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Hands raised at a White House press conference Women comprise about 41% of the US news workforce but less than a quarter of top jobs

this is very huge difference. I can't understand why women are failed to get top jobs.

Hands raised at a White House press conference Women comprise about 41% of the US news workforce but less than a quarter of top jobs

Nearly three-quarters of top management jobs in news media across the world are held by men, as are two-thirds of reporting jobs, a new study has found.

But the International Women's Media Foundation in Washington found 41% of senior anchors, writers, editors and producers in the industry were women.

Women were best represented in Europe and worst in Asia, the study of 170,000 people in 522 news companies found.

But the survey found no significant improvement from a smaller 1995 study.

Across the entire newspaper, radio and television workforce studied, the survey found 65% of jobs were held by men, compared to 35% by women.

"There is still quite a lot of work to be done to achieve some sort of equal footing in the industry," said Liza Gross, executive director of the International Women's Media Foundation.
Egalitarian Eastern Europe

The study did not address the affects the disparity has on the news media product, findings Ms Gross expected from a future study.

Among the news organisations studied, the survey found the most gender equity in 85 newsrooms of Eastern Europe, in Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia and Ukraine.

There, men's and women's salaries were comparable across all levels in the profession, a finding the survey authors attributed to the Soviet-era practice of educating women and moving them into the work force in great numbers.

In 47 newsrooms surveyed in France, Germany, Spain and the UK, women were nearing parity with men among the ranks of "junior professionals", a category which included correspondents, writers, sub-editors, producers and presenters.

But the survey reported women hit a "glass ceiling" at the senior professional level, holding only roughly a third of jobs in middle management and a quarter in top management.

In the 14 newsrooms surveyed in the US, women comprised about 41% of the total workforce, but were under-represented in the executive ranks, filling only 23.3% of the top management jobs, the survey found.
Under-represented in Asia

"Women have been successful in gaining access to US news companies in numbers approaching those of men overall, but they are not yet at parity with men in their status across occupational levels," the study found.

The study found women the most under-represented in 10 nations of Asia and the Pacific rim - Australia, Bangladesh, China, Fiji, India, Japan, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines and South Korea.

In Japan, for example, only one in eight newsroom jobs are held by women. The study suggested that low number was down to the relatively low rate of turnover in the Japanese workforce.
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New powers to seize Scottish crime profits
Banknotes Community projects have so far received more than £40m which was seized from criminals
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    * Seized funds to fight 'Mr Bigs'
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New powers will come into force this week enabling law enforcement agencies to seize more money from criminals.

Changes to the Proceeds of Crime Act extend the range of offences from which profits can be seized.

These will now include illegal money lending, distribution of obscene material and supply or intent to supply unclassified video recordings.

The threshold at which profits can be stripped from criminals will also be lowered, from £5,000 to £1,000.

The Scottish government said the legislative changes would create greater opportunities for law enforcement agencies to recover criminal profits.

These are then reinvested back into projects through the Cashback for Communities scheme, which has already received more than £40m since its launch in 2007.

Announcing the new powers, Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said: "Serious organised crime committed by these gangsters affects us all.

"It brings misery to thousands of Scots families through the evil trade they peddle - whether it's drugs, prostitution, extortion or intimidation and fear.

"Their criminal activity undermines legitimate hard-working businesses and we have had enough of it."

Lesley Thomson, area procurator fiscal for Glasgow, said: "These amendments to the Proceeds of Crime Act are to be welcomed as they will allow us to target a wider range of criminals and criminal conduct."
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Japan earthquake: Britons given iodine tablets
An employee of Yamagata city office holds a Geiger counter to detect radiation Priority for the tablets is being given to children and pregnant or breastfeeding women
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Japan quake

    * Q&A: Fukushima alert
    * In pictures: A week on
    * 'Fukushima 50' admired
    * Foreign evacuations mount

Britons in parts of Japan are being given iodine tablets as "a precaution" in case radiation levels increase from a quake-damaged nuclear power plant.

The Foreign Office said it was a "contingency measure" and people should only take the tablets if and when advised by the authorities.

Embassy staff were distributing tablets in Tokyo and Sendai on Saturday and will be in Niigata on Sunday.

The earthquake and tsunami is known to have killed more than 7,300 people.

Fears have been rising over levels of radiation leaking from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant which was hit by the 9.0-magnitude earthquake on 11 March.

The earthquake and tsunami it triggered crippled the plant's cooling systems and some radiation has leaked.

The decision to distribute iodine tablets was revealed by the Foreign Office in its updated travel advice to British nationals who have decided to remain in Tokyo and areas north of the city.

Proof of British citizenship is required to collect the tablets with priority being given to children and pregnant or breastfeeding women.

