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PARIS: Andre Cassagnes, the French inventor of the Etch A Sketch, a toy beloved of children around the world, has died at the age of 86.
His death in France in mid-January was announced by the Ohio Art Company which has been making the Etch a Sketch since 1960, according to media reports.
The Etch A Sketch, a grey screen with bold red frame, allows children to draw a picture using a stylus and then erase it with the turn of two buttons.
It has sold more than 100 million copies around the world.
- AFP/ck
"Kashmir is a place of sufis and saints and there is no room to nourish western type of culture and immoral values," Hurriyat spokesman Ayaz Akbar said in a statement.
"Though in a civilised society there is no place for coercion and force, there are some values a citizen has to adopt to safeguard the ethical and religious traditions," he said.
"Hurriyat Conference expresses regret and surprise over the support of Omar Abdullah," Akbar said.
"As a matter of fact no noble family will allow their girls to choose their profession as a dancer so as to be a mere thing of pleasure for strangers," he said.
Akbar said Omar should have gone through the history of Kashmir to find out the high regard and esteem bestowed upon women in order to save them from being sold as commodity.
"It is a matter of concern for us the way Omar Abdullah backed the rock band because the dynasty he belongs to has since long disassociated itself from Islamic and ethical values," he said.
Referring to the reported threats being given to the rock band, the spokesman termed it "not good".
"Instead, parents should have rectified the things and provided advice to their daughters that their activities were not as per ethics of Islam, culture and our unique identity," he said.
Omar had come out in support of the girls yesterday saying police will probe the threats.
"I hope these talented young girls will not let a handful of morons silence them," he said.
The all-girls band, which came to limelight in late December last year after their performance at the annual 'Battle of the Bands' competition here, had defied the convention by stepping into the male-dominated field of music.
The girls' band has received abusive and hate messages on their Facebook page for defying convention by choosing the field of music.
Photograph by Dieu Nalio Chery, AP
The magnitude 7 earthquake that struck near Port au Prince, Haiti, in January 2010 so devastated the country that recovery efforts are still ongoing.
Professional dancer Georges Exantus, one of the many casualties of that day, was trapped in his flattened apartment for three days, according to news reports. After friends dug him out, doctors amputated his right leg below the knee. With the help of a prosthetic leg, Exantus is able to dance again. (Read about his comeback.)
Why We Love It
"This is an intimate photo, taken in the subject's most personal space as he lies asleep and vulnerable, perhaps unaware of the photographer. The dancer's prosthetic leg lies in the foreground as an unavoidable reminder of the hardships he faced in the 2010 earthquake. This image makes me want to hear more of Georges' story."—Ben Fitch, associate photo editor
"This image uses aesthetics and the beauty of suggestion to tell a story. We are not given all the details in the image, but it is enough to make us question and wonder."—Janna Dotschkal, associate photo editor
Published February 1, 2013
A man is under arrest in connection with the killing of a former Navy SEAL and "American Sniper" author Chris Kyle and another man at an Erath County, Texas, gun range, police said.
"We have lost more than we can replace. Chris was a patriot, a great father, and a true supporter of this country and its ideals. This is a tragedy for all of us. I send my deepest prayers and thoughts to his wife and two children," "American Sniper" co-author Scott McEwen said in a statement to ABC News.
ABC affiliate WFAA-TV in Dallas reported that Kyle and a neighbor of his were shot while helping a soldier who is recovering from post traumatic stress syndrome at a gun range in Glen Rose.
The suspect, identified as Eddie Routh, 25, was arrested in Lancaster, Texas, after a brief police chase, a Lancaster Police Department dispatcher told ABC News.
Routh was driving Kyle's truck at the time of his arrest and was held awaiting transfer to Texas Rangers, according to police.
Investigators told WFAA that Routh is a former Marine said to suffer from post-traumatic stress syndrome.
AP Photo/The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Paul Moseley
The other man who was killed with Kyle was identified as 35-year-old Chad Littlefield by authorities.
PHOTOS: Notable Deaths in 2013
Kyle, 38, served four tours in Iraq and was awarded two Silver Stars, five Bronze Stars with Valor, two Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medals, and one Navy and Marine Corps Commendation.
From 1999 to 2009, Kyle recorded more than 150 sniper kills, the most in U.S. military history.
Travis Cox, the director of FITCO Cares, the non-profit foundation Kyle established, said Kyle's wife Taya and their children "lost a dedicated father and husband" and the country has lost a "lifelong patriot and an American hero."
