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It’s a short while after sunset and I am standing in my garden staring at the house roof. Midges nip my face as the light drops. Suddenly from just above the gutter, there’s a flurry and a bat darts out and flies above my head. It’s the first of the night to emerge and a burst of noise from the bat detector registers its inaudible sound.

Ruth Hadden, from my local bat group, tunes a knob on a black box to align it with the frequency of this particular bat’s call. She is here to find out what species of bats dwell under our roof. They live under the stone roof slabs that are a feature of older houses in this area, and we can hear their scrabbling, flapping noises at dawn as they come back to roost.

This first bat is a common pipistrelle, the clicking sounds it produces registering at 45khz, and we count them out as they loop over the garden and head off towards the fields. A faster set of clicks signals a different frequency on the detector, and the next group are Natterer’s bats that always appear some minutes after the pipistrelles. Now there’s a different set of clicks, slower and louder than the Natterer’s, and Ruth says we have a whiskered bat too, confirmed by its different behaviour. As the dusk deepens we watch it fly systematically up and down in front of the house, sweeping up all the insects as it passes.

Of the three species we count some 40 bats and it is likely we have a fourth as well. Ruth explains the earthy smell often noticed in an upstairs room as evidence of soprano pipistrelles. Given off by their fur, it is described variously as curry, bacon or coffee, but it is not unpleasant. These have now dispersed from the roost. Each bat can eat 3,000 midges a night, making them the gardener’s friend. The air is now heady with night-scented stock as we head indoors leaving the bats to a night’s foraging.

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/aug/28/country-diary-allendale-bats

Campaigners have claimed that a “devastating divide” has opened up when it comes to accessing cancer drugs, after research revealed that people in England are much more likely to get drugs that their doctors think may work for them than patients living in Scotland or Wales

Using the Freedom of Information Act, the Rarer Cancers Foundation (RCF) gathered data from health trusts in England on the types of drugs approved through the government’s cancer drugs fund.

The fund, worth £200m a year, was set up so that patients in England could be given drugs that had been approved by their doctors but had not been given the go-ahead for widespread use on the NHS. The data was then compared with exceptional-case approvals for the same drugs in Scotland and Wales.

The analysis suggests that patients in England are three times more likely than people in Scotland to gain access to key cancer drugs, and five times more likely than patients in Wales.

Andrew Wilson, chief executive of the RCF, said the fund in England was “great news” for patients, but he was critical of the “devastating divide” that had opened up with Scotland and Wales.

“A cancer drug does not become any less effective simply because it is prescribed on the other side of a border. Nor does a patient’s need become any less pressing.” The NHS should be there when you need it the most, regardless of where you live.

“People in Scotland and Wales will want to know why their chances of accessing a life-extending cancer drug are so much lower than their neighbours in England.”

A spokeswoman for the Scottish government said the report would be carefully considered:

“Scotland has robust, equitable and transparent arrangements for the introduction of newly-licensed clinically and cost-effective medicines through the Scottish Medicines Consortium and Healthcare Improvement Scotland which operate independently from the Scottish government,” she said.

“These focus on equity of access to newly licensed drugs throughout Scotland, on the basis of their clinical and cost effectiveness,” she said.

“These arrangements include flexibility for additional factors to be taken into account in prescribing decisions, such as opportunities for local clinically-led consideration of SMC ‘not recommended’ medicines for individual patients in certain circumstances.”

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/aug/29/cancer-patients-england-key-drugs

Fashion-mad PR guru Edina Monsoon and inebriated magazine editor Patsy Stone are to return to our screens in three new episodes of Absolutely Fabulous, the BBC has confirmed.

The award-winning comedy series will celebrate its 20th anniversary next year with three 30-minute specials picking up Edina (Jennifer Saunders) and Patsy (Joanna Lumley) in the present day. The other original cast members – Julia Sawalha as Saffy, June Whitfield as Edina’s mother and Jane Horrocks as Bubble – will also reprise their roles.

