Two a penny

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BREAKING NEWS:
A man who shot his friend dead at a dinner party has been found not guilty of murder or manslaughter.

Sobbing and screaming was heard in theHigh Court at Aucklandwhen the jury found Alan Christopher Paul Gundry, 30,not guilty of the murder or manslaughter of Gene Patrick Atkins, 28.

Earlier, the jury heardthat Gundry,terrified for his young family, had only seconds to decide whether to shoot his friend with a pig-hunting rifle.

The jury had acceptedGundry’s defence that he killed Atkins in self-defence.

Both men had been friends for years and had spent January 12 this year eating and drinking at Gundry’s home.

Atkinshad goneberserk atGundry’s home after a fight with his girlfriend, Sarah Jane Dean, the court heard. They had gone home and he had thrown her belongings out of his house.

But during the evening Mr Atkins had become upset with his girlfriend.

Gundry’s lawyer, Graeme Newell, told the High Court at Auckland his client had been forced to shoot Mr Atkins in an act of self-defence. She then fled to Gundry’s, and Mr Atkins followed, intending to confront her.

One partygoer had been left semi-conscious in a pool of blood after being assaulted by Mr Atkins, while Gundry’s partner, Nicole MacDonald, was held over the top of a set of stairs.

Mr Newell said five people, including Gundry’s partner, had been attacked in the accused’s house that night, all in a short space of time.

“Should a person who has been attacked or seen others attacked wait until they too are the victim of a serious assault?

“If he wasn’t acting defensively, why would he let off two rounds in his own home when his nine-month-old, his five-year-old and his partner were upstairs?

“He didn’t want to do that, he didn’t want to fire shots into his own house.

Gundry was confronted by a dire threat and had to take “instant and decisive” action to protect himself and his family, Mr Newell said.

The court was told Mr Atkins had a history of violence, including several assaults on his girlfriend and a road-rage incident.”

Gundry was a peaceful man with no history of violence and no reason to kill his friend, Mr Newell said. The charge came after Mr Atkins allegedly glassed a man in the face at an Auckland nightclub.

Mr Newell told the court that at the time of his death Mr Atkins had also been awaiting trial on a charge of grievous bodily harm.

But Crown prosecutor Kevin Glubb said Gundry’s decision to shoot Mr Atkins was unacceptable and completely excessive. The injuries were so severe the man lost sight in one eye.

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REUTERS – French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s 23 year-old son is in line to head the development agency for La Defense business district in Paris, the agency’s outgoing boss said on Thursday, sparking opposition charges of nepotism.

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Jean Sarkozy, a law student married to the heiress of a retail empire, is currently a local councillor in the wealthy suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine where his father had been mayor.MsoNormalTable
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Jean Sarkozy is a candidate, he will be named director, representative of the board, and he can therefore become president, Devedjian, a government minister and a close associate of President Sarkozy told radio Europe 1.

He is now also be posed to take over as president of EPAD, the public agency in charge of developing La Defense, from Patrick Devedjian, who is leaving his post as he has reached the 65-year age ceiling for the job.

La Defense, a skyscraper-filled zone of banks and corporate headquarters just outside central Paris, is one of the main business areas of the French capital and the government hopes to develop it into a rival for the City of London financial district.

In souls nobly born valour does not depend upon age, Devedjian added, quoting the 17th century play, El Cid. .

Socialist parliamentarian Michele Delaunay decried the young Sarkozy’s candidature as a form of nepotism and provocation and pointed out that he had not even finished his degree.

French magazine Le Point reported on its website on Wednesday that Jean Sarkozy was likely to secure the board’s support on Thursday, paving the way for election to the board on December 4.

Jean Sarkozy – Nicolas Sarkozy – Paris

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The father of Lower Hutt schoolgirl Karla Cardno, who was brutally raped, tortured and murdered 20 years ago, is due to go on trial today on sex crimes against an underage girl.

Gary John Duffin and his wife Sharyn Lee Hills face five sex offence charges including sexual violation, and rape, as well as 10 counts of supplying a Class C drug to a minor.The offences are alleged to have happened between May 3 and December 31, 1991.Two of the sex charges allege indecent assault on a girl aged between 12 and 16.The pair appealed to have their names suppressed as a result of the risk their case would attract strong media attention due to Duffin being Karla Cardno’s natural father.Their trial is due to begin at the High Court in Wellington earlier today.However, Court of Appeal judge Justice David Baragwanath said in his ruling released in June, there was no basis in which name suppression could be justified and “since eventual publication was unavoidable there is no purpose in deferring it”.They also argued both were suffering medical conditions and name publication would result in significant stress. .Karla Cardno was 13 when she was kidnapped by Paul Joseph Dally in 1989.Dally was sentenced to life imprisonment and was denied parole last year, with the Parole Board ruling that he was a medium- to high-risk of reoffending.