Stable iodine tablets are used to stop the body absorbing radioactive iodine and are effective up to six hours after exposure to radiation.
Food contamination

The Foreign Office advice on what action to take if radiation increases in "any significant way" includes information on sheltering indoors and how to decontaminate after going outside.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote

    Whilst no survivors were found, the assistance given by the UK team was greatly appreciated by the Japanese”

End Quote Pete Stevenson International Search and Rescue team

With the Japanese government's exclusion zone of 30km (20 miles) around the plant, the statement added: "A significant increase in the radiation levels in Tokyo, well outside the exclusion zone, would only occur in a worst-case scenario."

Food products from the Fukushima prefecture have been banned from sale after radioactive contamination was found in milk and spinach.

Traces of radioactive iodine have also been found in tapwater in Tokyo and five other prefectures, officials said on Saturday.

The traces are within government safety limits, but usual tests show no iodine, the AP news agency reported.

Meanwhile, a final coach for British nationals and their dependents will depart Sendai for Tokyo on Sunday, departing at 1000 local time (0100 GMT).

So far five coaches have made the journey from Sendai to Tokyo, transporting 61 British nationals, 15 dependents and 31 people from other countries.

Sixty British nationals have flown from Japan to Hong Kong after the Foreign Office block-booked tickets on them and a fourth flight will take off on Sunday.

The British consular team in the tsunami-affected region has assisted at least 170 British nationals.
'Extremely challenging'

The official British rescue team, who had been in Japan since Monday, arrived home on Saturday.

The team of 59 search and rescue experts was made up of members from fire brigades across the UK and was put together by the Department for International Development. They were also joined by four medics and two sniffer dogs.

They found several bodies but no survivors.

Pete Stevenson, who led the team on the ground, said: "The work carried out by the team has been extremely challenging and arduous. As ever, they performed their tasks with the utmost professionalism and skill.

"Whilst no survivors were found, the assistance given by the UK team was greatly appreciated by the Japanese.

"Our thoughts are with the Japanese people and we wish them every success during the recovery and humanitarian response phase."

Some 17,000 Britons are believed to have been in Japan when the earthquake struck but there have not yet been any reports of British casualties. The number of British citizens remaining in the country is not known.

On Friday the National Pharmacy Association said demand for iodine in the UK had soared since the nuclear crisis in Japan.

It said more than 100 pharmacists have called to seek advice on dealing with customers wanting the drug.

The Health Protection Agency states there is no radiation risk in the UK.
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Hackers tackle secure ID tokens
SecurID token, RSA The SecurID tokens are widely used to grant access to sensitive information
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Hackers have stolen data about the security tokens used by millions of people to protect access to bank accounts and corporate networks.

RSA Security told customers about the "extremely sophisticated cyber attack" in an open letter posted online.

The company is providing "immediate remediation" advice to customers to limit the impact of the theft

It also recommended customers take steps, such as hardening password policies, to help protect themselves.
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ISPs defend plans for two-tier net
By Jane Wakefield Technology reporter
A motorway ISPs maintain that slow and fast lanes on the net are inevitable
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    * ISPs offer clarity on net slowing
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ISPs have defended their right to operate a two-speed internet, at a key debate into the future of the web.

The debate was organised by the government, which is keen to see the principles of a free and equal net maintained.

ISPs are increasingly looking to prioritise some traffic on their networks and block some.

After the meeting the BBC called for the creation of a broadband content group to represent content providers.

It, along with content providers such as Google, Yahoo, Facebook and Skype, is growing increasingly concerned about how the issue of net neutrality is being dealt with.

Net neutrality - the principle that all net traffic should be treated equally - has been challenged in recent years as ISPs look to make a return on their increasingly expensive networks.

They argue that if content providers want to pay to get their traffic prioritised on the network, then they should be allowed to do so.

But some content owners and digital activists such as Open Rights Group argue that such a policy would do long-term damage to the internet, which was always conceived as a platform for everyone - not just those with deep pockets.

Net neutrality has been a key issue in Europe and a raft of legislation comes into force in May which will force ISPs to be more open about how they manage the traffic on their networks.
Free net

After the debate, Ed Vaizey, communications minister, made his views clear.

"Internet traffic is growing," he said. "Handling that heavier traffic will become an increasingly significant issue so it was important to discuss how to ensure the internet remains an open, innovative and competitive place.

Commenting about a code of practice drawn up by the Broadband Stakeholders' Group earlier in the week, he said the agreement should be guided by three principles.

"The first is users should be able to access all legal content," he said. "Second, there should be no discrimination against content providers on the basis of commercial rivalry and finally traffic management policies should be clear and transparent."

While Mr Vaizey is reluctant to regulate the industry, he has appointed world wide web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee to bang heads together.

But he could struggle to persuade ISPs that all the traffic on their networks should be treated equally.

Jim Killock, director of the ORG, said ISPs were in no mood for compromise at the debate.