In the first episode, fans will rejoin the ensemble in the midst of a life-changing experience for one – which affects them all, the BBC said.

In the second show, Edina sets her sights on changing the career of someone described as “a very big fish indeed”.

In the concluding episode, Edina and Patsy play their own very special part in the London 2012 Olympics.

Saunders said: “It’s great that we are able to celebrate our 20th birthday with all the original cast. Like a good bottle of champagne we hope we have got better with time without losing any of our sparkle.

“Last week, when we started filming in dear old west London, it was as if nothing had changed. It was raining. Nevertheless, we are so happy to be working for an audience that has grown just a tiny bit older like us, but is still willing to let us fall over on TV in the name of PR.”

Jon Plowman, executive producer of BBC Comedy and original producer of the Absolutely Fabulous series, said: “Viewers have been fantastically loyal in their devotion to our show, so we’re really thrilled to say that it’s coming back.”

The sitcom aired from 1992 to 2003, with specials in 2004 and 2005.

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2011/aug/29/absolutely-fabulous-back-bolly-stolly

The man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing has been found apparently comatose in a palatial villa in north Tripoli.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi is slipping in and out of a coma and only being kept alive with oxygen and an intravenous drip, according to relatives attending him at the property, which they said had been ransacked by looters who plundered all his medicine.

Megrahi, last seen at a televised rally in Tripoli last month alongside Muammar Gaddafi, was tracked down by CNN international correspondent Nic Robertson.”He appears to be a shell of the man that he was, far sicker than he appeared before … at death’s door,” Robertson said.

Megrahi’s son, Khaled, told the broadcaster: “There is no doctor, there is nobody to ask and we don’t have a phone line to call anybody.”

Megrahi was discovered as the Libyan rebels’ National Transitional Council (NTC) ruled out extraditing him to Britain. The justice minister, Mohammed al-Alagi, said: “We will not give any Libyan citizen to the west. Megrahi has already been judged once and he will not be judged again. We do not hand over Libyan citizens. Gaddafi does.”

Megrahi is the only man convicted over the December 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103, which killed 270 people, mostly Americans, when it exploded over the Scottish town of Lockerbie. He was freed on 20 August 2009, after prison doctors said he had prostate cancer and probably had only three months to live. East Renfrewshire council, which received regular updates on Megrahi’s condition from the Gaddafi regime, had been trying to locate him after the rebels’ captured the Libyan capital.

The Scottish government and East Renfrewshire council issued a joint statement saying there had been contact through Megrahi’s family over the weekend.

They said: “There was no evidence of a breach of his licence conditions, and his medical condition is consistent with someone suffering from terminal prostate cancer. Speculation about Megrahi in recent days has been unhelpful, unnecessary and indeed ill-informed.”

“As has always been said, Al Megrahi is dying of a terminal disease, and matters regarding his medical condition should really be left there.

“It is in no-one’s interest for there to be a running commentary on either Mr Al-Megrahi’s medical condition or location, and we have no intention of providing one.

“Any change in Al-Megrahi’s circumstances would be a matter for discussion with the National Transitional Council as the legitimate governing authority in Libya.”

The NTC’s comments on extradition are also an apparent blow to British hopes of putting on trial the suspected killer of Yvonne Fletcher, the police officer shot dead in 1984 outside the Libyan embassy. Scotland Yard has identified a former Libyan diplomat as the prime suspect.

The foreign secretary, William Hague, welcomed a pledge by the NTC chairman, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, to “co-operate fully” with extradition. But the justice minister’s comments appear to cast doubt on the possibility.

No one has been prosecuted over the murder of WC Fletcher. But it has emerged that a witness saw Abdulmagid Salah Ameri, then a junior diplomat, firing a gun from inside the building. Libya has an extradition agreement with the UK, but it covers foreign suspects rather than Libyan nationals.

