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95567
Thu, 12/17/2009 - 22:57
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From foreign press
The Japanese government has increased its climate aid package to poor countries from $9.2 billion to $15 billion until 2012, the Kyodo news agency has said.
The aid will be provided on the condition that ''a fair and effective framework with participation of all major emitters'' is established with an accord on their ambitious targets, the agency said.
The aid will come within the framework of the so-called "Hatoyama Initiative," voiced by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama during the September summit in New York.
Under the initiative, Tokyo pledged to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 25% to the 1990 level and to offer financial support to the developing states, which have been the hardest hit by the consequences of the global climate change.
The package, which includes $11 billion in public money, with the rest coming from the private sector, is the largest climate aid so far. The European Union has earlier pledged to allocate $10.6 billion for the purpose.
Six nations, including the U.S., said they would allocate a total of $3.5 billion to protect rainforests earlier in the day.
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White Americans will be no longer the majorities in the United States around 2050, eight years later than previous expectation, said a Census Bureau report released on Wednesday.
The Census Bureau has earlier predicted that white children will become a minority in 2023 and the whole white population will follow in 2042.
However, due to the economic crisis and stricter immigration policies after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the flow of foreigners into the United States has been slowed.
The updated report said that the total U.S. population, which currently stands at 308 million people, is expected to reach 399 million by 2050, and the whites will make up 49.9 percent of the total, instead of two-thirds now.
By 2050, the black will remain accounting for 12.2 percent, and Hispanics' share will rise from 15 percent now to 28 percent, said the report, adding that Asians will also increase their share from 4.4 percent to 6 percent during the same period.
However, the bureau noted that the prospect of the demographic shift will not be only based on birth and death rates, but also influenced by a number of uncertain factors, including the economic growth, cultural changes and disasters as well as the immigration policy reform.
So the projections can be used more as a guide, it added.
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A young man with mental problems managed on Wednesday to reach the hospital floor where Premier Silvio Berlusconi was recovering from an attack, and police were questioning him, authorities said.
A Milan anti-terrorism police official said the man "wanted to pay a visit on the premier at 2 a.m." Wednesday and made it to the entrance of the seventh floor of Milan's San Raffaele Hospital where Berlusconi, 73, and other patients were being treated. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he didn't have advance authorization to talk with a reporter.
Police questioned the 26-year-old Turin man at Milan police headquarters but planned to release him. The police official said the man apparently is a supporter of the premier. A search of the man's parked car found "hockey sticks and kitchen knives," the official said, but the man apparently plays hockey. He will be cited for transporting the knives without justification, the official said.
The man, whose identity was not immediately released, was unarmed when he reached the seventh floor, the official said.
Berlusconi was struck in the face with a statuette on Sunday night as he signed autographs at a rally in Milan. The attack broke his nose and two teeth and cut his lips. Police said the attacker, Massimo Tartaglia, a Milan man suffering years of psychological problems, has been detained. Doctors were expected to examine the premier and media mogul before discharging him later on Wednesday.
Earlier, Berlusconi's spokesman, Paolo Bonaiuti, said his boss had a "rough night," with more pain from his wounds than he felt the two previous nights. But Berlusconi enjoyed receiving a phone call from President Barack Obama.
Bonaiuti said Obama called Tuesday night to offer get-well wishes.
The spokesman said Berlusconi's pain had "sharpened" a bit, and that an old neck problem was also causing him pain.
A Milan judge on Wednesday denied a request by Tartaglia's lawyers for their client to be transferred from San Vittore prison to the psychiatric ward of a hospital, Italian news reports said. The judge also upheld the arrest warrant, the ANSA news agency said.