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Labour says the Government is paying 39 of its Beehive staff more than $100,000 per year – close toly a quarter of the total 161 on the payroll.

Internal affairs spokesman Chris Hipkins said figures obtained under the Official Information Act showed that in June this year, annual salaries totalled $13,008,803. “In addition, over $165,000 has also been spent on temporary communications staff since November 2008. .”When you factor in the extra money the Government has spent on purchase advisors and communications consultants, it becomes quite clear they are spending more on staffing the Beehive than Labour did,” he said.”Mr Hipkins said the previous Labour government had 162 Beehive staff in June last year, for an annual cost of $13,319,768, but only 16 earned more than $100,000.”

.”This is yet another example of the National Party looking for loopholes to feather its own nest at the taxpayers’ expense

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AFP – Japan clothes giant Uniqlo, which opens a flagship store in the heart of Paris on Thursday, is aiming for up to 10 more in the world’s fashion capital as it takes on competitors such as Gap, H &amp M and Zara.

Tadashi Yanai, the billionaire president of Fast Retailing, which owns Uniqlo, told he aimed to open five to 10 big shops in Paris, where he had originally planned to launch as far back as 2007 or 2008 but it takes a long time to get authorisation. .

The cheap chic brand popular with designer-conscious Japanese youth currently has a store in an office district on the fringes of the capital, and Yanai set no date for the opening of new stores. The next high-profile launch is Moscow in spring 2010.

Similar stores have already opened in New York and London.

No cost seemed to be spared in the run-up to the Paris launch, with ads on city buses and the underground and even Paris bakers selling the traditional baguette in paper bags announcing the Tokyo to Paris launch. There are currently 875 Uniqlo stores worldwide, 761 of them in Japan.

H &amp M and Zara just sell fashion.

Referring to its European competitors H &amp M from Sweden and and Zara from Spain, whose lines sell like hot cakes and whose stores too are close to the new 2,000-square-metre (-yard) shop, Yanai said I think there is a lot of room for Uniqlo to muscle into the market.

Our philosophy, he said, is that a shirt, jacket or sweater are just spare parts which an individual combines to express their personality. We are different, we are offering high quality clothing, added Yanai, who according to Forbes magazine is Japan’s richest man.

He added: It is up to us to offer products that are sufficiently attractive to seduce customers, citing high-tech items such as clothes made of a fine fabric that gives off heat or a feather-light coat weighing 270 grams (about 10 ounces). That is why we seek to sell very basic but very high quality clothes.

For the Paris launch, customers are being offered cashmeres at less than 40 euros and men’s jeans under 10 euros.

Uniqlo, known for high-quality basics such as affordable cashmeres with quintessentially Japanese craftsmanship, manufactures its clothes mostly in Asia, in China, Indonesia, Vietnam and Bangladesh.

consumers – fashion – France – Paris
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We are the only company in the world able to offer products of this quality at low cost, Yanai said

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AFP – France’s public deficit will grow to a record 8.2 percent of GDP this year and 8.75 percent next year.5 in 2010, according to the government’s budget on Wednesday, based on expected growth of 0.

Under the eurozone stability pact, member states are supposed to keep their deficits under three percent, but most are far above this as public spending explodes and tax revenue falls during the crisis.

France is edging out of a recession caused by last year’s global financial collapse, but the government vowed to continue stimulus spending, and warned that deficit levels will not begin to fall until 2011.

Among the fiscal measures announced in the budget were a green carbon tax on households and businesses, and cuts in local business taxes.

France’s public debt will soar to 84 percent of national output in 2010, up from 68 percent at the end of 2008 and well above the theoretical 60 percent limit set when France and its partners launched the single currency.

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&raquo Special Report on France&#039s trial of the decade
&raquo Who&#039s who in the trial
&raquo How a finance trial turned into a major political scandal
&raquo A glossary of terms in the Clearstream saga
&raquo From Ben Barka to Elf, justice turns a blind eye to political elites
A key defendant in the Clearstream affair trial, Imad Lahoud, will take the stand in the Paris criminal court this Tuesday after he was granted a one-day leave to attend the Jewish religious holiday of Yom Kippur. .

In last week hearing, the two defendants traded accusations about the list falsification.

Although the list appears to have transited on Lahoud computer, it remains unclear whether he forged it on his own initiative or at the request of Gergorin. Lahoud said he was only acting on behalf of his former employer, while Jean-Louis Gergorin claimed he was misled by the computer expert.

Dubbed France trial of the decade, the Clearstream affair has been cast as a showdown between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Dominique de Villepin, a former prime minister, who stands accused of plotting to discredit Sarkozy in the build-up to the 2007 presidential election.

After examining the origins of the list, the criminal court is set to hear the libellous accusation case.

