Chloe Sevigny Ready to ‘Kill’ it for A&E

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Chloe Sevigny has just landed a killer new gig.

Sevigny – who’s currently starring as Shelley the nymphomaniac on Fox’s spooky drama “American Horror Story: Asylum” – has taken the lead in A&E’s upcoming drama “Those Who Kill,” the cable network told TheWrap on Monday.

Based on the Danish series “Den Som Draeber,” “Those Who Kill” centers on police detective Catherine (Sevigny) and a forensic profiler, who possess a deep understanding of the serial killers they hunt.

The pilot will shoot in Pittsburgh this fall, with Joe Carnahan (“The Grey”) directing.

“Final Destination” and “The X Files” writer/producer Glen Morgan – who’s developing the project with Imagine TV – is penning the project, and also executive-producing, along with Jonas Allen, Peter Bose, Brian Grazer and Francie Calfo.

Fox 21 is producing “Those Who Kill.”

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U.S. nuclear plant declares “alert” after Sandy storm surge: NRC

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Exelon Corp declared an “alert” at its New Jersey Oyster Creek nuclear power plant due to a record storm surge, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said, warning that a further water rise could force the country’s oldest working plant to use emergency water supplies to cool spent uranium fuel rods.

The alert — the second lowest of four NRC action levels — came after water levels at the plant rose by more than 6.5 feet, potentially affecting the pumps that circulate water through the plant, an NRC spokesman said late on Monday.

Those pumps are not essential since the 43-year-old plant was shut for planned refueling since October 22. However, a further rise to 7 feet could submerge the service water pump motor that is used to cool the water in the spent fuel pool.

Exelon said in a statement that there was no danger to equipment and no threat to public health or safety.

The incident at Oyster Creek, which is about 60 miles east of Philadelphia on the New Jersey Coast, came as Sandy made landfall as the largest Atlantic storm ever, bringing up to 90 mile per hour (mph) winds and 13-foot storm surges in the biggest test of the industry’s emergency preparedness since the Fukushima disaster in Japan a year and a half ago.

Although such alerts are considered serious events in the industry — with only about a dozen such instances in the past four years, according to NRC press releases — flood waters should be receding at the plant following high tide, reducing the risk of emergency action.

Sandy had been expected to force the closure of at least two other nuclear plants in New Jersey, although the NRC said none of the country’s other nuclear reactors had been shut by the storm.

The NRC spokesman said the company could use water from a fire suppression system to cool the pool if necessary. The used uranium rods in the pool could cause the water to boil within 25 hours without additional coolant; in an extreme scenario the rods could overheat, risking the eventual release of radiation.

Exelon spokesman David Tillman said the plant has “multiple and redundant” sources of cooling for the spent fuel pool. He said he did not know whether the service water system was operational at the moment.

MONITORING NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS

Constellation Energy Nuclear Group’s 630-MW Nine Mile Point 1 nuclear power reactor in upstate New York did shut down due to a problem putting power onto the grid, although it was not clear whether the trouble was related to the storm, the NRC spokesman said.

The relatively small 636-megawatt Oyster Creek plant also experienced a “power disruption” at its switch yard, causing two backup diesel generators to kick in and maintain a stable source of power, Exelon said.

Tillman said another Exelon reactor at the Limerick facility in Pennsylvania was reduced to 91 percent power after Sandy caused a problem with the condenser.

An alert-level incident means there is a “potential substantial degradation in the level of safety” at a reactor.

“Given the breadth and intensity of this historic storm, the NRC is keeping a close watch on all of the nuclear power plants that could be impacted,” NRC Chairman Allison Macfarlane said.

The concerns over the status of the spent fuel pool at Oyster Creek was reminiscent of the fears that followed the Fukushima disaster last year, when helicopters and fire hoses were enlisted to ensure the pools remained filled with fresh, cool water. The nuclear industry has said that the spent fuel rods at Fukushima were never exposed to the air.

Nuclear plants must store the spent uranium fuel rods for at least five years in order to cool them sufficiently before they can be moved to dry cask storage containers.