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/29/lockerbie-bomber-al-megrahi-coma

“This is the goddess Durga,” says Lance Corporal Prithvi, gesturing towards the shrine containing a statue of the Hindu deity. “She represents power. At this moment we pray to her because we think she gives us power to defeat evil forces.”

Above the shrine is a hanging featuring the god Hanuman, to its right a poster of the Lord Shiva, to the left another poster of the goddess Durga and, next to her, a poster of Lakshmi.

This is the only temple of its kind. Many Gurkha units and soldiers will make do with a photograph of a god or goddess or a poster in a box.

The temple is in Lashkar Gah and has only been open a few months. “It was one of the first things we did when we got here in April, as soon as our freight arrived,” says Prithvi, from 2nd Battallion the Royal Ghurka Rifles, who is originally from Nepal.

Every morning the 20 Gurkhas say prayers, light candles and apply the tika to the statue.

It is Prithvi’s second tour of Afghanistan. “In my first tour we were ground-holding, we were fighting and it was a different experience. We lost some our friends. Because of the situation, I’m glad there is somewhere to pray.”

Last month the pundit Shankar Mani and the lama Kesang Ghale toured Afghanistan to meet the Gurkhas – all of them – at their various bases. “It was good he came,” says Prithvi; “he was the perfect man to give us advice.”

The smell of sandalwood incense perfumes the air inside and outside the temple. “Whenever we smell that it reminds us of temple.”

When the Gurkhas leave Lashkar Gah, so will the temple.

• Read Riazat Butt’s other dispatches from Afghanistan here

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/blog/2011/aug/29/gurkhas-hindu-temple-in-lashkar-gah

The Gurkhas’ Hindu temple at the British army base in Lashkar Gah, Afghanistan, is the only one of its kind. Click here to read Riazat Butt’s blogpost on the temple

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2011/aug/29/gurkhas-hindu-temple-in-lashkar-gah

With a police helicopter hovering overhead and 5,500 officers drafted in to preserve order, an ebullient Notting Hill carnival got under way peacefully as showers and bleak bank holiday weather conspired to lower temperatures all round.

More than 1 million people are expected to attend what is billed as the second biggest street festival in the world, after the Rio carnival.

Three weeks after the biggest riots in the capital for a generation, with fears beforehand that the carnival could act as a catalyst for renewed outbreaks of disorder, police reported that the event got off to a quiet start, with just 14 arrests by late-afternoon, seven for drug offences. One dangerous dog had been corralled. An extra 1,000 officers will be on duty at the carnival on Monday – and an additional 4,000 will be policing the rest of London in case of trouble elsewhere.

Despite bleak weather, Boris Johnson, London’s mayor, issued a call to “let the true spirit of London shine through,” in the hope that the carnival would help heal wounds left by the riots.

“It’s right that carnival goes ahead so we can show the world that the overwhelming majority of London’s people are decent, law-abiding citizens who respect the law, love their city and want to celebrate our vibrant, diverse and historical culture,” he said.

Fifty-one floats took part on the first day of the festival, with organisers saying that “babes in arms” took part in the costumed parades through west London on children’s day. Over half a million people are expected to attend on Monday, with the forecast for fine and dry weather. The carnival will begin as early as 9am, with the music due to be turned down early on both evenings.

There was a small element of subversion – some more serious than others. Sunday saw 50 dancers and brass-band members from the Yaa arts group trouping through the streets in red, black and yellow camouflage, symbolising, organisers said, “hooded youth”.

Spraypaint taggers, meanwhile, struck shops on the fashionable Ledbury Road. They covered fences and plywood hoardings, erected to protect premises, with graffiti.

The Metropolitan Police put in place a section 60 order, giving extra stop-and-search powers, across London as part of the ongoing security operation. There was a heavy police presence on the streets and officers staffed checkpoints at underground stations. A statement said the order had been based on “the unprecedented scale and unpredictable locations of the disorder that was seen in London during 6-8 August”. The force said the powers would be kept under review “day by day” during the festival.

