Khalil Edney Wonder Shot Dedicated To Late Mum

A high school basketball player who pulled off an incredible match-winning shot just ahead of the buzzer, has dedicated his feat to his mother who died of cancer.

Khalil Edney's feet have barely touched the ground since he grabbed a loose ball for the miracle 55-footer to give New Rochelle a 61-60 victory over rival Mount Vernon in a New York sectional final.

The 17-year-old has had a ride in a limousine and a night in a Manhattan hotel, given numerous TV interviews and held a makeshift news conference since Sunday night.

Video of what has already become known as "The Shot" has become a sensation online, with high praise from the professionals.

Duke guard Seth Curry tweeted "Wow!" to go along with a YouTube link for Edney's heave, and New Rochelle alumni Ray Rice of the Baltimore Ravens also offered his congratulations online.

Edney knew who to thank at the news conference.

The teen - whose mother died from cervical cancer in 2006 when he was just 11 - showed off his tattoos, including "momma's boy", the date of her birth and the day she died.

Edney's father, Lewis said: "I thought his mother took it out of his hands and scored."

The winning sequence started when a New Rochelle pass was broken up and a Mount Vernon player tried to run out the clock by flipping the ball in the air.

But Edney brought it in and let fly for the win. The shot was initially waved off, but the referees eventually reversed the call.

The win sends New Rochelle to the state regional semifinals on Tuesday.

Their star player is still nursing a sprained ankle from before Sunday's game, but he is determined the buzz surrounding The Shot will not go to his head.

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India: Irom Sharmila Explains Hunger Strike

By Alex Rossi, India Correspondent

An Indian woman who has been on hunger strike for more than 12 years has told Sky News she will continue her protest despite being charged with attempting to commit suicide.

Irom Sharmila started her fast after she witnessed the killing of a group of civilians by Indian paramilitary forces in Manipur in November 2000.

The 40-year-old says she will never end her hunger strike unless the Indian government repeals a controversial piece of legislation called the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA).

She told Sky News: "I am a democratic citizen. I am a simple non-violent woman who wants a simple normal life."

"I am so determined to my cause. My struggle is very needed - whether it is difficult or easy does not matter."

The AFSPA gives Indian soldiers immunity from prosecution in areas where there is conflict.

In Manipur, a state in India's northeast, there has been an insurgency for the last five decades.

Ms Irom arrived at court flanked by tight security

A number of militant groups are demanding independence from India. 

Indian human rights groups claim the AFSPA is used by soldiers as legal cover to carry out torture and extrajudicial killings.

Ms Irom – who is known as the Iron Lady of Manipur by her supporters - has not eaten a solid meal for more than 12 years.

She is currently being held in judicial custody and is kept alive by being force fed twice a day through a tube in her nose.

Her diet consists of liquid carbohydrate, protein and a smattering of vitamins.

She was arrested three days after her hunger strike began but under Indian law has to be released every year to see if she will start eating again.

Protesters outside court backed Ms Irom's call for a change to the law

In 2006, while on release, she took her protest to the capital city Delhi but was arrested and charged with attempting to commit suicide under section 309 of the Indian penal code.

The case is only just coming to court now – the wheels of Indian justice turn very slowly.

Ms Irom told Sky News she does not want to commit suicide and that her protest is about "justice and peace".

She says it is no different to what Mahatma Gandhi did to end British rule in India.

The Iron Lady's struggle has been compared to that of Nelson Mandela and Aung San Suu Kyi.

She has been awarded a number of human rights awards over the years and in South Asia is seen as a symbol of female power.      

She has pleaded not guilty and may get another chance to give voice to her views when her trial begins on May 22.

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Greece Corruption: Ex-Defence Minister Jailed

By Anthee Carassava, In Athens

A former defence minister has been jailed for eight years by a Greek court for lying on his income statements and concealing a lavish lifestyle.

The conviction of Akis Tzohatzopoulos marks the second ruling against a Greek politician in as many weeks as part of what government officials call a "crusade" to stamp out decades of corruption and cronyism.

Once a powerful socialist politician who came within reach of becoming prime minister in the 1990s, Tzohatzopoulos will serve his sentence in Korydallos - the country's maximum-security prison.

He was also fined 520,000 euros (£447,000) for failing to declare a neo-classical mansion on the foot of the Acropolis when he purchased it in 2009.

Within hours of the ruling, the townhouse was seized by the state and the politician stripped of his voting rights for four years.

Deemed by authorities to be a flight risk, the 73-year-old has been jailed since April pending trial as prosecutors probed a series of allegations linked to fraudulent wealth he acquired while serving in key government posts in the 1990s.

He faces a separate criminal trial in May for allegedly accepting and then laundering 8m euros (£6.8m) in kickbacks in a scandal-marred defence deal which has Greece paying billions for faulty submarines.