The plant uses pumps to take in external water that circulates through a heat exchanger used to cool the internal water that surrounds the rods, keeping them from overheating. (Editing by Ed Davies)

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UBS to slash 10,000 jobs in fixed income exit

ZURICH (Reuters) – UBS unveiled plans to wind down its fixed income business and fire 10,000 bankers in one of the biggest bonfires of finance jobs since the implosion of Lehman Brothers in 2008.

The move will focus the Zurich-based lender and wealth manager around its private bank and a smaller investment bank, ditching much of the trading business that saw it lose $ 50 billion in the financial crisis and one suspected rogue trader lose $ 2.3 billion last year.

Chief Executive Sergio Ermotti, a former Merrill Lynch banker who took over after the trading scandal, is spearheading the three-year investment banking overhaul that is aimed at saving 3.4 billion Swiss francs ($ 3.63 billion), on top of existing cuts of 2 billion francs.

The Swiss bank will separate many fixed-income activities in order to wind down positions in businesses it will exit as they are no longer profitable due to far tougher capital rules on riskier business introduced after the crisis.

Current investment bank co-head Carsten Kengeter will leave UBS’s top management board to head the discontinued unit.

The remaining investment bank, comprised of equities, foreign exchange trading, corporate advice, and precious metals trading, will be run by Andrea Orcel, a recent Ermotti hire from Bank of America who currently co-runs the unit with Kengeter.

“The net impact of all these changes will be transformational for the firm,” chairman Axel Weber and Ermotti told shareholders in a letter. “Our overall earnings should be less volatile, more consistent and of higher quality.”

The measures translate to a 15 percent staff cut, taking UBS’s overall staff to 54,000, from 63,745 now.

Roughly 2,500 jobs will be cut in Switzerland, with the remainder mainly in London and the United States, where UBS runs considerable trading operations out of Stamford, Connecticut.

A smaller investment bank will leave UBS to focus on its private bank, which looks after the affairs of rich people. It is the second-largest operation of its kind in the world after Bank of America with 1.6 trillion francs in assets.

UBS shares, which soared 7.3 percent on Monday in anticipation of the announcement, were indicated to open up 0.9 percent in an otherwise weaker market, according to pre-market indications from bank Julius Baer.

“Overall, I think it’s a good move to abandon activities which don’t earn anything and concentrate on those which create value for shareholders,” Bank Sarasin analyst Rainer Skierka said. He rates UBS stock at neutral.

INVESTMENT BANK LOSSES

UBS was one of the banks hardest hit by the financial crisis when its fixed-income unit racked up more than $ 50 billion in losses after gorging on subprime securities, forcing it to seek a bailout from the Swiss government in 2008.

After settling a damaging U.S. tax probe in 2009, the bank had just started to rebuild client confidence when the $ 2.3 billion trading scandal surfaced in September last year.

Kweku Adoboli, who worked on the bank’s London-based exchange-traded equities funds desk, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of fraud and four of false accounting over the costly bets. His trial is under way in London.

Ermotti’s overhaul comes against the backdrop of far tougher regulation on riskier securities trading activities, and represents a return to advisory roots stemming from UBS’s purchase of Warburg, a British merchant bank, in 1995.

The expected UBS cuts will add to existing cuts of 3,500 jobs, part of the tens of thousands of jobs the financial sector has shed globally since the financial crisis of 2008.

The bank aims to pay out more than 50 percent of profits to shareholders from 2015, after paying a symbolic dividend of 0.10 francs a share last year. It has put away funds in the third quarter for an unspecified dividend this year, financial chief Tom Naratil told journalists.

The costs related to the investment banking split will also lead to a fourth-quarter and full-year loss, when taken together with charges on the bank’s own debt, UBS said.

UBS’s private bank also faces challenges, with profits falling as Swiss banking secrecy is weakened by repeated demands from foreign governments determined to recoup tax on undeclared funds held in offshore accounts.

The unit secured 7.7 billion francs in net new money from clients in the third quarter, which represents the highest result in a third quarter — traditionally a slow one for the business due to summer holidays — in five years.

UBS’s rival Credit Suisse said last week it was also cutting more costs as part of efforts to bolster its profits and capital position.

UBS swung to a third-quarter net loss of 2.172 billion francs, hit by the restructuring charges as well as 863 million francs in charges on the value of its own debt. Analysts in a Reuters poll had forecast a net profit of 457 million francs.