Plainclothes officers with radios mingled with the crowds to try to spot potential trouble.

The festival began with J’ouvert, in which festivalgoers covered themselves in white paint and chocolate – which has become a tradition at the carnival in the last three years.

Simon Halls, 31, from Southend, said: “We got bombarded after lunch and everyone was getting hugged by people covered in chocolate.” Off the main parade route, dozens of stalls were selling food favourites such as jerk chicken, curried goat, corn dumplings and fresh coconut juice, although a brief lunchtime storm sent revellers scurrying for shelter.

Festival co-organiser Chris Boothman said the riots had helped bring the carnival community together. “If today is anything to go by, Monday is going to be a really great day because it has been one of the best Sundays we’ve had in a really long time, maybe five years,” he said.

“Carnival goers have been saying they’ve been reassured by the heavier police presence, which I found surprising. Young people are saying that as well.”

Another organiser, Franka Philip, added: “The police have been very cooperative and the bands have been fast moving. It feels good and the vibe has been brilliant.”

Liz Hone, from Hitchin, Hertfordshire, who is getting married in seven weeks, had brought a dozen friends along. She said, “We’ve been in London for the whole weekend. We’ll eat lots and drinks lots and just party all day and all night. It’s amazing. I’m having the best time of my life.”

“There’s loads of police around and everyone’s really happy. It’s the best atmosphere.”

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/aug/28/notting-hill-carnival-peaceful-start

An unprecedented public inquiry into the conduct of British soldiers in Iraq is expected to contain damning criticism of senior army officers and their legal advisers, and highlight the failure of commanders to ensure orders were passed down.

The inquiry’s report into the September 2003 death of Baha Mousa, a Basra hotel worker, is also understood to include scathing criticism of military intelligence personnel and the lack of training and preparation British troops received for the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath.

The report by retired appeal court judge Sir William Gage, due to be published next week, is unlikely to accuse the army of systematic torture, army sources reportedly said in what appeared to be a damage-limitation exercise.

The Sunday Telegraph quoted a senior, unidentified army officer as saying: “The inquiry has found no evidence of systematic abuse because there wasn’t any. That is not to say that abuse did not happen, but claims that there was a culture or a conspiracy to torture alleged insurgents has not been proved.”

Such findings were never likely, given the evidence heard by Gage. Lawyers acting for Iraqi families, however, have since collected fresh material which they claim does point to the systematic abuse by British troops.

They are demanding another public inquiry into wider allegations surrounding the abuse of more than 200 Iraqi detainees by the Joint Forces Interrogations Team (JFIT) near Basra.

Gage is expected to point to a catalogue of failings that led to the death of 26-year-old Mousa, who was arrested with nine other Iraqis at the Haitham hotel in Basra by soldiers of the 1st Battalion The Queen’s Lancashire Regiment (QLR).

Rifles, bayonets and suspected bomb-making equipment were found at the scene but there was no evidence that they had been used against British troops.

Mousa died after 36 hours in detention. A postmortem found he had suffered asphyxiation and at least 93 injuries to his body, including fractured ribs and a broken nose. Sir Michael Jackson, Britain’s top general at the time, described the episode as “a stain on the character of the British army”.

At the end of a six-month court martial six members of the QLR, including the regiment’s commanding officer, Colonel Jorge Mendonca, were cleared of abuse and negligence. A seventh, Corporal Donald Payne, who pleaded guilty, was jailed for a year and dismissed from the army. The court martial judge accused the soldiers of closing ranks, a charge Gage is expected to echo.

Des Browne, then defence secretary, set up a public inquiry in 2008, when the MoD admitted soldiers had breached the terms of the Human Rights Act. The inquiry heard evidence from nearly 250 witnesses, and was told that British troops used interrogation techniques – hooding; deprivation of sleep, food, and drink; subjection to noise; and wall-standing – outlawed by the UK government in March 1972 after an investigation into interrogation in Northern Ireland.

