s response was thorough: "We even explore inter-food s*x in the movie. We explore all of that." He then laughed that throaty, dirty laugh that Seth Rogen does, and we knew that Sausage Party will be a watershed moment in cinema.
According to Rogen, the movie has been made for "under $30m", a snip when compared to the likes of Pixar movies Up ($175m) and Brave ($185 million), but it"s still not to be sniffed at. Can we take a moment to appreciate how weird and great it is that some of the biggest movie stars in the world have worked on a passion project as f*****g stupid as this? Apparently Rogen began work on the script while feeling creatively unfulfilled on the set of the 2011 action comedy The Green Hornet, which he cowrote.
Even his pal Sacha Baron Cohen has said Sausage Party is insane: Sausage Party appalled [Baron Cohen] in some ways. We brought him to a screening where we watched the hand-drawn version of the movie and he could not believe it.: That is the single craziest f*****g thing Ive seen in my whole life. He said: Just know youve gotten successful enough to make the craziest thing Ive ever seen in my life."
And that"s from the bloke who had an enormous man sit on his face in Borat. So, as will become clear when a work-on progress is aired at SXSW festival in Texas on March 14, this isn"t going to be Toy Story. Jesus, this film is going to be even more outrageous than the offensively s**t Cars 2 , though admittedly for very different reasons.
