Oct 27, 8:36 AM (ET) WARSAW (Reuters) - A Sudanese woman gave birth on a tram in the center of Poland's capital, ensuring instant celebrity for her baby daughter, Polish media reported on Thursday.
Duha Ismail -- whose first name means "light" -- was welcomed to the world on Wednesday by photographers' flashbulbs and the scribbling pens of reporters. Warsaw Mayor Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz later visited her in the hospital.
"I was coming back from a meeting when suddenly the pain came," said Duha's mother, Sulafa Ismail, looking happy and healthy in a bright red turban, according to PAP news agency. "Everything happened so fast." City officials will debate a proposal on Thursday to award Duha free lifetime access to Warsaw's public transport. Sulafa Ismail, 37, came to Poland to study medicine 17 years ago, according to Polish media. She has lived in Warsaw for five years.
Oct 25, 10:21 AM (ET) VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - A Canadian city under pressure for alleged sexual harassment within its fire department has ordered firefighters to wear only boxer-style underwear.
Richmond, British Columbia will spend C$16,000 ($14,200) to buy six pairs of underwear for each firefighter in a bid to make firehalls in the suburb of Vancouver more gender neutral, a newspaper reported on Tuesday. "We supply firefighters with various pieces of gear such as gloves, now it's underwear," city official Ted Townsend told the Vancouver Sun, saying it was part of the "integration of the sexes in the workplace." A recent investigation of the department described its workplace culture as "characterized by juvenile and hostile behavior" toward female firefighters by their male colleagues. Firefighters strip off most of their clothes in order to don protective gear when responding to fire alarms, although Townsend said the city is considering buying gear that can be put on over regular uniforms.
Oct 27, 8:35 AM (ET) By Karen Lema MANILA (Reuters) - In the crowded sprawl of Manila, the living must compete for space with the dead. Fortunately for Virginia Bernardino and hundreds of other slum dwellers who have moved into the largest cemetery in the Philippines, the deceased don't seem to mind. "So far we have not seen any ghosts here," the soft-spoken Bernardino, 59, said with a chuckle. "I think that only happens in the movies. As the saying goes, we should fear not the dead but the living."
For years, Manila North Cemetery, a public graveyard in the center of the capital of 12 million people, has been a thriving community for those evicted from their homes or flocking from the provinces for better opportunities in the big city.
After being forced from their state lot beside the cemetery to make way for a new graveyard, Bernardino and her husband have converted her mother-in-law's mausoleum into a home for their two sons, their wives and children.
Living conditions are basic but the residents manage some creature comforts. Clothes hang from lines strung among the makeshift shacks and television sets flicker in a few homes with electricity stolen from nearby power lines.
POPULATION PRESSURE
The mainly Roman Catholic country, now home to more than 86 million people, has one of the fastest population growth rate in Asia at 2.36 percent, or 5,400 babies born each day.
The incessant search for jobs and accompanying migration to cities has worsened problems of poverty, poor sanitation and urban decay.
A visit to Manila North Cemetery raises serious questions about government boasts that the economy is ready for take-off.
The squatters try to make a living by painting and cleaning gravestones and tombs. Others, like Bernardino's husband and children, have found work outside the cemetery in casual labor.
Small children run through the rock-filled lanes in bare feet, their faces and thin bodies covered with dirt.
"They already know that they should not make homes out of cemeteries," said Dr. Eduardo Serrano, head of the Manila Health Department's preventable diseases division.
"It's dangerous to their health. The problem is they are being asked to leave but they keep on coming back," he said.
The country's housing shortage is expected to worsen as the population continues to grow to a projected 142 million by 2040.
The high birth rate is tied to the strong influence of the Catholic Church, which frowns on the use of contraceptives such as condoms and birth-control pills.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, who survived an impeachment attempt last year and an alleged coup plot in February, relies on the support of the Church and shows no signs of reversing her emphasis on natural family planning over artificial methods.
THE COST OF DYING
v On All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day, Catholic feasts on November 1 and 2, cemeteries across the Philippines come alive as people pay their respects to departed loved ones.
The holiday has also become a reunion for families, with graveyards transformed into picnic grounds for the two days.
But for Bernardino and her neighbors, the annual event could spell trouble. Richard Navarra, one of the cemetery's caretakers, said the squatters would be asked to leave to make way for the crowds of visitors.
Manila North Cemetery, laid out in 1904, is the final resting place for a number of Filipino figures, from presidents and senators to popular actors.
Like their prominence in life, their tombs celebrate their passing with lavish splendor -- a stark contrast to the lives of the poor seeking shelter among the graves.
And for many of those buried in public cemeteries, dying does not always mean resting in peace.
That is the lesson relatives of Herminia Lumindas have learned as they wait anxiously for the caretakers to remove a coffin from the tomb where they will bury her.
Many public cemeteries allow the use of certain grave sites for only five years.
"What can we do?" Luminda's nephew Adriano said as he lit a candle. "We don't have a choice because we do not have money to buy our own lot."
Law Enforcement: This Week's Corrupt Cops Stories http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/459/drug_police_corruption
Ho-hum, the banality of drug war-related law enforcement corruption. More crooked cops trying to rip-off drug dealers, another one trying to rip-off his own department, and, of course, yet another prison guard trying to earn a few bucks on the side. Also notable this week is an overview of corruption along the US-Mexico border in the Los Angeles Times. It's well worth checking out, too.
In Chicago, two Chicago police officers trying to rip off what they thought was a drug dealer's cash stash went down in a sting operation Wednesday, according to the Associated Press. Officers Richard Doroniuk, 30, and Mahmoud "Mike" Shamah, 27, used information from a co-defendant to obtain search warrants to search self-storage lockers. In two raids, they stole $31,100 in what they thought was drug money, reporting no cash seizure in the first raid and only reporting part of the cash in the second, but the money had actually been placed in the lockers by the FBI and Chicago police internal affairs investigators. Doroniuk, Shamah, and their co-conspirator have now been charged with conspiring to steal government funds.
In Columbia, South Carolina, the Associated Press reported October 19 that a former York County deputy has been busted for ripping-off $1,200 in cash that was supposed to be used in undercover drug deals. William Graham, 37, worked in the county's special drug unit and was in charge of keeping track of those funds. Instead he pocketed them. Now, he has confessed and repaid the money, but still faces charges of embezzlement of public funds and misconduct in office.
In Inez, Kentucky, a federal prison guard was indicted for taking $3,000 for smuggling drugs to a prison inmate, the Associated Press reported Wednesday. Guard Alice Marie Stapleton, 30, now faces seven counts of drug possession and conspiracy to smuggle contraband into the prison. According to the indictment, a prisoner's mother delivered heroin and marijuana to Stapleton at a local motel and Stapleton smuggled them into the prison. The prisoner in question has already pleaded guilty to being part of the conspiracy, and his mother and her driver are preparing to do the same, so it looks like the state will have the witnesses it needs to convict Stapleton.
