Harry Redknapp charged with £40,000 tax evasion

Tottenham Hotspur manager Harry Redknapp has been charged with two counts of tax evasion.

Mr Redknapp, 62, was charged with cheating the public revenue of about £40,000 at Bishopsgate police station.

It relates to two payments totalling US $295,000 allegedly made by former Portsmouth chairman Milan Mandaric to Mr Redknapp via a Monaco bank account.

Mr Mandaric was charged with tax evasion on Tuesday and both men are due before magistrates next month.

Mr Mandaric, 71, is currently the chairman of Leicester City.

A Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) spokesman said: "The CPS Revenue and Customs Division decided there was sufficient evidence and it was in the public interest to charge Mr Redknapp.
"He is jointly charged with Milan Mandaric, the former chairman of Portsmouth Football Club, following an investigation by the City of London Police and HM Revenue and Customs."

A CPS spokesman told that, as a common law offence, there is technically no maximum sentence for the charge - meaning that an unlimited fine or prison sentence could be decided at a judge's discretion.

Ian Burton, his solicitor, said: "Harry has co-operated fully with investigators during the course of this inquiry and is confident of a successful outcome to these court proceedings."

Mr Burton, of law firm BurtonCopeland, added: "The £40,000 figure is our estimate."

The charges relate to Mr Redknapp's time as Portsmouth manager.

It is alleged he evaded tax and national insurance contributions between 1 April 2002 and 28 November 2007.

Mr Redknapp was originally arrested in November 2007 by investigators looking at deals between Portsmouth and Birmingham City.

At the time he accused the police of targeting him simply because of his high profile.

'Non-football matter'

He left the club in 2008 to join his current employer.

Tottenham Hotspur have previously said the case will not affect his employment because it was a private, non-football matter and pre-dated his tenure at the club.


Following the charges, a spokesman for the club told : "His position remains unaffected and it is a private matter."

Since taking over at Tottenham Mr Redknapp has guided the club from the threat of relegation to contention for European qualification this season.

Portsmouth are mired in financial difficulties and have been unable to pay players on several occasions.
Portsmouth chief executive Peter Storrie was also questioned during the 26-month police inquiry about the transfer of former player Amdy Faye to the club from French side Auxerre for £1.5m in August 2003.

Mr Storrie was subsequently charged with concealing a signing-on fee during the deal by paying it into the midfielder's bank account. He is due to appear at Southwark Crown Court on 20 January.

Birmingham City's former managing director Karren Brady and former co-owner David Sullivan were also investigated by police, but no further action was taken against them.

Mr Redknapp is due to appear at the City of Westminster Magistrates' Court on 11 February.

In May 2008 Mr Redknapp sued City of London Police for arresting him and searching his home in Poole, Dorset.

The High Court ruled the search was unlawful and granted him £1,000 in damages.

Dexter star Michael C. Hall battles cancer

Actor Michael C. Hall, who stars in US TV show Dexter, has announced that he has been battling cancer and is in remission from the disease.

The 38-year-old said he had been diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, which he described as a "treatable and curable condition".
His spokesman said Hall was in complete remission but would continue treatment.

In his award-nominated role, he plays Dexter Morgan, a Miami police analyst who moonlights as a serial killer.

In a statement to People magazine, Hall said: "I feel fortunate to have been diagnosed with an imminently [sic] treatable and curable condition, and I thank my doctors and nurses for their expertise and care".

Hall, who also starred in the long-running US drama Six Feet Under, still plans to attend Sunday's Golden Globes, with his wife Jennifer Carpenter - who plays his sister on the show.

He is nominated for best dramatic actor, while the show is on the shortlist for best drama.

A fifth series of Dexter is due to go into production later in the year.

Space station needs 'extension to 2020'

Europe wants a decision in 2010 on an extension to the life of the International Space Station (ISS).

At the moment, no programme for its use nor any funding has been put in place to support the platform beyond 2015.
But the European Space Agency's (Esa) Director General, Jean-Jacques Dordain, told the uncertainty was undermining best use of the ISS.

He said he was persuaded of its worth, and expressed the desire to keep flying the station until at least 2020.

Only by guaranteeing longevity would more scientists come forward to run experiments on the orbiting laboratory, he argued.

"I am convinced that stopping the station in 2015 would be a mistake because we cannot attract the best scientists if we are telling them today 'you are welcome on the space station but you'd better be quick because in 2015 we close the shop'," he said.

The weightless environment on the station enables scientists to study systems and processes without the bias of gravity. Already it is providing new insights into infectious and degenerative diseases, and is expected to return new knowledge in a host of other fields as well, such as materials science.

But scientists needed time to run their experiments, Mr Dordain said.

The ISS project is a partnership of five - the US, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada.

Budget consideration

One of the biggest issues holding up an agreement on station-life extension is the human spaceflight review ordered by US President Barack Obama.

The Americans are developing a new vision for space exploration, and the rockets and spacecraft they will need to implement it. The future of US participation in the ISS is intimately tied to the outcome of the review.