On Monday, de Villepin fired the latest volley in an increasingly acrimonious dispute by filing a lawsuit against the French president for allegedly violating his right to the presumption of innocence.

Clearstream trial – Nicolas Sarkozy

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There will be no talks on climate change or nuclear Iran on the French president menu in Avignon on Tuesday.

In the old papal city, Nicolas Sarkozy will unveil a series of measures aimed at 16 to 25 year-olds, a segment of the population that has been particularly affected by the economic crisis.

The left-leaning National Union of Students (UNEF) says the situation is alarming: over the last year, unemployment among young people [ed: already almost three times that of the 25 - 49 year-old age group] has increased by 28%. These include steps to help with housing, training and employment.

At a recent press conference in 2001, the UNEF also denounced a continued increase in student expenses since 2001. For France’s largest student union, the young have been largely forgotten in the government anti-crisis measures.

Take them by the hand

Nicolas Sarkozy is widely expected to build on a Green Paper drawn up by Martin Hirsch, France secretary for youth. . The booklet, published in July, includes 57 proposals resulting from four months of intense committee discussions. The booklet, published in July, includes 57 proposals resulting from four months of intense committee discussions.

But he faces a tough task, as UNEF warned in a statement: Students are not stupid: the time for rhetoric and communication is over. In the second rounf of the 2007 presidential election, his Socialist rival S&eacutegol&egravene Royal had scooped 63% of votes among the under 25 year-olds.

Aurore Berg&eacute, a spokesperson for the UMP’s youth movement, remains optimistic: Maybe decisions in favour of students have been diluted, giving an impression that Nicolas Sarkozy was not interested in the young, she acknowledged. If the government does not have another perspective to offer the young apart from lack of qualifications, job insecurity and unemployment, it lays the foundations for a long-term rupture with the country’s youth. We are today the biggest youth movement in France, proving that the president image in France is changing. But the preconceived notion that young people are more inclined to the left, because we tend to see more of the minority unions on television, is being undermined.

Economic crisis – France – Nicolas Sarkozy – reforms – UMP – unemployment – Youth

.France centre Mathieu Bastareaud received a three-month suspension, commuted to community service, for having lied about an assault on himself while on tour in New Zealand.
The French Rugby Federation’s (FFR) disciplinary committee ruled that Bastareaud’s actions had harmed the wider interests of the sport.
The federation said the Stade Francais back would have to complete 18 activities related to amateur rugby before June 30, 2010, or face having the suspension enforced.
Federation chairman Pierre Camou referred the affair to the committee after Prime Minister Francois Fillon ended up apologising to New Zealand for the player’s claims.
Bastareaud, 21, admitted making up a story about being attacked in the street in Wellington following France’s 14-10 defeat by the All Blacks on June 20.
Wellington police found video evidence that the player had entered the team hotel on the Sunday morning uninjured and had gone to his room 25 minutes later. .
Bastareaud finally admitted he had not been assaulted but received a cut and bruised face after a drunken fall in his room.
France coach Marc Lievremont said Bastareaud would certainly not be part of the France team that plays three Test matches this November but that he would not be out of the equation in future.
He said he had invented the assault story to avoid being sent home by the French team management and upsetting his family. “With this sanction, he again becomes a player like any other, even if it seems complicated to pick him for the November Tests, as I have told him.
“He is available for selection,” Lievremont said.
“There’s a lot to say about Mathieu’s case, on the story and also how the media dealt with it.
“But I never envisaged that we’d be without him for the 2011 Rugby World Cup (in New Zealand).
“We always gave the truth as it was given to us by Mathieu,” he said, insisting that he did not consider the affair a ‘diplomatic’ incident.
“We always gave the truth as it was given to us by Mathieu,” he said, insisting that he did not consider the affair a ‘diplomatic’ incident.”
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.World surfing championship leader Joel Parkinson has been upset by a wildcard in round three of The Quiksilver Pro France.
Local entrant Patrick Beven grabbed a 6.87 to 13.87-point ride in the closing seconds to oust Parkinson 14.
Fellow Queenslander Mick Fanning, the current world number two, won his heat against Julian Wilson to threaten Parkinson’s points lead.07.
“I don’t really smell blood yet,” the American said, “I think I’m still in the forest trying to find him (Parkinson).
Reigning nine-time world champion and current number six Kelly Slater also moved into the fourth round of what is event seven in the ten-round WCT.
The best performer on a day of small waves was American Dane Reynolds with a score of 18.”
Other Australians progressing were Bede Durbidge, Ben Dunn, Dean Morrison, Taj Burrow and Kieren Perrow. .27 points to eliminate Hawaiian Roy Powers (11.
Reynolds will face Durbidge in the opening heat of round four when competition recommences, probably on Sunday.
– AAP