"They weren't willing to make any concessions on their ability to manage traffic," he said. "BT even said that if people want to block things they should be able to."

"If people are blocking large sections of the internet and promoting a handful of service then they shouldn't be able to claim that they sell internet access," he added.
Enhanced service

A spokesman for ISPA, the body that represents UK internet service providers told the BBC that ISPs "should be free to manage their networks as they see fit".

He added that it would make no sense to throttle popular services such as the iPlayer. "That is just going to annoy your customers and they will leave," he said.

The code of practice drawn up by the BSG this week is aimed at making it easier for consumers to see how traffic is managed on different networks.

The ORG argues that it should go further

"In some countries, such as Norway, ISPs have said that they will only do traffic management to deal with congestionm" said Mr Killock. "But the UK code allows ISPs to prioritise and discriminate as they like as long as they are transparent."

Simon Milner, head of policy at BT, said the ISP had no intention of blocking anything other than illegal traffic, but he defended the right of others to do so.
Traffic lights The BBC is planning a traffic lights style test for how the iPlayer works on different networks

"In our view if someone wants to offer a service in which things are blocked - for example the Church of England might want to deliver Christian-friendly broadband - then they should be allowed to do that. It is no different from the walled gardens we used to have," he said.

And in the "multi-channelled" internet of the future, he said, firms should be allowed to prioritise certain traffic.

"If someone came to us - for example a Russian TV mogul - and wanted enhanced delivery, then that shouldn't be regulated against. It wouldn't mean that other content would be of low quality," he said.

But, he added, so far "content providers aren't beating down our door" for such a service.
Traffic lights

The BBC has always maintained that it won't pay to have its popular iPlayer service prioritised over other traffic.

John Tate, the BBC's director of policy and strategy said: "People should be able to access the internet without the blocking or throttling of certain content due to commercial rivalry."

The BBC is currently developing a traffic-light system to let users see how different ISPs treat its iPlayer service.

The details of the system, due for release in the spring, are not fully decided but it is likely ISPs will be rated simply: Red for poor, amber for OK, and green for acceptable.

The debate also looked at how mobile operators are managing traffic as more people access the web via mobile devices.

Traffic management in mobile is already routine, said Mr Killock.

"The levels of blocking on phones is enormous," he said. "Most phones block peer-to-peer traffic while most degrade the quality of Skype calls because they don't want Skype to be taking revenue away from them."
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Japan to repair damaged undersea cables
By Katia Moskvitch Science and technology reporter, BBC News
MARCUS II robot KDDI will use deep water robots to repair the damaged undersea cables
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Aftershocks are still preventing Japan's telecommunication companies from repairing undersea cables, damaged in the recent earthquake and tsunami.

To restore services, many providers have rerouted traffic to backup cables.

KDDI, Japan's second-largest telecoms operator, said it will send out a ship equipped with remotely-controlled robots as soon as the ground is still.

The robots can dive to a depth of 2,500m to repair the damaged cables - a task that may take months to complete.

In the mean-time, there is enough redundancy in the telecommunications infrastructure linking Japan to the rest of the world to keep the country connected.

KDDI spokesman Shin-ichiro Itoyama, speaking by phone from the company's headquarters in Tokyo, said that the deep water robots had previously only been used to lay cables on the seabed and not for any major repairs as there had never been much damage from previous earthquakes.

More than 5,400 people perished in Friday's 9.0-magnitude quake - the most powerful ever to hit Japan - and the ensuing tsunami.

Some 9,500 people are still missing.

Aftershock hits

At one point, during the interview, Mr Itoyama broke-off: "Oh wait a second, the ground is shaking again," he said.

Powerful aftershocks continue to rattle the devastated country, reaching magnitudes of 6.0 and higher.
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“Start Quote

    Oh wait a second, the ground is shaking again”

End Quote Shin-ichiro Itoyama KDDI, Japan

Mr Itoyama said he was one of the few KDDI employees left working in the office. The majority were told to stay at home as long as the aftershocks last.

He explained that it was very difficult to assess the damage to the cables in the Pacific as many were buried in the seabed in those areas most affected by the disaster, including Ibaraki and Miyagi Prefectures.

Although there were serious service disruptions right after the earthquake and tsunami, with communications between Japan and US badly affected, that had since been restored, he added.

"On March 15, we solved all the problems by means of using other cables and back-up systems and we have recovered all the services between Japan and US," he said.

Mr Itoyama added that the traffic had been partially rerouted using the Russia-Japan cable network operated by KDDI and Russia's Rostelecom.
Other companies

KDDI is not the only telecommunications company in Japan badly affected by the disaster.
Whirlpool, Japan Many cables were damaged in the hardest-hit areas, such as Ibaraki Prefecture

The country's biggest operator, NTT, was hit hard as well.

"About half a million of telephone circuits are down," Kazuhiro Gomi, the head of the US branch of NTT, told the BBC.