"Chris Kyle was a hero for his courageous efforts protecting our country as a U.S. Navy SEAL during four tours of combat. Moreover, he was a hero for his efforts stateside when he helped develop the FITCO Cares Foundation. What began as a plea for help from Chris looking for in-home fitness equipment for his brothers- and sisters-in-arms struggling with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) became an organization that will carry that torch proudly in his honor," Cox said in a statement.
After leaving combat duty, became chief instructor training Naval Special Warfare Sniper and Counter-Sniper teams, and he authored the Naval Special Warfare Sniper Doctrine, the first Navy SEAL sniper manual. He left the Navy in 2009.
"American Sniper," which was published last year in 2012, became a New York Times best seller.
The fatal shooting comes after week filled with gun related incidents -- a teen who participated in inaugural festivities was shot to death in Chicago, a bus driver was fatally shot and 5-year-old was taken hostage in Alabama and a Texas prosecutor was gunned outside a courthouse.
RICHMOND — After a brief flirtation with the GOP’s surprise Virginia Senate redistricting plan, and a fierce backlash from unions, a black House Democrat has soured on supporting it.
Del. Onzlee Ware announced on the House floor Friday that he has decided to vote against the new Senate map, which would create a new majority-black district in Southside but also disperse black voting power in at least eight other districts.
He had said in an interview Wednesday that he was considering voting for it. His support would have provided Republicans with a measure of bipartisan support and helped to blunt criticism that they had pushed the proposed districts through the Senate in a way that was offensive to blacks.
The map would probably lead to the election of a sixth black senator but also diminish Democratic power in the now evenly divided Senate. Ware had said on Wednesday that he was open to the proposal because he was tired of putting the interests of black people second to the interests of the Democratic party.
But he announced Friday that he had decided to vote against the map, which Republicans sprang on the Senate on Inauguration Day, when Sen. Henry Marsh of Richmond — a Democrat regarded as a civil rights icon — was away in Washington to attend President Obama’s swearing-in. Ware said he’d concluded that the map, tacked onto a bill calling for minor “technical adjustments” to House districts, was too much of a departure from the original legislation.
“It was just too drastically changed,” Ware said.
Democratic legislators and union leaders pounced after Ware and another black Democratic delegate, Rosalyn R. Dance of Petersburg, said in interviews with The Washington Post that they were open to the map.
At the request of the Senate Democratic caucus, union members pushed the two hard, on the phone and in person, according to union officials and Capitol staffers.
“The whole Senate Democratic caucus was rightfully concerned that [their] vote was going to give Republicans cover and fix the optics,” said one union official involved in the effort but not authorized to speak publicly about it.
Dance, who lives in the newly created Senate district, did not address the matter on the House floor and could not be reached for comment.
But another union member, Julia Newton of Service Employees International Union Virginia 512, said Dance told her she has decided to abstain from voting on the measure. The plan could come up for a vote in the House as early as Wednesday.
“She said she wasn’t going to vote at all,” Newton said.
THE HAGUE: Blanco - formerly the Rabobank team - said on Saturday they have suspended Spanish rider Luis Leon Sanchez provisionally amid accusations he was linked to Spanish doctor Eufemiano Fuentes in the Operation Puerto blood doping racket.
The Dutch team said it is investigating and would in the meantime not select Sanchez.
"The object of this investigation is to verify or refute revelations which appeared in the Dutch press on the subject of the role of our rider in the Fuentes affair," Blanco said in a statement.
Spanish police believe Sanchez was a client of the doctor in 2006 while riding for the Liberty Seguros team - something the 29-year-old denies.
Sanchez has won several major titles, including the San Sebastian Classic in 2010 and 2012, the 2009 Paris-Nice, the Tour Down Under in 2005 and four stages of the Tour de France.
Last Wednesday, a Spanish judge refused to demand that Fuentes, the suspected mastermind of one of the sporting world's biggest blood doping rackets, provide the names of athletes implicated in the scandal.
The ruling in the so-called "Operation Puerto" case could avert a huge fall-out from the high-profile trial, with suspects across the drug-tarnished world of cycling and perhaps in other sports potentially at risk.
The Canary Islands doctor, 57, was detained when police seized 200 bags of blood and plasma, and other evidence of performance-enhancing transfusions, revealing a huge doping network after a months-long investigation dubbed "Operation Puerto".
Fuentes on Tuesday said his activities had stretched beyond cycling, which is still reeling from the aftermath of revelations that Lance Armstrong cheated his way to a record seven Tour de France wins.
"I worked with individual sportspeople, privately. It could be a cyclist in a cycling team, a footballer in a football team, an athlete, a boxer," he told the court.