Denying wrongdoing, Tsohatzopoulos claimed he was the victim of a political ploy outside the Athens courtroom.

He said: "Unfortunately not only was democracy not served but it was covered up, as the truth and reality.

"This leads to legal failure."

The case, which has captivated Greek people who blame much of the country's financial mess on feckless and corrupt politicians, comes weeks after another court sentenced former Thessaloniki mayor Vassilis Papageorgopoulos to life imprisonment for embezzling millions of euros from the state coffers.

The convictions could bode badly for another politician, former finance minister George Papaconstantinou, who is accused of removing the names of his relatives from a list of alleged tax evaders.

A congressional committee has until March 29 to issue its findings, expected to be the most damning against a high-profile politician in decades.

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Google Ivory Adverts 'Against Own Policies'

Google has been accused of helping to increase the demand for ivory by running adverts promoting the sale of the product.

The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) said illicit ivory traders in China and Thailand were benefiting from the killing of African elephants at record levels.

Google was a party to the trade because there were around 10,000 ads on Google Japan's shopping site that promote the sale of ivory, the conservation group said.

About 80% of the ads are for "hanko", small wooden stamps that are widely used in Japan to affix signature seals to official documents. The rest are carvings and other small objects.

Hanko are used for everything from renting a house to opening a bank account. The stamps are legal, and are typically inlaid with ivory lettering.

The EIA said Japan's hanko sales were a "major demand driver" for elephant ivory and had contributed to the widescale resumption of elephant poaching across Africa.

It said it had written a letter in February to Google CEO Larry Page urging the company to remove the ads because they violate Google's own policies but Google had neither answered nor taken down the adverts.

Over the past 70 years, millions of elephants have been slaughtered

"While elephants are being mass slaughtered across Africa to produce ivory trinkets, it is shocking to discover that Google, with the massive resources it has at its disposal, is failing to enforce its own policies designed to help protect endangered elephants," said EIA president Allan Thorton.

In an email to the AP news agency, Google said: "Ads for products obtained from endangered or threatened species are not allowed on Google. As soon as we detect ads that violate our advertising policies, we remove them."

Curbing the trade in so-called "blood ivory" is at the top of the agenda of the 178-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or Cites, which is meeting in Bangkok this week to discuss how to protect the planet's biodiversity by regulating the legal trade of flora and fauna and clamping down on smuggling.

In a video message played at the opening of the summit, the Duke of Cambridge urged delegates to do more to tackle the illegal killing of the African elephant and rhino.

 "We must do more to combat this serious crime if we are to reverse the current alarming trends. If not, we could soon see some populations of these creatures, or even an entire species, disappear from the wild," he said.

"We simply must not let this catastrophe unfold. Our children should have the same opportunity that we have to experience wildlife in its many beautiful and varied forms."

Around 70 years ago, up to five million elephants are believed to have roamed sub-Saharan Africa. Now, just several hundred thousand are left.

Over the past few years, as Asian economies have grown and demand for ivory has risen, the slaughter of elephants has reached its worst level in more than two decades.

Last year alone, some 32,000 elephants were killed in Africa, according to the Born Free Foundation, which says black-market ivory sells for around $1,300 (£858) per pound. Much of it ends up as tourist trinkets and carvings.

Cites banned the international ivory trade in 1989, but the move did not address domestic markets.

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Kenya Elections: Deputy PM Has Early Lead

Kenya's deputy prime minister, who faces charges at the International Criminal Court (ICC), took an early lead on Tuesday as votes were counted following the presidential election.

With around a third of ballots counted, early results showed Uhuru Kenyatta ahead with 54% of the vote, with Prime Minister Raila Odinga behind on 41%.

Few votes have been counted from Mr Odinga's stronghold, the western city of Kisumu.

Long queues formed around the country on Monday as voters went to the ballot box. Election officials estimate that turnout was around 70% of 14 million registered voters.

Masai wait to cast their ballot papers near the town of Magadi

Attacks by separatists on the coast killed 19 people on election day, and other attacks were seen near the border with Somalia.

Kenya's capital, Nairobi, was quiet on Tuesday and no more violence had been reported in the country.

Mr Kenyatta faces ICC allegations he helped orchestrate post-election violence in 2007-2008, when more than 1,000 people were killed.

The US has warned of "consequences" if he wins, as have several European countries.

Because Mr Kenyatta is an ICC indictee, both the US and Europe have said they might have to limit contact with him even if he is president.

After Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki was hastily named the winner of Kenya's 2007 vote, supporters of Mr Odinga took to the streets in protest which led to two months of tribe-on-tribe attacks.

As well as more than 1,000 deaths, more than 600,000 people were forced from their homes.

Officials have been working to ensure that level of violence does not return to the election cycle.

Both candidates have pledged to accept the results of a freely contested vote.