UBS targets a drop in risk-weighted assets to below 200 billion francs by the end of 2017, from 301 billion currently. Of this the investment bank will soak up roughly 70 billion, less than half of what it accounts for today.

($ 1 = 0.9366 Swiss francs)

(Reporting By Katharina Bart, Editing by Emma Thomasson and David Cowell)

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Ukraine’s opposition doing well in election

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) —

Ukraine’s opposition parties performed strongly in Sunday’s parliamentary vote, according to an exit poll, but President Viktor Yanukovych‘s party could still retain control of the legislature as its members are likely to sweep individual races across the country.

The West is paying close attention to the conduct of the vote in the strategic ex-Soviet state, which lies between Russia and the European Union, and serves as a key conduit for transit of Russian energy supplies to many EU countries. An election deemed unfair would likely turn Ukraine further away from the West and toward Moscow.

Opposition parties alleged widespread violations on election day, such as vote-buying and a suspiciously high amount of home voting, but a local election monitor said those violations were isolated. Authorities insisted the election was honest and democratic.

The Fatherland party, led by the jailed charismatic former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, the Udar (Punch) of world boxing champion Vitali Klitschko and a nationalist party together received more than 50 percent of the vote on party lists, outnumbering Yanukovych’s Party of Regions and its traditional ally, the Communist Party.

Both Yanukovych’s and Tymoshenko’s parties claimed victory, saying the election showed the voters trust them to lead the country.

However, only half of the parliament’s 450 seats are split proportionately between the winning parties. The other half is filled by the winners of single-mandate races, where Yanukovych loyalists are expected to make a strong showing. In the election, each voter had two ballots, one with party names and one with the name of candidates in specific constituencies. No exit poll numbers were available for the individual races.

With Yanukovych under fire over the jailing of his top rival, Tymoshenko; rampant corruption and slow reforms, the opposition made a strong showing.

Tymoshenko’s Fatherland party is poised to get about 25 percent of the proportional vote, the Udar (Punch) led by world boxing champion Vitali Klitschko is set to get around 15 percent and the nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) party receives some 12 percent. The Party of Regions polled 28 percent and the Communists nearly 12 percent.

If the three opposition groups unite, they could get 127 parliament seats versus 98 seats gained by the Regions and Communists. The distribution of the remaining 225 seats is expected to be clear Monday.

Opposition forces hope to garner enough parliament seats to weaken Yanukovych’s power and undo the damage they say he has done: the jailing of Tymoshenko and her top allies, the concentration of power in the hands of the president, the snubbing of the Ukrainian language in favor of Russian, waning media freedoms, a deteriorating business climate and growing corruption.

The strong showing by the far-right Svoboda (Freedom) party which campaigns for the defense of the Ukrainian language and culture but is also infamous for xenophobic and anti-Semitic rhetoric emerged as a surprise and showed the widespread disappointment and anger with the ruling party.

It remains to be seen whether Tymoshenko’s group, Klitschko’s party and Svoboda can forge a strong alliance and challenge Yanukovych.

The election tainted by Tymoshenko’s jailing on charges of abuse of office has also been compromised by the creation of fake opposition parties, campaigns by politically unskilled celebrities, and the use of state resources and greater access to television by Yanukovych’s party.

___

Yuras Karmanau in Kiev contributed to this report.

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Benghazi: The Real Libya Story Is No Story

It was, from the start, about as hard an intelligence problem as you can find. The date was Sept. 11, and the CIA was stretched thin, monitoring anti-American protests in no fewer than 54 countries that day, according to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Post-Qaddafi Libya itself was still chaotic, caught up in the fog of war, and indeed Ambassador Chris Stevens, at great personal risk, had journeyed to his old Arab Spring-era stomping ground in Benghazi to assess the situation himself. Still, Clapper recently told an annual conference of intelligence professionals that there was no warning to Stevens or anyone else that he was about to be targeted by an organized extremist attack.