Mr Dordain said no one partner in the ISS project could unilaterally call an end to the platform. A meeting would be held in Japan later in the year where he hoped the partners could get some clarity going forward.

"The decision must be taken early enough to put the budget in place, to build the hardware necessary and to decide on which transportation policy we shall use between 2015 and 2020. There are lot of aspects to be discussed and if decisions are not taken by the end of this year - beginning of next year - it will become more and more difficult to have the approach under which we will exploit the space station."
Mr Dordain said it was also essential the benefits were increased and the costs were reduced.

Increasing the benefits could include finding new uses for the station.

Esa has called for ideas on how to use the ISS as a platform for Earth observation. Mr Dordain said the agency had received about 20 very good proposals.
On the issue of reducing costs, there were many ideas on the table, he explained.


"First of all, we have four control centres - one in Houston, one in Oberpfaffenhofen, one in Moscow and one in Tsukuba - and these four control centres are working 24 hours a day. Question mark: Why can't we use only two of them for 12 hours and then the other two for 12 hours?"

He also questioned whether it was necessary for the station to be staffed by six astronauts at all times. If there were periods when little maintenance was required or the experiment load was light, could the ISS run on a smaller crew, he suggested.

One way to reduce costs would be to bring in new partners outside the current five - something Mr Dordain is keen to see discussed.

Construction of the space station is due to finish this year. Next month, two components built in Europe - a connecting node and a robotic control room - will be flown to the platform by the US shuttle Endeavour.

Tranquility and the Cupola, as they are known, will complete the non-Russian side of the ISS.

Obama outlines $117bn bank levy

President Barack Obama has said Wall Street must repay $117bn (£72bn) to taxpayers and criticised banks for "massive profits and obscene bonuses".

The tax is to recoup money US taxpayers are expected to lose from bailing out the banks during the financial crisis.

"My commitment is to recover every single dime the American people are owed," the president said.

The move follows populist anger at banks, seen as being responsible for causing the recent economic crisis.

Average American
"My determination to achieve this goal is only heightened when I see reports of massive profits and obscene bonuses at the very firms who owe their continued existence to the American people," the president said.

He said the aim was not to punish Wall Street firms but to stop abuses and excesses from happening again.
The Michelle Fleury said the president had made clear "in strong language" that the banks must repay the taxpayer, through what is being dubbed a "financial crisis responsibility fee".

"It may go some way to quelling the anger of the average American," our correspondent said.

The tax would apply only to financial firms with assets of more than $50bn.

There are reckoned to be about 50 of these institutions - although many did not accept any taxpayer assistance and many others have already paid back what the government lent to them.

'Drag on sector'

Analysts said the fact that the fees levied on banks would be spread out over a decade would diminish their impact.

"It throws some sand into the gears," said Robert Albertson, chief strategist at Sandler O'Neill in New York.

"It's one more thing dragging on the sector, but it's spread over 10 years, so it's not so consequential. It's petty theft from bank balance sheets."

The levy comes ahead of the latest reporting season on Wall Street, with banks expected to report record bonuses.

The tax will claw back some of the losses from a $700bn taxpayer bail-out of American banks known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (Tarp).

It was drawn up in the midst of the financial crisis in 2008, following the collapse of US investment bank Lehman Brothers and multi-billion dollar rescue of insurance giant American International Group (AIG).

It helped stem the crisis by injecting public capital into the biggest US banks and restoring confidence in the banking syste

No plans to reschedule X Factor

ITV says it has no plans to reschedule this year's X Factor, despite reports that Simon Cowell is trying to move the show from its autumn slot.
An ITV spokesman said the announcement that Cowell was launching a US version of the show was "no surprise".


"We are absolutely planning for the X Factor to return this autumn and next," ITV said in a statement.

Cowell said he would be involved in both shows, sparking speculation that the UK series may be moved.

New challenge

Earlier this week, Cowell, 50, announced he was leaving Fox TV's American Idol as a judge to launch a US version of the X Factor on the same network.

The music mogul, who owns the rights to the X Factor format, said he would be a a judge on the new show.

ITV said the star would continue with "both his on-screen and production role" on the UK version of the X Factor.

On Monday, Peter Rice, chairman of entertainment for Fox, said the US X Factor would also be screened in the autumn.

It is not clear how Cowell will be able to participate in both.

The ITV spokesman said, "we've got plans", but refused to expand further.

Cowell said he was offered a lot of money to stay with American Idol.

"But that wasn't the reason behind it. I wanted to do something different. I wanted a new challenge," he said.

It has been reported that Cowell stands to make more money with the X Factor than if he had stayed on American Idol.

Earthquake devastation emerges in Haiti

The extent of the devastation from a huge quake in Haiti is slowly emerging, with a number of UN peacekeepers among thousands of people feared dead.

Jordan, Brazil and China have all reported deaths, and France says it fears the Tunisian head of the UN mission in Haiti has been killed.

The 7.0-magnitude quake, Haiti's worst in two centuries, struck south of the capital, Port-au-Prince, on Tuesday.