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Bolshoi Acid Attack: Star's Home Searched

By Katie Stallard, Moscow Correspondent

Russian police are searching the home of a star of the Bolshoi Ballet in connection with the acid attack on the company's artistic director.

Sergei Filin is currently being treated in Germany, where surgeons are attempting to save as much of his sight as possible after the attack in January almost blinded him.

Officers were in the apartment of soloist Pavel Dmitrichenko, known for his roles as tsar Ivan the Terrible and Evil Villain in Swan Lake, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

The ministry announced separately on Tuesday that it had detained a suspect in the attack and was searching his home.

The LifeNews website, which has close links to the city's police, quoted a source as saying that the suspect had been seized during an early morning operation in Moscow's suburbs, and that searches were under way at several addresses in the Stupino area.

It said the suspect was arrested in connection with the sulphuric acid attack on Mr Filin and that investigations were ongoing to find out who had ordered it.

Mr Filin had sulphuric acid thrown in his face outside his Moscow apartment

The source said the suspect had been traced through mobile phone records after a search of mobile activity close to Mr Filin's address around the time of the assault.

The 42-year-old artistic director was attacked on January 17 outside his Moscow apartment.

Speaking from his hospital bed shortly afterwards, he said he was sure the incident was linked to his work at the Bolshoi - one of the world's oldest ballet companies.

Last month, the ballet postponed its production of Stravinsky's The Rite Of Spring and in January, leading ballerina Svetlana Lunkina fled to Canada after receiving unconnected threats.

The case has focused attention on the bitter rivalries within the ballet world.

Colleagues have said the attack could be in retaliation for Mr Filin's selection of certain dancers over others for prized roles.

The Bolshoi has been plagued by intrigue and infighting that has led to the departure of several artistic directors over the past few years.

Katerina Novikova, a spokeswoman for the Bolshoi Theatre, said the management was not aware of a conflict between Mr Dmitrichenko and Mr Filin and had no information about the purpose of the search.

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Deadly Florida Sinkhole Is Finally Revealed

The deadly sinkhole that swallowed a man at his home in Florida has been uncovered by demolition teams.

The remaining walls of the house were knocked down on Monday and debris was dragged towards the street to reveal the crater in Seffner, about 15 miles east of Tampa.

The authorities estimate that it now measures 30 feet (9m) across and between 30 and 100ft (30m) deep.

It has become the final resting place of Jeff Bush, whose body was never recovered after the sinkhole opened up under his bedroom on Thursday night.

The remaining walls of the Bush family home are torn down

Five other family members who were in the house escaped unharmed.

During a brief ceremony on Monday afternoon, the 37-year-old's family placed a teddy bear, a photo, notes and flowers into the bucket of a digger which dropped them into the makeshift grave.

Then the first load of gravel to stabilise the hole was poured on top.

Jeremy Bush, 35, who tried to save his brother thanked rescuers and salvage teams, but also suggested they could have "tried harder".

Jeremy Bush said more could have been done for his brother

"I tried my hardest to get you out, brother," he said through his tears at a news conference.

"I think I'm the only one that really tried to get you out. They said the ground was too unstable to do anything, but they got all this heavy equipment on there, pulling stuff out and everyone's cheering for everything that's coming out of the house. I've had enough of the cheering."

Rescue teams had halted all recovery efforts on Saturday when the site became too unstable.

Two neighbouring houses have been evacuated and could also be condemned.

Florida is highly prone to sinkholes because there are caverns below ground of limestone, a porous rock that easily dissolves in water.

A new smaller sinkhole opens up in Seffner. Pic: WTSP-TV

A second hole was reported about three miles away from the Bush family's home on Monday but aside from a piece of fence, there was no serious damage and nobody was hurt.

It is the loss of life that makes the Seffner case so highly unusual and tragic.

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Costa Concordia Victims' Last Moments Revealed

By Nick Pisa, Sky Reporter

Details of the final moments of the 32 people who died in the Costa Concordia cruise ship tragedy have emerged in a prosecution report.

The 60-page document makes up the official request to have captain Francesco Schettino - who was in charge at the time - sent for trial.

He is accused of multiple manslaughter, causing a disaster, failing to inform authorities of what had happened and abandoning ship while dozens of passengers were still onboard.

More than 4,000 passengers and crew were onboard the doomed Costa Concordia when it struck rocks after Schettino allegedly changed course in order to carry out a sail-by salute of a Mediterranean island to impress holidaymakers.

Victims of the Costa Concordia disaster

The 70-metre gash allowed water to pour in and the ship eventually capsized and came to rest on its side at a location known as Seagull Point, just outside the harbour on the island of Giglio in January last year, hours into a seven-day cruise.

The chaotic scenes of panic and disorganisation that gripped the ship as it started to sink are evident throughout the report.

