• New York State votes for strict gun law

    New York governor Andrew Cuomo yesterday signed into law a sweeping gun-control bill. The bill expands a ban on assault weapons, limits the size of magazines, includes measures to keep guns away from the mentally ill, and make penalties stiffer for using a gun in the commission of a crime. Cuomo signed the bill shortly after the State Assembly approved it by a 104-43 vote on the second day of the 2013 legislative session.

  • American Taliban wins court fight to allow Muslims group prayer in prison

    John Walker Lindh, an American who joined the Taliban forces in Afghanistan, has won a legal fight which will allow him and his fellow Muslim inmates to gather for their daily prayers. The judge said that by not allowing Muslim prisoners group prayers, but allowing other activities such as board or card games, the warden was violating the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

  • Police depts. reviews policy on retaining data from license plate readers

    License plate readers (LPRs) have been used more and more by law enforcement agencies across the United States, but as they gain popularity in law enforcement, they have become the subject of debate, and concern, in many local governments.

  • Saudi Arabia defends beheading

    Saudi Arabia defended its execution of a Sri Lankan maid for the death of an infant she was watching. The Saudi authorities also had harsh words for the international criticism of her beheading. Human rights advocates, pointing out that the maid was 17 years old (the Saudis say she was 21), and the Saudi Arabia violated international conventions by executing her

  • France gains international backing, faces complicated situation on the ground

    France on Monday received a unanimous support from all members of the UN Security Council for the military action French forces have initiated last Friday against Islamists in Mali. On the ground, the situation is more complicated. The Islamists were driven out of one town south of the demarcation line between north and South Mali, but on Monday they managed to send another column south toward the town of Diabaly, on the western side of the Niger River, located 250 miles from the capital Bamako. French general admitted that the Islamists rebels are better-equipped and better-organized than initial estimates indicated. France faces a choice: send French ground troops to fight the Islamists in the north, or wait until late summer for a reconstructed Mali army and a West Africa multi-national force to conduct the ground war necessary to evict the Islamists from north Mali.

  • Obama on Wednesday will outline executive action to curb gun violence

    President Obama on Wednesday will outline steps the administration can take without congressional approval to curb gun violence in the United States. Vice President Joe Biden told congressional leaders that there are nineteen separate actions the administration can take by using executive power. The president will emphasize that these executive measures are not an alternative to legislative action, and he will also announce his plan to push through Congress the most comprehensive reform of gun laws in two decades.

  • Egypt’s president Morsi used blatantly anti-Semitic language in 2010 speech, TV interview

    President Mohamed Morsi of Egypt used blatantly anti-Semitic language in a speech and in a TV interview – both in 2010, when he was a top official of the Muslim Brotherhood movement. The speech and the TV interview were video-taped, and just came to light.

  • French air strikes begin campaign to evict Islamists from Mali

    France sent its planes to bomb al Qaeda-affiliated Islamist groups in Mali after hundreds of members of these groups began to move from the north-east portion of Mali, which they have controlled since last April, down south, into the remaining part of Mali. French fighter jets have pounded insurgent training camps, arms and oil depots as the French defense ministry confirmed reports of dozens of Islamist deaths. Islamist militants were fleeing Timbuktu, Gao, and other towns in northern Mali. A coalition of Western African countries is sending the 1,000 troops to Mali today – soon to be followed by 2,300 more – to begin ground operations against the Islamists. France has asked the United States for surveillance drones to help track the fleeing Islamic militants.

  • New York to make state’s strict gun laws even stricter

    New York State is nearing an agreement on a proposal to put some of the toughest gun-control laws into effect. The laws include expanding the definition of banned assault weapons, limiting magazines to seven rounds, and requiring background checks on people who buy ammunition

  • Neutralizing the effects of lethal chemical agents

    Organophosphorus agents (OPs) are used both in farm pesticides, and by terrorists and rogue states. About 200,000 people die each year across the world from organophosphorus agents (OP) poisoning, through occupational exposure, unintentional use, and misuse, mostly in developing countries like India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka and through deliberate terrorist activities. OPs include compounds like Tabun, which was developed in 1936 by German scientists during the Second World War, Sarin, Soman, Cyclosarin, VX, and VR. Researchers develop an enzyme treatment which could neutralize the effects of OPs.

  • Airborne pods tracing nuclear bomb’s origins

    If a nuclear device were to unexpectedly detonate anywhere on Earth, the ensuing effort to find out who made the weapon probably would be led by aircraft rapidly collecting airborne radioactive particles for  analysis; relatively inexpensive UAVs, equipped with radiation sensors and specialized debris-samplers, could fly right down the throat of telltale radiation over a broad range of altitudes without exposing a human crew to hazards

  • Biden hints at executive action on gun violence

    Vice President Biden on Wednesday said the White House could use executive orders to advance gun control measures. Biden held a series of meetings Wednesday in the White Housed on the topic of gun violence and the ways to reduce it; in a meeting with gun-safety and victims groups, Biden said: “There are executive orders, executive action that can be taken,” adding: “we haven’t decided what that is yet”

  • Instant DNA analysis worries privacy advocates

    In the past, it took weeks to analyze a person’s DNA, but with new technology it can take less than a day, and in most cases less than two hours; Rapid DNA analyzers can process a DN sample in less than ninety minutes; these machines, the size of a household printer, are now being marketed to local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies around the country; privacy advocates worry

  • Shoring up Long Island’s natural shore defenses against future storms

    Sand and other coarse-grained sediments are vital to the naturally occurring barrier systems which dissipate storm surges, protect coastal residences, and shelter biologically diverse estuaries and ecosystems; a team of researchers is conducting marine geophysical surveys of the seafloor and shallow subsurface to assess the health of the offshore barrier system which protects the New York Harbor and southwestern Long Island region against damage from future storms

  • New York State power plants showing their age

    New York State could face power plant closings in the near future as a result of updated environmental regulations and the fact that plants in the state are outdated and inefficient; a recent report concluded that New York’s coal and nuclear power plants, as well as steam and turbine plants that run on oil or gas, are on average older than others around the country