Post for Italy's Dr Subtle sparks fury over political perks

ROME | Thu Sep 12, 2013 1:20pm EDT

ROME (Reuters) - The nomination of a former Italian prime minister notorious for collecting multiple state pensions to a lucrative new job has sparked fury among Italians fed up with the privileges of a political class seemingly immune to austerity.

Veteran two-time centre-left premier Giuliano Amato, 75, nicknamed "Dr Subtle" for his political acumen, was named as a constitutional court judge on Thursday.

Viewed as the ultimate political insider, who collects multiple state pensions worth over 31,000 euro ($41,200) a month before tax, Amato was touted for both prime minister and president in turmoil following a deadlocked February election.

His nomination by President Giorgio Napolitano to a post that will earn him an extra 427,000 euros gross a year - twice they pay of a U.S. Supreme Court judge - quickly drew public ire as Italy struggles to plug its budget deficit amid the longest recession since World War Two.

"The country is still at the mercy of the usual suspects," lawmaker Roberto Fico of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement wrote on Facebook. "Italy can no longer be condemned to be a slave to these characters."

Other deputies protested against the decision in parliament.

Anger at revolving-door politics propelled the 5-Star Movement to a quarter of the vote on pledges to cut politicians' salaries - 60 percent higher than the European average - and kick the old guard out of parliament.

Construction worker Tonino Cortese, 53, said a privileged caste appeared to be untouched by austerity while ordinary people paid through tax hikes and cuts to public services.

"Any one of them earns 10 times what I do. I've worked hard every day of my life and it's getting harder to find work," said Cortese, smoking a cigarette outside a Rome building site. "We the citizens are paying for the crisis. It doesn't touch them."

Giulia Rocca, a 23-year-old student, shared his outrage.

"I don't even know what to say," said Rocca. "One group has all the power in Italy and it feels like we can't do anything. We are all fed up and we can't put up with it anymore."

As prime minister in 1992, Amato famously asked Italians "to put one hand on their hearts and get their wallets out with the other" when he imposed a 0.6 percent levy on bank accounts in a "blood and tears" austerity drive following a currency crisis.

(Reporting by Naomi O'Leary; Editing by Paul Taylor)

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Cubans make yellow-ribbon appeal to U.S. over imprisoned spies

1 of 9. People stand with Cuban intelligence agent Rene Gonzalez (C), released two years ago and now living in Cuba, during a gathering in front of the U.S. Interests Section diplomatic mission in Havana September 12, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Desmond Boylan

By Marc Frank

HAVANA | Thu Sep 12, 2013 2:42pm EDT

HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba held a day of protest on Thursday over four intelligence agents imprisoned in the United States, displaying yellow ribbons to show national support for bringing the men home on the 15th anniversary of their arrest in Florida.

It was the largest anti-U.S. protest staged in the communist country since President Raul Castro took over from his ailing brother Fidel in 2006.

The men were convicted in 2001 of conspiring to spy on Cuban exile groups and U.S. military activities as part of an espionage ring called the "Wasp Network."

A fifth Cuban agent, Rene Gonzalez, who was released two years ago and now lives in Cuba, headed the public drive for the return of his colleagues, who are considered national heroes at home and are known in the United States as the "Cuban Five".

Raul Castro took part in a televised cultural event in their honor on Wednesday evening and a concert with top Cuban performers was scheduled on Thursday in front of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.

Many of the country's 11.2 million residents joined the protest, according to sources in different cities. Yellow ribbons hung from trees, lamp posts and car antennas from Havana to Camaguey city in central Cuba and eastern Santiago.

The Chicago-born Gonzalez, 57, who returned to Cuba this year after renouncing his U.S. citizenship, said in a televised address last week that yellow ribbons, symbolizing longing for absent loved ones, were meant to resonate with the "average American."

The United States and Cuba do not have diplomatic relations but have lower level interests sections in each other's capital.

The agents' case has dogged the already-hostile U.S.-Cuba relations and gained greater attention after the 2009 arrest of U.S. contractor Allen Gross in Cuba. He was sentenced to 15 years for his role in a U.S. government effort to set up an underground Internet network on the Caribbean island.