In one part, Francecso Verusio relives the moment when the youngest victim of the disaster, five-year-old Dayana Arlotti, and her father, William, drowned.

Mr Verusio wrote that they died ''because they were unable to find any space in a lifeboat on deck four, on the left-hand side, and they were then directed to the right-hand side by crew members on the same deck but as they were crossing the inside corridor ... they fell into a hole that had been created when the ship rolled onto its right side.

"They dropped into an area that was already flooded and they died from drowning," he added.

Relatives of the victims staged a memorial last month

Other stories include that of bartender Erika Fani Soria Molinala, who fell from a lifeboat as it pulled away from the Concordia but as she was not wearing a lifejacket she was dragged underwater from the current created as the Concordia tilted on its side.

It also emerged that holidaymaker Maria D'Introno - whose body has yet to be recovered - was told to get out of a lifeboat because it was too full and the tilt of the ship made it impossible to launch safely.

She was later seen terrified by the edge of the ship, jumping into the water without a lifejacket despite not being able to swim.

The last moments of musician Giuseppe Girolamo are described in another section of the report.

It emerged he had been directed to the right-hand side of the boat to get into a lifeboat and had actually got into one when he decided to give up his place - only to later drown.

The prosecution report also details how Schettino was distracted by the ''inopportune presence of unauthorised persons'' on the bridge of the Concordia, including several crew members and passenger hostess Domnica Cemortan - who was seen enjoying dinner with the captain minutes before the ship struck the rocks.

It also details how Schettino was distracted as he was speaking on the telephone while he was ''in close proximity to the coast in a dangerous situation and with the helm under manual control".

Francesco Schettino said he "tripped and fell" into a lifeboat

It goes on to list 157 passengers who are suffering from post-traumatic stress following the disaster.

Schettino, 52, has insisted he is innocent of all charges and that the rocks were not marked on his charts. He says he should be thanked as his actions in steering the ship back towards the port at Giglio saved hundreds of lives.

However, he was ridiculed by the world's media after it emerged he had told coastguards he "tripped and fell" into a lifeboat as the Concordia began to list to one side, while recordings later emerged of him refusing orders to get back onboard and co-ordinate the rescue efforts.

Some other crew members also face charges, as do management figures from the company Costa Cruises, which owns the ship that is still lying on its side and not expected to be removed until September at the earliest.

The initial part of the trial is expected to last a week and once again will take place in a theatre in the town of Grosseto.

Prosecutors have also requested the indictment of five other crew members, including two officers Ciro Ambrosio and Silvio Coronica and the Concordia's helmsman Jacob Rusli.

In an unusual move, Mr Verusio has posted details of the case on a Facebook site in various languages and invited those who may have a claim to contact him.

It has also emerged that Costa Cruises asked for a plea-bargaining agreement, which would see them pay a fine of one million euros. They insist Schettino is solely to blame.

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Lamb Of God's Blythe Cleared Over Fan's Death

The frontman of US heavy metal band Lamb of God has been cleared of causing a teenage fan's death at a concert in the Czech Republic.

Randy Blythe was charged last December in Prague with causing bodily harm to another person with lethal consequences.

He was accused of pushing the 19-year-old man from the stage during a 2010 concert at the city's Abaton club.

The man fell into a coma and later died of a head injury.

Randy Blythe cools off during a gig in Sydney last year

The 41-year-old singer had pleaded not guilty. His manager said they would fight the charges vigorously.

The court spokeswoman, Marketa Puci, confirmed Tuesday's ruling by Prague's Municipal Court.

The state prosecutors, who had demanded a five-year prison term for Blythe, have appealed the verdict.

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Ikea Pulls Almond Cakes Over 'Faecal' Bacteria

Ikea has pulled a batch of almond cakes from its restaurants in 23 countries after bacteria normally found in faecal matter was discovered.

Chinese authorities confirmed that the Swedish-made cakes had failed tests "for containing excessive levels of coliform bacteria", the Shanghai Daily website wrote.

The Swedish furniture giant said 1,800 Taarta Chokladkrokant cakes – described on its website as an almond cake with chocolate, butter cream and butterscotch – were destroyed in December after being intercepted by Chinese customs.

"These cakes never reached our stores," said Ikea spokeswoman YIva Magnusson.

"There are indications that the levels of bacteria found are low but we obviously have to know the exact amount, and find out how this happened," she added.

Ikea told Sky News that the countries affected do not include the UK.

A microbiologist at the Swedish National Food Agency, Mats Lindblad, said coliform bacteria "could be an indication of faecal contamination though not always".

He said the bacteria was not normally dangerous for consumers.

Last week, Ikea pulled its trademark meatballs off the shelves in 25 countries after Czech authorities found traces of horse DNA in a batch of 1kg bags of frozen meatballs.

"It's very important to us that the products our customers buy are safe and secure to use and to eat," Ms Magnusson said.

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