The Gage inquiry heard that senior officers were unaware of the 1972 ban and were confused or ignorant of their obligations under domestic and international law.

The detainees’ closing submissions noted: “From the chain of command to the medical staff and even to the padre, no one was prepared to speak up for what was right and report what was wrong.”

Gage heard evidence that military and civilian officials tried to downplay the significance of Mousa’s death and dissembled when MPs asked about the circumstances surrounding it.

He also heard how the MoD’s top legal advisers failed to seek the advice of Lord Goldsmith, the attorney general who was known to take the view that British troops in Iraq were bound by the UK’s Human Rights Act.

The MoD said it would look carefully at Gage’s report. It said more than 100,000 service personnel served in Iraq and the vast majority conducted themselves with “extraordinary courage, professionalism and decency in very demanding circumstances”.

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/28/baha-mousa-inquiry-clear-army

The government has caved in to calls from anti-abortionists to overhaul existing protocols and strip charities and medics of their exclusive responsibility for counselling women seeking to terminate a pregnancy.

The Department of Health confirmed that it would change the rules to ensure that women are also offered counselling “independently” of existing abortion services. Its announcement was made in advance of an attempt next week led by the Tory backbencher Nadine Dorries to amend the health and social care bill to force such a requirement. Dorries says that the charity-run abortion services – including the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) and Marie Stopes – have a financial conflict of interest in advising women seeking terminations. She says that by offering independent counselling, 60,000 of the 200,000 abortions each year could be prevented.

The charities say that another layer of counselling could cause distress by delaying access to abortions. They also say that the counselling they offer is continuous throughout the process of seeking a termination and that there is no evidence they are biased in the care they provide.

Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, said the government’s decision was based on prejudice rather than evidence.

The DH confirmed that it wanted to change the rules to offer women independent counselling in addition to that currently offered by abortion services and said it was consulting on the precise method to use, with sources acknowledging that it was a direct response to lobbying from backbenchers.

An aide to the health secretary, Andrew Lansley, said: “We remain of the view that we can do this without legislation but we aren’t shying away from a parliamentary debate. We want women to have the offer of independent counselling, independent of the abortion provider.

“We believe that it would be an improvement on the current system. Equally, the timing of it has been determined by cross-party push by backbenchers on all sides of the house to ask the government to look into this issue.”

Dorries launched her campaign for the change alongside the Labour MP Frank Field. They are backed by the campaign group Right to Know, which has set up a website and Facebook page to promote the idea.

Dorries, a former nurse who says she is campaigning on the issue after witnessing botched terminations, says she does not oppose abortion. However, she has previously campaigned to reduce the abortion time limit and said that her explicit aim was to reduce the number of terminations, claiming that 60,000 could be prevented each year if women were given independent advice.

“The important thing is that the government have highlighted themselves and agreed that counselling by organisations that are paid to conduct the procedures is not independent. That’s the most important. That’s very reassuring. It validates the amendment and what we’re doing,” she told the Guardian.

“The abortion process is so fast – seven to 14 days. Women who do have doubts or niggles are on the other side before they have a chance to think it through. The majority may feel it’s fine but there are a growing number thinking it wasn’t what I wanted to do. As it gets faster and faster more women are falling off the edge. This is a women’s rights issue.”

Dorries said she did not know how the Right to Know campaign was being funded, claiming that it represented “hundreds” of people and was run by a lobbyist. She would not reveal the lobbyist’s name, or the other organisations the lobbyist represents but did say that she was receiving advice from Dr Peter Saunders, the head of the Christian Medical Fellowship.

Saunders led the Alive and Kicking campaign, a group of anti-abortion groups including the ProLife Alliance, which campaigned for an immediate cut in the abortion time limit, prohibition of abortion for “social convenience” and a cooling-off period.