Havana has linked the fate of its agents with that of Gross, stating a humanitarian solution is needed for both cases.

Cuba says its agents were unjustly convicted and says they were mainly collecting information on Cuban exile groups planning violent actions against Cuba.

One agent, Gerardo Hernandez, is serving a double life sentence after being convicted of involvement in the shooting down of two U.S. planes in 1996 flown by an exile group that dropped anti-government leaflets over Havana. He denied the charge.

The other three are serving sentences ranging from 18 years to 30 years.

(Editing by David Adams and David Storey)

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50 years after Birmingham bombing, U.S. mayors vow renewed racism fight

By Verna Gates

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama | Thu Sep 12, 2013 6:29pm EDT

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (Reuters) - From lunch counters to public buses, the battle over racism in the United States during the 1950s and 60s took place in cities, and five decades later mayors of some of the country's largest urban areas have vowed to carry on the fight for civil rights.

Meeting in Birmingham, Alabama on Thursday where the 50th anniversary of the bombing of a black church will be remembered this week, civic leaders called for an end to modern discrimination in areas like jobs, housing and transportation.

"Cities are the place where hope hits the street, and where the hard work of government happens," said Mitch Landrieu, mayor of New Orleans, during a U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting taking place this week.

Landrieu was among 50 mayors nationwide who on Thursday joined a newly created U.S. Coalition Against Racism and Discrimination by signing a pledge to end racism in their own cities.

The 10-point plan calls on mayors to use their bully pulpits to push for diversity and equality while enacting policies that support programs such as post-release employment for prisoners, affordable daycare, fair housing, community events and education celebrating diversity.

The action comes as Birmingham remembers the 50th anniversary this week of the racial bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church that killed four girls and galvanized the civil rights movement.

On Friday, as part of its commemoration activities, the conference will host former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who was an 8-year-old girl in Birmingham at the time and lost her friend, 11-year-old Denise McNair, in the explosion.

The official ceremonies feature U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and will happen on Sunday, September 15, in Birmingham.

McNair, as well as 14-year-olds Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley perished in the blast. The bomb set by members of the Ku Klux Klan sparked passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Fifty years on, however, black children are still three times more likely to be impoverished, blacks and Hispanics have a higher unemployment rate than whites, and minorities are disproportionately imprisoned, according to the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

Birmingham was the epicenter of the civil rights struggle as its citizens enacted change on a local level long before federal law caught up to them.

Clashes over whites-only waiting rooms in train stations, segregated bathrooms and water fountains, and other disparities in the laws regarding minorities resulted in change that turned activists like Rosa Parks, who refused to give her seat to a white person on a city bus in 1955, into civil-rights heroes.

"The marches in Birmingham were about toilets, parks and zoning, the things real people can change," said Christopher Cabaldon, mayor of West Sacramento, California, who signed the pledge. "Cities have always been the center, the focus, of civil rights progress."

(Reporting by Verna Gates; Writing by Karen Brooks; Editing by Greg McCune and Andrew Hay)

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Saucy party ad spices up dull German election campaign

BERLIN | Thu Sep 12, 2013 9:19am EDT

BERLIN (Reuters) - A satirical party has spiced up a dull German election campaign with a television advert depicting a 90-second sex scene, blurred but leaving little to the imagination.

Die Partei (The Party), whose policies include building a wall around Germany and putting Chancellor Angela Merkel on trial in a cage, said the ad was designed to represent its family policy.

Election rules require broadcasters to give parties advertising time to use as the parties see fit.

Merkel, with a comfortable lead in the polls over a so-far relatively toothless opposition, has opted for a bland campaign, short on specifics, that emphasizes business-as-usual.

Germany's top selling newspaper Bild called the advert, which aired at 10:30 p.m. after the main news, complete with steamy sound track of sighs and groans, a "climax" of the campaign. It said only three viewers had called national broadcaster ZDF to complain.

"Is anyone watching this political broadcast by Die Partei on ZDF and thinking what in God's name is this?" asked twitter user Katharina. Other users described it as the "best political broadcast ever".