So in the ensuing days, the fog lifted only very gradually. The intelligence community did not see a clear way to explain the deaths of Stevens and three other Americans. And as the probe advanced they began shifting their assessment dramatically. Four days after the attacks, on Sept. 15, intel briefers sent U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice off to tape the Sunday talk shows with talking points that suggested Stevens’s death was the result of “spontaneous” protests at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo against a short film made in California lampooning the Prophet Muhammad. And that’s what Rice said on CBS’s Face the Nation “based on the best information we have to date,” as she put it. Rice added, however, that “soon after that spontaneous protest began outside of our consulate in Benghazi, we believe that it looks like extremist elements, individuals, joined in that—in that effort with heavy weapons.”

“It was clear from the outset that a group of people gathered that evening. A key question early on was whether extremists took over a crowd or if the guys who showed up were all militants,” said an intelligence official involved in the Benghazi assessment. “It took time—until that next week—to sort through varied and sometimes conflicting accounts to understand the group’s overall composition.”

By the following week, however, the DNI came to believe that there had been no protest at all. “That was genuine fog of war issue,” the intelligence official said. “Press reports at the time indicated there had been. It took about a week or so to iron that out.” On Sept. 28, Shawn Turner, spokesman for Clapper’s office, said in a statement that as U.S. intelligence learned more about the attack, “we revised our initial assessment to reflect new information indicating that it was a deliberate and organized terrorist attack carried out by extremists.”

To supporters of Republican nominee Mitt Romney in the chattering classes and in the House of Representatives, where an investigative committee has been hard at work probing the attacks and, apparently, leaking information, there is a lot more going on here. They see a deliberate effort by the Obama administration to play down evidence that new al-Qaida-linked terrorist groups were at work killing Americans. After all, one of the president’s big talking points in a tough election race is that he’s killed Osama bin Laden and decimated al-Qaida.

It sounds very plausible. There’s only one problem with that view: No evidence has surfaced so far to support the idea that the Obama administration deceived the public deliberately. On Wednesday a new spate of stories emerged, quoting unclassified e-mails sent to the White House and State Department only hours after the attacks that indicate the extremist Libyan militia Ansar al-Sharia had asserted responsibility. “Smoking gun!” Jennifer Rubin, a conservative blogger, tweeted. “The White House cover story—namely that CIA got it all wrong and the White House (in urging us to believe the murder of four Americans was the result of a video riot gone bad) was telling us what it knew, when it knew—has been severely undercut,” she added on her blog. “Three e-mails sent to the White House within two hours of the attack identify it as a terrorist operation and inform the White House that local jihadists with al-Qaida connections claimed responsibility.”

But that story doesn’t hold up well either. The e-mails in question contained nothing more than “raw” intelligence, uncorroborated and unverified, that often flows in after an event. Intelligence officials typically don’t deliver their assessments until they have “finished” reports based on multiple sources, and corroborated evidence, and Obama officials such as Rice certainly would not have been out in front of the TV cameras citing raw intelligence. And as the government’s most senior officials say, the Benghazi case has taken them a long time to finish. “People forget that a Palestinian group was the first to claim credit for 9/11,” the intelligence official said. “There was no message from the field in those first hectic days that would have eliminated questions or proven who was behind the attack.”

Indeed, as White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters, all that Wednesday’s stories reported was “an open-source, unclassified e-mail about a posting on a Facebook site. I would also note I think that within a few hours, that organization itself [Ansar al-Sharia] claimed that it had not been responsible.” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, in separate remarks on Wednesday, also said that “posting something on Facebook is not in and of itself evidence, and I think it just underscores how fluid the reporting was at the time and continued for some time to be.” 

Even now, intelligence officials say, the full story is not known. It is not even clear that the video-inspired protests in Cairo were unrelated to the attack in Benghazi, because some of the extremists who attacked Stevens and his colleagues may have been provoked by watching the demonstrations on TV. Officials say they are still compiling a list of suspects.

“The bulk of available information still supports the early assessment that extremists—many with ties to Ansar al-Sharia, AQIM [Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb], or other groups—didn’t preplan the attack days or weeks in advance, but launched their assault opportunistically after they learned about the violence at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo,” the intelligence official said.