The Red Cross says up to three million people have been affected.
Describing the earthquake as a "catastrophe", Haiti's envoy to the US said the cost of the damage could run into billions of dollars.

A number of nations, including the US, UK and Venezuela, are gearing up to send aid.

The quake, which struck about 15km (10 miles) south-west of Port-au-Prince, was quickly followed by two aftershocks of 5.9 and 5.5 magnitude.

The first tremor had hit at 1653 local time (2153 GMT) on Tuesday, the US Geological Survey said. Phone lines to the country failed shortly afterwards.

China has already indicated in reports in state media that eight of its peacekeepers are dead, with another 10 unaccounted for.
The AFP news agency quoted the Jordanian army as saying three of its peacekeepers had been killed and 21 wounded.

The Brazilian army said four of its peacekeepers had been killed and a large number were missing.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said the UN HQ had collapsed "and it would appear that all those who were in the building, including my friend [UN mission head] Hedi Annabi... and all those who were with him and around him are dead".

A French official also told AFP that about 200 people were missing in the collapsed Hotel Montana, which is popular with tourists.

There were also some reports of looting overnight.

Rachmani Domersant, an operations manager with the Food for the Poor charity, told Reuters the capital had been in total darkness overnight.

"You have thousands of people sitting in the streets with nowhere to go."

People were "trying to dig victims out with flashlights", he said. "Hundreds of casualties would be a serious understatement."

Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere and has suffered a number of recent disasters, including four hurricanes and storms in 2008 that killed hundreds.

Thoughts and prayers

With communications destroyed by the earthquake, it is not yet possible to confirm the extent of the destruction, although there were reports on Wednesday of many bodies piled in the streets.
People in the capital were lifting sheets on bodies to try to identify loved ones.

Haiti's ambassador to the US, Raymond Joseph, said there was "no way of estimating" the casualties.

"I'm quite sure we're going to face a disaster of major proportion," he told ABC.

Mr Joseph said the presidential palace, the tax office, the ministry of commerce and the foreign ministry had all been damaged.

Haitian President Rene Preval and his wife both reportedly survived the quake.
US President Barack Obama said his "thoughts and prayers" were with the people of Haiti and that he expected "an aggressive, coordinated [aid] effort by the US government".
Venezuela says it will send a 50-strong "humanitarian assistance team".

The Red Cross is dispatching a relief team from Geneva and the UN's World Food Programme is flying in two planes with emergency food aid.

The Inter-American Development Bank said it was immediately approving a $200,000 grant for emergency aid.

The UK said it was mobilising help and was "ready to provide whatever humanitarian assistance may be required".

Canada, Australia, France and a number of Latin American nations have also said they are mobilising their aid response.

Pope Benedict XVI has called for a generous response to the "tragic situation" in Haiti.

Shouting and screaming

In the minutes after the quake, Henry Bahn, a visiting official from the US Department of Agriculture, said he had seen houses which had tumbled into a ravine.
"Everybody is just totally, totally freaked out and shaken," said Mr Bahn, who described the sky as "just grey with dust".

He said he had been walking to his hotel room when the ground began to shake.

"I just held on and bounced across the wall," he said. "I just heard a tremendous amount of noise and shouting and screaming in the distance."

Tweets from troylivesay spoke of the worst damage being in the Carrefour district, where "many two and three storey buildings did not make it".

In the immediate aftermath of the quake, a tsunami watch was put out for Haiti, Cuba and the Bahamas, but this was later lifted.

Fresh snow falling across UK brings more disruption

Fresh snow has hit many parts of the UK, causing more problems for transport amid further limits on road gritting.

Met Office warnings of heavy snow are in place for north-west England, the West Midlands and southern England.

Rail and air travellers face delays and cancellations, with several airports shut, while many roads are closed, including the M48 old Severn Bridge.

Hundreds of schools are closed. Some pupils taking exams had difficult journeys on treacherous roads.

Runways at Gatwick, London City and, Birmingham International airports were closed because of snow, causing delays and cancellations. Southampton and Cardiff have now reopened.

Heathrow Airport reported the cancellation of 84 mostly short-haul or domestic flights, both arrivals and departures.
Much of Yorkshire is experiencing its worst disruption of the winter due to black ice, with many roads impassable. Four gritting lorries slid off North Yorkshire roads.


Similarly, in West Yorkshire, two vehicles hit buildings and a taxi slid down an embankment onto a house roof. Some 187 West Yorkshire schools are shut and the ambulance service is reporting one of its busiest days so far.

Yorkshire Ambulance Service said there had been a four-fold increase in calls during Wednesday morning and was on "a higher alert status".

Facebook fugitive back in custody

A prisoner who updated his Facebook profile while on the run from an open prison in Suffolk has been captured.

Suffolk Police said burglar Craig Lynch, 28, who absconded from Hollesley Bay Prison on 23 September, was arrested in Kent on Tuesday night.

He has been charged with escaping from lawful custody and will appear at Bexleyheath magistrates in London later.

He had a Facebook following of more than 3,400 people across the world.