- AFP/de
"The strategic-military partnership with Japan is evolving to a new level. General Singh, who will leave on February 11, will meet the Japanese defence minister, military chiefs and others to discuss ways to further strengthen bilateral ties. He will also visit some defence establishments," said an official.
The visit comes soon after India and Japan, both wary of the increasingly assertive behaviour of China and the rapid modernisation of its People's Liberation Army, held their first-ever maritime dialogue on January 29.
Ranging from joint combat exercises and coordinated anti-piracy patrols to counter-terrorism and service-to-service exchanges, India and Japan are implementing a "action plan to advance security cooperation".
The plan, which dwells upon strategic and defence cooperation as well as coordination in tackling terrorism, piracy and proliferation, is meant to reinforce the strategic focus in the "global partnership" between India and Japan, say officials.
"India and Japan have similar views on several global and regional issues like extremism, terrorism and WMD-proliferation. The two are also keen to ensure the safety of sea lanes in the Indian Ocean Region and Asia-Pacific because both depend largely on maritime traffic for their energy and trade needs," said an official.
"In addition to regular exercises being held between the Indian and Japanese coast guards, our naval warships are also conducting coordinated anti-piracy patrolling in the Gulf of Aden. We also have regular Navy-to-Navy staff talks," he added.
Photograph by Dieu Nalio Chery, AP
The magnitude 7 earthquake that struck near Port au Prince, Haiti, in January 2010 so devastated the country that recovery efforts are still ongoing.
Professional dancer Georges Exantus, one of the many casualties of that day, was trapped in his flattened apartment for three days, according to news reports. After friends dug him out, doctors amputated his right leg below the knee. With the help of a prosthetic leg, Exantus is able to dance again. (Read about his comeback.)
Why We Love It
"This is an intimate photo, taken in the subject's most personal space as he lies asleep and vulnerable, perhaps unaware of the photographer. The dancer's prosthetic leg lies in the foreground as an unavoidable reminder of the hardships he faced in the 2010 earthquake. This image makes me want to hear more of Georges' story."—Ben Fitch, associate photo editor
"This image uses aesthetics and the beauty of suggestion to tell a story. We are not given all the details in the image, but it is enough to make us question and wonder."—Janna Dotschkal, associate photo editor
Published February 1, 2013
A brother and sister who escaped the school bus where a 5-year-old autistic boy was taken hostage by a retired Alabama trucker are speaking out about the standoff and the man who threatened the lives of the children on board.
"I look up and he's talking about threatening to kill us all or something," 14-year-old Terrica Singletary told ABC's "Good Morning America." "He's like, 'I'll kill all y'all, I'll kill y'all, I just want two kids.'"
Singletary and her brother, Tristian, 12, said Jimmy Lee Dykes boarded the bus on Tuesday and offered the driver what appeared to be broccoli and a note, before demanding two children.
"The bus driver kept saying, 'Just please get off the bus,' and [Dykes] said, 'Ah alright, I'll get off the bus," said Terrica Singletary, "He just tried to back up and reverse and [Dykes] pulled out the gun and he just shot him, and he just took Ethan."
PHOTOS: Worst Hostage Situations
School bus driver Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was fatally shot several times by Dykes.
The siblings and the rest of the students on board were able to get away unharmed, but were shocked by what had transpired just five days ago.
"I never thought I would have to go through a shootout," Singletary said.
They said they had seen Dykes, 65, working on his fence, and described him as a menacing figure.
"He was very protective of his stuff," Tristian Singletary said. "Whenever he stares at you, he looks kinda crazy."
Dykes has been holed up in his underground bunker with his 5-year-old hostage named Ethan near Midland City, Ala. for five days now. Neighbors told ABCNews.com that Dykes has been known to retreat underground for up to eight days.
READ: Alabama Hostage Suspect Jimmy Dykes 'Has No Regard for Human Life'
While Dykes, who was described as having "no regard for human life," has allowed negotiators to send Ethan's medicine, as well as coloring books, into the bunker for the boy through a ventilation pipe that leads into the 6 by 8 foot subterranean hideout 4 feet underground, authorities are staying quiet about their conversations with Dykes.
While negotiations continue and it was reported that Ethan is physically unharmed, an official told the Associated Press that the boy has been crying for his parents.
Meanwhile, his peers are steadfast that he will return home soon.
"Ethan will make it out there, Ethan will make it out there," said Tristian Singletary.
ABC News' Kevin Dolak and Gio Benitez contributed to this report.
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