Interestingly, even Romney seems to have grown a bit tired of the Benghazi story, as he indicated on Monday night when moderator Bob Schieffer made Libya question No. 1 in his final debate with President Obama and the GOP nominee basically ignored it. Nonetheless, the story of what senior administration officials knew and when they knew it doesn’t seem to go away. Perhaps it will after Nov. 6.

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‘Argo’ finally tops box office with $12.4M

LOS ANGELES (AP) — It took three weeks, but “Argo” finally found its way to the top of the box office.

The Warner Bros. thriller from director and star Ben Affleck, inspired by the real-life rescue of six U.S. embassy workers during the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis, made nearly $ 12.4 million this weekend, according to Sunday studio estimates. “Argo” had been in second place the past two weeks and has now made about $ 60.8 million total.

Debuting at No. 3 was the sprawling, star-studded “Cloud Atlas,” which made a disappointing $ 9.4 million. The nearly three-hour drama, also from Warner Bros., was co-directed by siblings Lana and Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer and features an ensemble cast including Tom Hanks, Halle Berry and Hugh Grant playing multiple roles over six story lines.

Dan Fellman, head of distribution at Warner Bros., said the studio thought there might be a good chance of “Argo” coming out on top this weekend.

“We’re thrilled. An accomplishment like that is well deserved, they don’t happen very often. You would probably have to do a lot of searching to find a movie that opened in wide release to have two No. 2 weekends in a row and hit No. 1 in the third week,” Fellman said. “It’s a tribute to the film. Word-of-mouth has taken over the campaign. We have a long way to go, we have a lot of year-end accolades which will approach, and we’ll see what happens in terms of the Academy.”

On the flip side, Fellman acknowledged that “Cloud Atlas” underperformed compared to hopes that it would end up in the $ 11-12 million range domestically. The movie had an estimated budget of $ 100 million. But he pointed out that it had a higher per-screen average than any other film opening in the top 10 with $ 4,681.

“We did very well on the East and West coasts in a number of major cities,” he said. “We’re challenged in the Midwest and the South.”

It was a soft weekend all around, though, with several newcomers opening poorly, Hollywood.com box-office analyst Paul Dergarabedian pointed out. The horror sequel “Silent Hill: Revelation 3-D” from Open Road Films debuted at No. 5 with $ 8 million and the Paramount Halloween comedy “Fun Size” arrived in 10th place with just over $ 4 million. “Chasing Mavericks,” an inspirational surfing drama from Fox 2000, didn’t even open in the top 12 — it came in at No. 13 with $ 2.2 million.

The World Series might have been a factor in keeping folks away from the theaters; also, potential moviegoers along the East Coast in the path of Hurricane Sandy might have stayed home this weekend.

“The whole marketplace felt more like September than October. Back in September, we had four down weekends in a row. There was no momentum in the marketplace,” Dergarabedian said. “When a holdover is No. 1, it reflects a lack of strength in the marketplace. Every week should have a new movie topping the chart.”

As for the philosophical, centuries-spanning “Cloud Atlas,” he said: “To have a) a big budget, b) Tom Hanks and c) it’s a big, epic film, it doesn’t necessarily follow that it’s going to be a big box office hit. I admire that they went for it.”

But there’s hope on the horizon with the animated comedy “Wreck-It Ralph” coming next weekend, the latest James Bond film, “Skyfall,” opening Nov. 9 and the final installment in the “Twilight” saga due out Nov. 16. “Skyfall” opened this weekend overseas with a whopping $ 77.7 million in 25 countries.

“This is just one of those box office weekends we’d rather forget,” Dergarabedian said. “Unless you’re ‘Argo.’”

Estimated ticket sales are for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. “Argo,” $ 12.4 million. ($ 5 million international.)

2. “Hotel Transylvania,” $ 9.5 million. ($ 18.1 million international.)

3. “Cloud Atlas,” $ 9.4 million.

4. “Paranormal Activity 4,” $ 8.7 million. ($ 14.1 million international.)

5. (tie) “Silent Hill: Revelation 3-D,” $ 8 million.

6. “Taken 2,” $ 8 million. ($ 10.1 million.)

7. “Here Comes the Boom,” $ 5.5 million.

8. “Sinister,” $ 5.07 million.

9. Alex Cross,” $ 5.05 million.

10. “Fun Size,” $ 4.1 million.

