Mandela visits London for birthday events
Mandela visits London for birthday events
LONDON — Nelson Mandela is in London for a week of events to celebrate his 90th birthday.
The former South African president’s is due to attend an outdoor concert in his honor in Hyde Park on Friday.
Proceeds from the concert will go to the 46664 charity, the AIDS charity named for the number Mandela wore while imprisoned by South Africa’s apartheid authorities.
Mandela, who turns 90 on July 18, has visited London many times, and has expressed gratitude to the city for the constant vigil that was held outside the South African Embassy during the apartheid years.
He was released in 1990 after 27 years behind bars and was elected South Africa’s first black president in 1994.
McCain targets energy
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Republican John McCain said Tuesday the federal government should practice the energy efficiency he preaches, pledging as president to switch official vehicles to green technologies and do the same for office buildings.
Expanding upon his ideas to address the nation’s energy crisis, the Arizona senator also called for a redesign of the national power grid so power is better distributed where it’s needed and the country has the capacity to run electric vehicles that he wants automakers to supply.
McCain drives a 2003 Cadillac CTS, a sedan the Environmental Protection Agency says gets 16 to 24 miles per gallon and emits about 9.6 tons of greenhouse gases annually.
Bill Clinton offers to help
WASHINGTON — Former President Clinton on Tuesday offered to help Barack Obama win the White House, although what work he’ll do for his wife’s former rival remained uncertain.
The Obama campaign is still smarting over some of Bill Clinton’s criticism in the primary race, while the last Democratic president remains a popular political draw.
But before the two can work together, they have to speak.
Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton have taken steps to join efforts in the last three weeks.
Problems for hospitals
CHICAGO — Wireless systems used by many hospitals to keep track of medical equipment can cause potentially deadly breakdowns in lifesaving devices such as breathing and dialysis machines, researchers reported Tuesday in a study that warned hospitals to conduct safety tests.
Some of the microchip-based “smart” systems are touted as improving patient safety, but a Dutch study of equipment — without the patients — suggests the systems could actually cause harm.
The wireless systems send out radio waves that can interfere with equipment such as respirators, external pacemakers and kidney dialysis machines, according to the study.
Monet sale exceeds $80M
LONDON — A water lily painting by Claude Monet sold for more than $80 million Tuesday, breaking the auction record for the French impressionist artist, Christie’s said.
“Le bassin aux nymph as,” or “Water Lily Pond,” which sold for $80,451,178, was part of a four-work collection of water lily paintings that Monet put up for sale during his lifetime.
The four large-scale paintings of Monet’s water lily garden were signed and dated by the artist in 1919.
One of the other paintings is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, while another was sold at auction in 1992 for $12.1 million and is in a private collection.
The final painting in the series was cut into two before World War II.
Probe focuses on police
MEXICO CITY — Police shoved terrified youths trying to leave the News Devine nightclub back into the face of a deadly stampede that killed a dozen people, including three officers and a 13-year-old girl, prosecutors said Tuesday.
The initial investigation suggests that bad conditions at the club, including overcrowding, and police errors caused the tragedy Friday, Mexico City Prosecutor Rodolfo Felix Cardenas said.
The club’s narrow entrance became a death trap as patrons were crushed and asphyxiated by the crowd, according to witness accounts.
The emergency exit was locked.
Associated Press