Right to Know refused to reveal how it is funded, saying only that it relies mostly on individuals. A spokeswoman said: “This is a campaign that has attracted support from people of very different backgrounds and beliefs (including atheists) who simply share the common view that the support and information that women receive ahead of an abortion should be improved.”

Pro-choice supporters and charities such as the Family Planning Association, who are mounting a lobbying campaign of MPs, warn that the proposed amendment to the health bill would restrict women’s access to impartial and non-directive information . They also predict that the counselling role could be taken up by organisations ideologically opposed to abortion.

Ann Furedi, the chief executive of BPAS, said: “The thing I find most frustrating about this discussion is the assumption behind it that we want to encourage women towards the abortion option, rather than the option of continuing the pregnancy.

“Nothing could be further from the truth. I can say with hands on heart that the last thing that anyone involved in abortion wants is for a woman to be having treatment that they are not sure about. Everybody wants people to walk away feeling that the right thing has been done.”

The health and social care bill is due to be debated in the Commons when parliament returns next week, and a decision on whether to select the amendment – one of the first submitted – will be taken on 6 September.

Dorries claimed that private polling has suggested that up to 80% of MPs could back the amendment. All three parties confirmed that, as is traditional with matters of conscience, there would be a free vote on the issue.

Lib Dem sources said that they had not opposed the decision to introduce independent counselling within the DH but that the coalition agreed the legislation was unnecessary.

Cooper said: “These plans are based on prejudice rather than evidence. This could make it harder for women to get proper health advice and counselling when they need it most. Health ministers need to urgently think again. David Cameron should not put politics before the interests of women’s health and women’s lives.”

John Healey, the shadow health secretary, said the Labour health team would vote against Dorries’ amendment: “The Tory backbenchers are hijacking the health bill to make arguments that are entirely irrelevant to the huge and fundamental changes being made to the NHS. MPs will only get two days to debate the bill, and that limited time would be spent on more important matters than this amendment.”

A DH spokesperson said the department “wants women who are thinking about having an abortion to be able to have access to independent counselling. Work is under way currently to develop proposals … on which the department will consult externally”.

Article source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/28/anti-abortion-lobby-reforms

The gathering took place about two weeks after British Prime Minister David Cameron suggested that the government should impose limits on the “free flow of information” when it’s “used for ill.” “When people are using social media for violence, we need to stop them,” he said then.

Twitter took the brunt of the blame immediately following the violent rioting and looting in England. However, people mostly used private lines like BlackBerry Messenger to organize, rather than Twitter or Facebook, later reports found.

“RIM continues to maintain an open and positive dialogue with the UK authorities and continues to operate within the context of U.K. regulations,” a RIM spokeswoman said in a statement late Thursday. “It was a positive and productive meeting, and we were pleased to consult on the use of social media to engage and communicate during times of emergency.”

The U.K. was still entertaining the idea of limiting social media usage shortly before Thursday’s meeting. In a statement released beforehand, the Home Office said: “We are working with the police to see what action can be taken to prevent access to those services by customers identified as perpetrators of disorder or other criminal action.”

Instead of detailing plans to block criminals’ access to networks, police and government officials solicited advice from those in attendance about how to monitor the sites, the organizations said. Spokeswomen for the Home Office and for Facebook described the meeting as “constructive.”

“We welcome the fact that this was a dialog about working together to keep people safe rather than about imposing new restrictions on Internet services,” the Facebook spokeswoman said in a statement. She noted that Facebook already has rules in place to punish illegal activity on the site.

A Twitter spokeswoman said that governments and police rely on its service to distribute alerts. “We are always interested in exploring how we can make Twitter even more helpful and relevant during times of critical need,” she said in a statement after Thursday’s meeting.

Article source: http://rss.cnn.com/~r/rss/edition_world/~3/NEykdF2AMfA/index.html