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Estimated weekend ticket sales at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada) for films distributed overseas by Hollywood studios, according to Rentrak:

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1. “Skyfall,” $ 77.7 million.

2. “Hotel Transylvania,” $ 18.1 million.

3. “Paranormal Activity 4,” $ 14.1 million.

4. “The Bourne Legacy,” $ 11.5 million.

5. “Taken 2,” $ 10.1 million.

6. “The Impossible,” $ 8.7 million.

7. “Madagascar 3,” $ 8.4 million.

8. “Asterix et Obelix: Au Service de Sa Majeste,” $ 5.3 million.

9. (tie) “Argo,” $ 5 million.

10. “Ted,” $ 5 million.

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Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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UCB’s next generation drugs take over after blockbuster expiry

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Belgian pharmaceuticals group UCB said on Monday that sales of its three new main products had for the first time overtaken those of its expiring blockbuster epilepsy treatment Keppra and retained its full-year guidance.

UCB, which makes drugs targeted at diseases of the immune and central nervous systems, said on Monday sales of Cimzia, Neupro and Vimpat rose 50 percent to 665 million euros over the first nine months and were now treating about 382,000 patients.

UCB said it was on course to reach its goal of 1.5 million patients treated with the three drugs, with combined peak sales of at least 3.1 billion euros, in the second half of the decade.

Sales of Cimzia, treating bowel disorder Crohn’s disease and rheumatoid arthritis, rose 51 percent to 334 million euros. For Neupro, a patch used for Parkinson’s disease and restless leg syndrome, sales were up 33 percent to 93 million euros.

Sales of Vimpat, UCB’s next generation epilepsy drug, increased 54 percent to 237 million euros.

Keppra sales dropped 13 percent to 652 million euros as generic competitors took advantage of its patent expiry in Europe and North America.

In the first half, sales of Keppra were strong enough in Japan to offset generic competition in Europe and the United States.

The company said overall revenues increased 5 percent to 2.565 billion euros ($ 3.32 billion). However, based on stable exchange rates they were flat.

UCB is forecasting that 2012 revenues should be at least 3.2 billion euros ($ 4.14 billion), with recurring core profit between 630 and 660 million euros and core earnings per share about 1.70 euros.

Last year, revenues were 3.25 billion euros and recurring core profit 683 million euros.

($ 1 = 0.7733 euros)

(Reporting By Robert-Jan Bartunek and Philip Blenkinsop)

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Indian Companies Are America-Bound

The southern Indian city of Hyderabad is home to the 500-year-old Chilkur Balaji Temple, which features a statue of Lord Vishnu, the Hindu deity. The monument has become a magnet for workers such as Ravi Shanker, who seek divine help in securing a work permit from Washington, D.C. Shanker, who lives in Bangalore, works for Kodiak Networks, a telecom services company in Plano, Tex., and the company needs him stateside to help its client AT&T (T) develop software. “A visa is not under my control, my employer’s control, or my country’s control,” says Shanker. “The only way to change my luck is through God.”

With the Obama administration applying tougher standards for H-1B and L-1 work visas in an effort to protect jobs at home, Indian companies aren’t relying on prayer to staff their U.S. operations. Instead they’re hiring tech workers who are American citizens or hold green cards. They’re facing pressure by their American clients, which spent $ 27.7 billion on outsourcing services last year, to move some operations from India to the U.S. for faster customer support.

With jobs and outsourcing such hot political issues in the U.S., it pays for Indian companies to hire some Americans, even though they’re more expensive. Companies that want to win contracts with state and local governments need at least some work to go to local hires. “A lot of us want to be seen as generating employment in the U.S.,” says Lakshmanan Chidambaram, senior vice president (Americas) at IT services company Mahindra Satyam (SCS).

