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Remarks made by Iranian foreign minister signal Tehran won't agree to dismantle atomic facilities in talks with world powers on final settlement of decade-old dispute over its nuclear activity.By ReutersNEW DELHI - Iran is willing to address international concerns about its atomic activities but will keep its nuclear program "intact", not close it down, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Thursday. His remarks signaled that Tehran will not agree to dismantle any of its atomic facilities in talks with six world powers on a final settlement of the decade-old dispute over its nuclear activity. Related: Those negotiations got under...

LONDON: Indian military is among the least gay-friendly in the world, while Britain's military is the second most homosexuality-friendly. The first-ever global ranking of countries by inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) service members in the armed forces brought out by the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies ranked more than 100 armed forces by inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender personnel. India is in the bottom half of the list recording only 34 out of 100 in its LGBT score while New Zealand's military, which was found to be the most gay-friendly in the world top scored...

Father of Murdered Woman Says Husband Admitted to Previous Murder Feb. 22, 2014 By GILLIAN MOHNEY PHOTO: Erin W. Willinger is shown in this Facebook photo. The father of an American woman killed in India said she was in the process of dissolving her marriage, when she was allegedly killed by her estranged husband. Erin Willinger, 30, was found stabbed to death on Thursday by the side of the road in Agra, India, the home of the Taj Mahal. Her husband, Bunty Sharma, was suspected of killing her, but killed himself the same day by exploding a can of cooking...

The Indian Air Force has dropped a bomb with its alarming admission that it will be difficult for it to tackle a combined threat from China and Pakistan, raising questions about the country's ability to fight a two-front war. Advertisement The IAF has told a Parliamentary panel that Pakistan would certainly fish in troubled waters if China were to launch offensive operations against India. It, however, stressed that China may not pose "a collusive threat" if hostilities were to break out between India and Pakistan. Setting off alarm bells, a senior IAF officer informed the Parliamentary standing committee on defence...

Hard-sells fully operational combat model at Defexpo Mumbai, February 12: Even as the Indian Army has entered the global market to buy short-range surface-to-air missile defence systems, Russia is keen to offer its anti-missile system Tor-M2KM to India, with the latter slated to undergo a series of tests. Exhibited outside of Russia for the first time, a fully operational combat model of the Tor-M2KM anti missile system was displayed at the Defexpo-2014 exhibition held in Delhi recently. Defence purchases have risen from just over $200 million in 2001 to over $14 billion currently. As part of the recently announced tender...

The Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) is giving the final touches to the preliminary design of the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas Mk-II, scheduled to be completed by the end of March. An official confirmed to Express on Saturday that the detailed design phase of LCA Mk-2 would begin in the second quarter of 2014. A separate project team from ADA and Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL), dedicated to the upgraded version, is currently undertaking daily reviews to get the first cut of the design out by next month. The main scope of Tejas Mk-2 programme is to have the engine changed...

Link only - Angry Residents Wave Pitchforks, Torches In Protest Of Mayor's Crackdown On Homelessness

<p>Defense relations between India and Israel have come a long way, against all odds. Israel has emerged as India’s second-largest arms supplier, behind only Russia, with bilateral arms trade over the last decade estimated at $10 billion. 2013 witnessed major developments in India-Israel defense cooperation, most of which involved enhancing arms trade and furthering joint projects. There were certain constraints as well, none of which curbed ties.</p>

Wendy Doniger, a 'Hindu Scholar' at the University of Chicago, has had her book banned, or interrupted, by Indian authorities because it denigrates the Hindu religion. This is a long article and I am still reading it myself, but, having been a UofChicago Student myself in a previous life, I had to go to a 'meet the faculty' dinner and listen to this woman speak; in which, she spent two hours talking about the sexual practices of a village in India she visited. This, I guess, gives her as a UofChicago demigod the capacity to speak for the entire Hindu...

February 08, 2014: Delayed by over four years, but this one is truly better late than never. In what will be a significant boost to the Indian Navy’s quest for a credible air defence system deployable on its frontline vessels and aircraft carriers, the Indo-Israeli long-range surface-to-air missile (LR-SAM) system will be tested in a naval configuration towards the end of this year, reveals the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) Chief Dr Avinash Chander. The missile underwent a first test from a land launcher in 2010, and has since been tested an unspecified number of times. The collaborative programme,...

Research Triangle Park, N.C. — Dispatches from the firing line at IBM: "People broke down after seeing the inhuman treatment. Laptops along with the cases were confiscated, so several employees were seen crying and exiting building carrying and balancing their personal belongings with their two hands." "IBM STG INDIA is doing RA and it is very deep and numbers are huge." "Just heard from a colleague in Bangalore that job cuts there have begun. Workers asked to leave on the spot. He claims 6 out of 23 people in his department." RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. - IBM's latest $1 billion...

