US Swine Flu Cases Rise

The US now has 2,532 confirmed cases of swine flu, after a jump in figures in recent days, officials say.

The cases – up around 600 since Friday – mean the US has now surpassed Mexico as the most affected nation.

But the total of three confirmed deaths is far lower than in Mexico where 48 people are known to have died.

In Mexico, people worked over the weekend to clean and disinfect primary schools which are due to resume classes after a two-week break.

Allen Stanford Was ‘US Government Informer’

   A (BBC) Panorama investigation has suggested that Sir Allen was shielded from an earlier inquiry into his activities because he co-operated with a US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) attempt to track money laundering by Latin American drug cartels.

US officials closed down his banking activities in February, alleging a vast fraud centred on his Antigua-based offshore bank. Sir Allen, 59, previously most famous as the sponsor of the Twenty20 cricket tournament, has vowed to clear his name.

No criminal charges have yet been filed but the US Securities and Exchange Commission described his activities as a “massive Ponzi scheme”.

A former law enforcement official said in February that the FBI and other agencies started looking into Sir Allen’s possible involvement in money-laundering in the 1990s but could not find sufficient evidence to charge him.

Opium Poppy Crop Set To Break Records This Year

   Iranian police officials say drug production in Afghanistan has had a 40-fold increase since the US led invasion of the country in 2001.

Afghanistan’s opium poppy crop is set to break all records this year, as grim reports by Iranian sources showed that drug production has reached a new height in the land-locked country.

Instability in the wake of the US invasion is widely believed to be the main reason behind Afghanistan’s booming market for drug production and opium trade.

UN’s Ban Ki Moon Comes To The Defence Of Israel

   A United Nations inquiry concluded that Israel’s military forces carried out direct and intentional strikes on its premises during the assault on Gaza earlier this year. Israel was therefore responsible for the deaths and injuries of UN personnel and civilians, as well as extensive damage to its property.

The inquiry, led by Ian Martin, a former secretary general of Amnesty International, found that the Israel Defence Force (IDF) was “involved in varying degrees of negligence or recklessness with regard to United Nations premises and to the safety of United Nations staff and other civilians within those premises, with consequent deaths, injuries, and extensive physical damage and loss of property.”

This included:

• The deaths of three young men killed by a single IDF missile strike at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) Asma school in Gaza City.