In September, Bangalore-based Infosys (INFY) acquired Marsh Consumer BPO, an outsourcing company with 87 workers based in Des Moines. In June rival Mahindra Satyam opened a new outsourcing center in Fargo, N.D. Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTSH), a company headquartered in Teaneck, N.J., that has most of its 145,000 workers in India, acquired centers in June in Des Moines and Minot, N.D., employing over 1,000 people. Even with U.S. unemployment at 7.8 percent, Indian executives say they have difficulty finding skilled tech workers. Two years ago, Cognizant began recruiting software developers at 17 American universities to reduce its reliance on employees from India on short-term visas. Cognizant added 4,000 workers in the U.S. between mid-2011 and mid-2012 and would like to do more hiring, says President Gordon Coburn. “There’s not enough tech talent in the U.S. to meet the need,” he says.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) used the social network site CareerBuilder to find Darlene Black, 54, from Ann Arbor, Mich., who had worked for Parke-Davis and Pfizer (PFE) for 18 years. She applied on a Sunday and by Friday had a full-time offer to help a TCS client manage contractors and other construction-related work. “They are getting people [into] the workplace here in the U.S.,” says Black.

Indian companies have also expanded their talent hunt beyond well-known tech hubs. Bangalore-based MindTree (MTCL), an Indian outsourcer with 11,000 employees, is opening its first U.S. software development center in Gainesville, Fla. MindTree has 100 engineers in training, with plans to increase its U.S. headcount to 400. It chose the location to be close to the University of Florida and has promised the state government it will invest $ 2.5 million in the region. In return, it will get tax abatements from the state and help to cover the cost of training new employees. “It takes state aid to make the business model work,” says Scott Staples, president of MindTree Americas.

Back at Chilkur Balaji Temple in Hyderabad, Google (GOOG) employee Narendra Sripal, who wants a visa to travel to the home office in Silicon Valley someday soon, has asked Lord Vishnu for help. The realist in him thinks it will take some time before Washington eases up on work permits. “I’m not even sure if God could convince the U.S. to change its visa policy,” says Sripal.

The bottom line: Indian firms are hiring U.S. staff to serve clients, which spent $ 27.7 billion on outsourcing in 2011.

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Indonesia arrests 11 people suspected of planning terror attacks on US, Australian embassies

JAKARTA, Indonesia – Indonesian police say they have arrested 11 people suspected of planning a range of terrorist attacks on domestic and foreign targets including the U.S. and Australian embassies.

National Police spokesman Maj. Gen. Suhardi Aliyus says the suspects were arrested by an anti-terror squad in raids Friday night in four provinces.

He said Saturday that police also seized bombs, explosive materials and a bomb-making manual.

He said the newly formed group had plans to target the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta and a plaza near the Australian Embassy and the local office of U.S. mining giant Freeport-McMoRan. Aliyus said they also planned to attack the U.S. Consulate in Surabaya and the headquarters of a police special force in Central Java.

It was unclear how far the plans had advanced.

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Play ‘Grand Theft Auto: Vice City’ on Your Phone Very Soon [VIDEO]

Nostalgic for the days of getting home from school or work, firing up the PlayStation 2 and popping Grand Theft Auto: Vice City in the tray? Then get your smartphone ready: Rockstar Games on Friday officially announced the game will be ported to Android and iOS later this fall.

[More from Mashable: Hunky Breast Cancer Screening App Gets a Hot Update [VIDEO]]

Rockstar made the mobile versions, which will have some all-new bonus features and top-notch graphics, to celebrate the game’s 10-year release. That’s right: Vice City, the sixth Grand Theft Auto title, came out way back in 2002.

“Grand Theft Auto: Vice City gave players the freedom of a massive open-world in one of the most iconic and vibrant settings ever realized in a game,” said Sam Houser, founder of Rockstar Games, in a statement. “It was a defining moment in the series and we’re delighted to be celebrating its 10th anniversary this year with a stunning, updated version for phones and tablets.”

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As part of the anniversary celebration, Grand Theft Auto fans will find new promotional gear for sale at the Rockstar Games Warehouse and through online sweepstakes.

There’s no solid release date for the mobile game yet: Rockstar’s only saying “later this fall.” The company’s silent on any Windows 8 version, too.

Can’t wait for your fix of old-school vehicular carnage? Check out Sega’s mobile port of Dreamcast favorite Crazy Taxi while you’re waiting for Vice City to arrive.

Below, one of the original trailers for the PlayStation 2 version of Vice City. Check it out, then share your favorite Grand Theft Auto memories in the comments!

This story originally published on Mashable here.

Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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