The much-awaited Mumbai monorail was inaugurated by Maharashtra's Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan and Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Saturday. The service will be open to the public on Sunday, making Mumbai the first Indian city to ever use such a transport facility. The monorail service that will link the city to major stations will begin its first phase of 8.93 km between Wadala and Chembur in the eastern fringes of the Commercial Capital. The second phase (to be completed in 2015) will cover a distance of 11.2 km and will include the following 11 stations: Chinchpokli, Chembur Naka, Wadala...

Of lasting genes and lost cities of Tamil Nadu Papri Sri Raman (Indo-Asian News Service) Chennai, January 5 India's East Coast, especially along Tamil Nadu, is increasingly drawing the attention of archaeologists and anthropologists from across the world for its evolutionary and historical secrets. The focus has sharpened after genetic scientist Spencer Wells found strains of genes in some communities of Tamil Nadu that were present in the early man of Africa. In the "Journey of Man" aired by the National Geographic channel, Wells says the first wave of migration of early man from Africa took place 60,000 years ago...

It's boom time at Jaguar Land Rover's Halewood Body & Assembly facility on Merseyside, the northernmost tip of the Tata Motors empire, the Indian giant that has coaxed a pair of venerable British car brands into performing one of the most dramatic U-turns in recent corporate history. Despite the 4,500-odd miles between it and Tata Motors Group's famously modest HQ on Homi Mody Street in Mumbai, the influence of the firm and its patriarch, Ratan Tata - who has made his fortune extracting value out of businesses that others failed to spot - is clear. JLR's assets, both human and...

It looks as though Indian combat aircraft are going to continue flying for many years to come with Israeli designator pods. A Rafael official confirmed to Air&Cosmos during the Defexpo Show that the company’s Litening G4 had been selected last year following an IAF call for tenders for 164 pods to equip its entire fleet of fighter-bombers. Deliveries under this huge order (the largest ever recorded outside the US, according to Rafael) are expected to get under way by the end of this year. When completed, they will bring the total number of Litening pods in IAF service to approximately...

Shiva Keshavan, a 31-year-old luge athlete participating in his fifth Olympic Games, falls off his sled but manages to remain calm and regain control to finish his practice run. - See more at: http://www.nbcolympics.com/video/indian-luger-shiva-keshavan-crashes-then-makes-amazing-save?ctx=top-moments#sthash.oeKMH3zj.dpuf

As part of TATA’S strategy to enhance the scope of its defense business Tata Motors HAS showcased the ‘Kestrel’, an 8×8 wheeled armored amphibious VEHICLE platform providing protected mobility and firepower to the troops. The Kestrel, designed by the DRDO was unveiled yesterday by TATA Motors. Photo: Noam Eshel, defense Update The vehicle is designed as a Light Armoured High Mobility Vehicle (LAMV), functioning as a recon scout vehicle, moving ahead of the armored columns. The vehicle was designed by the Indian Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). Supacat of the UK, an expert in tactical armored vehicles, has also...

MOSCOW, February 6 (RIA Novosti) – Russian shipbuilders could adopt the design of submarines for an upcoming Indian tender to accommodate Brahmos missiles and an Indian-made air-independent propulsion system, the Rubin design bureau said Thursday. Russia is planning to offer its fourth-generation Amur-1650 boats in India’s $ prospective 11.8-billion tender for the supply of six “stealth” diesel-electric submarines. France, Germany and Spain have also said they will take part in the tender, which the Indian Defense Ministry is expected to open in the near future. “We have considered arming Amur-1650 with vertical launchers, and have made significant progress in designing...

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) last week unearthed a Harappan seal from Karanpura in the Hanumangarh district of Rajasthan. “The seal consists of two Harappan characters, with a typical unicorn as the motif and a pipal leaf depicted in front of an animal. There is a knob behind the seal,” says VN Prabhakar, superintending archaeologist, who led the ASI team. Maintaining that the discovery ‘confirms’ that the site belongs to the mature Harappan period, the time when the civilization was at its peak (2600 BC to 1900 BC), he said: “A cubicle chert weight was also unearthed in a...

The Black Death of the 14th century may be written into the DNA of survivors' descendants, new research finds. The study reveals that Roma people (sometimes known as gypsies, although this is considered a derogatory term) and white Europeans share alterations to their genetic code that occurred after the Roma settled in Europe from northwest India 1,000 years ago. The plague of the 1300s, which killed at least 75 million people, is a likely candidate for forcing this evolutionary change. "We show that there are some immune receptors that are clearly influenced by evolution in Europe and not in northwest...