Die Partei failed to meet the legal requirements to stand in the last federal election, but this time is fielding dozens of candidates - with next to no hope of getting any into parliament on September 22.

It described its advert, which ends with the slogan "Vote for The Party and you'll feel good", as having confused "dozens of pensioners".

Among its other policies is a plan to frack Environment Minister Peter Altmaier to release his "enormous energy resources".

(Reporting by Alexandra Hudson; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

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Miss America hopeful is a national guard sergeant - with tattoos

1 of 4. Miss Kansas, Theresa Vail, is seen on stage during the bathing suit portion of the preliminary round of the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in this September 10, 2013, file photo.

Credit: Reuters/Carlo Allegri/Files

By Victoria Cavaliere

NEW YORK | Thu Sep 12, 2013 4:43pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A Kansas woman hoping to be crowned the next Miss America on Sunday night keeps her personal mission statement close to her heart: it's tattooed on her torso.

Miss Kansas Theresa Vail became the first Miss America contestant to visibly show her tattoos during competitions this week, pageant officials said. Her two pieces of ink are expected to be on display during Sunday's nationally televised pageant.

Tattoos aren't the only thing that sets Vail, 22, apart from her beauty queen competitors. She's also a member of the Kansas National Guard, making her the second contestant in the history of the Miss America Pageant to be an active member of the military.

Sergeant Vail, who lists her hobbies as hunting, archery and cooking, addressed her tattoos on her personal blog. She said her decision to not cover them during the contest was an attempt to challenge traditional definitions of beauty and femininity.

"I do not want to shock the nation when I'm seen in a swimsuit, bearing my marks," she wrote. "I am opting to show them proudly."

Her goal, she said is "empowering women to OVERCOME stereotypes and break barriers."

Vail's two tattoos include her "personal mission statement," the Serenity Prayer, down the right side of her torso. It reads "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference."

Her other tattoo is the insignia of the U.S. Army Dental Corps on her left shoulder. Vail says she hopes to go on to dental school in the future.

The 2014 Miss America will be crowned Sunday night.

(Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Andrew Hay)

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Russian Bolshoi acid attack victim to return to Moscow

Sergei Filin, artistic director of Russia's Bolshoi Ballet, attends a news conference in the university hospital in the western German city of Aachen March 15, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Wolfgang Rattay

MOSCOW | Thu Sep 12, 2013 12:56pm EDT

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The artistic director of Russia's Bolshoi Ballet is returning to Moscow from Germany following eight months and 22 operations on his eyes and face after an acid attack that nearly blinded him, the theatre's spokeswoman said.

Sergei Filin will fly in on Saturday and take part in the troupe's reunion after holidays on Tuesday, the spokeswoman said. She could not say what role he might play in the troupe in the future.

"The troupe hopes very much that Sergei will recover and come back," Katerina Novikova said. "To what extent he will be able to take part in the life of the troupe, that will become clear in the nearest future."

Filin had the power to make or break careers at the Bolshoi, a world-renowned symbol of Russian culture, and the January 17 attack put the ballet's bitter internal rivalries in the spotlight.

Novikova said in June Filin could not see out of one eye at all and vision in the second one was severely damaged. She had no fresh details on his health on Thursday.

One of the Bolshoi's top dancers, Pavel Dmitrichenko, is on trial on charges of ordering the attack. He and his two alleged accomplices face up to 12 years in jail if convicted.

Dmitrichenko, who made his name playing villains in Swan Lake and Ivan the Terrible, told the court he was upset with the management and Filin, but that he only wanted the artistic director beaten up, not attacked with acid.

Russia dismissed the long-serving head of the Bolshoi in the aftermath of the incident, and entrusted another experienced theatre manager with the mission to rebuild the theatre's reputation.

"From the very first day after this horrid event took place, everybody (in the theatre) felt we want to prove to ourselves and Sergei and the whole world that we are worthy and apt. The best thing we can do for Sergei is to do our job well, that is dance," Novikova said.

(Reporting by Catherine Koppel; Writing by Gabriela Baczynska; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

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