"Nowadays, the Internet is as important as telephone lines - and about 150,000 internet circuits are down."

Mr Gomi added that mobile phone services have also suffered, especially in the north-east coastal area.

Other companies with undersea cables in the waters around Japan include Australian operator Telstra International, Taiwan's largest phone operator Chunghwa Telecom, and global telecommunications service provider Pacnet, headquartered in Singapore and Hong Kong.

While some of them say their services have been restored, others are still struggling.
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Funds to maintain Europe's Ariane 5 rocket
By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News
Ariane 5 (Arianespace) Europe's Ariane 5 rocket has made 42 consecutive launches without mishap
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European Space Agency (Esa) member states are putting 240m euros (£210m) into industry so that the Ariane 5 rocket can continue to be exploited.

The company that operates the vehicle, Arianespace, has made losses in each of the past two years, even though it is the dominant player in its market.

Esa, which developed the big rocket, agreed to the cash injection at a two-day council meeting in Paris.

The decision follows an assessment of the costs of running the rocket system.

This assessment, ordered last year by member states, was intended to gauge where efficiencies could be found in the supply and operation chains.

The new money covers the period up until the major meeting of European space ministers at the end of 2012.

It is expected that a plan will be on the table by then to put Arianespace and its operations on a more sustainable footing.

Ariane 5 rockets launch from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana.

Six or seven flights are conducted each year, usually lofting two satellites at a time.

Through a subsidiary, Arianespace also markets Russian Soyuz vehicles, which historically launch out of the Baikonur and Plesetsk cosmodromes, but which will soon fly from French Guiana too.

The company is also bringing online a third, but much smaller rocket called Vega to carry into orbit institutional or scientific payloads weighing up to 1.5 tonnes.

An Ariane 5 is scheduled to launch next on 30 March. The vehicle will put the Yahsat 1A and Intelsat New Dawn telecommunications satellites on paths to take up geostationary positions 36,000km above the Earth.

The combined mass of these satellites will be about nine tonnes.
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Japan earthquake: 'Radiation pill' sales surge in US
Potassium iodide Several potassium iodide manufacturers are reportedly out of stock
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Japan quake

    * Japan quake Live
    * Q&A: Fukushima alert
    * In pictures: A week on
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Fears of radiation sickness stemming from the unfolding nuclear crisis in Japan have prompted a surge in US sales of potassium iodide.

Potassium iodide (KI), a salt, floods the thyroid gland with non-radioactive iodine which lessens the amount of radiation the gland can absorb.

Pharmacies do not generally carry KI, but several manufacturers have reported being out of stock.

The US government has a stockpile on hand in case of emergencies.

Online retailer nukepills.com said via its Twitter feed that it had sold out of KI pills on Tuesday.

It received 3,800 orders in 18 hours on Sunday and has shipped 50,000 pills to Tokyo, with the help of Harvard Medical School.

Debby Fleming Wurdack, co-owner of Fleming Pharmaceuticals, which produces a KI solution on demand, told the BBC the firm would be out of stock by the end of the day.

"This is insanity," Ms Fleming Wurdack said.

The company received more than 350 calls with orders from clients ranging from housewives to state governments on Tuesday, she said.

It also received orders from companies intending to send KI to their employees in Japan.

Ms Fleming Wurdack told the BBC that her company had ordered additional raw materials to manufacture more KI solution.

She expects the orders will continue for months.
Policy review

At present, the US government recommends that states have sufficient KI on hand for residents in a 10-mile (16km) radius of nuclear plants.
Woman in wheelchair undergoing radiation scan People in evacuation centres in northern Japan are undergoing radiation exposure scans

A 2002 law, authored by Representative Ed Markey, expanded that requirement to 20 miles (32km), but the provision has never been implemented.

In a letter to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy on Monday, Mr Markey called the failure to implement the law a "subversion of the intent of Congress".

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services told Bloomberg News that the administration intended to review its rules on KI provision.

For maximum effectiveness, KI, a common salt similar to table salt, should be taken before exposure to radiation.

Its protective properties last about 24 hours.

KI tablets can prevent the body absorbing radioactive iodine, thus mitigating an increased threat of thyroid cancer, but do have side effects.

Children and pregnant and nursing women are priority KI recipients because they are more susceptible to radiation poisoning.

Japanese authorities say they have distributed 230,000 units of KI to evacuation centres close to nuclear facilities.
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Actos is 'alternative' to banned diabetes drug Avandia
Diabetes medicine Drugs are used to control sugar levels in diabetes
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A drug to treat diabetes, Actos, would be a "sensible alternative" to one which was banned last year, researchers have said.

Avandia, also known as rosiglitazone, was suspended by authorities in Europe, but is still available in the United States and Canada.

The study published on the BMJ website said patients taking Actos had fewer heart problems.

Diabetes UK said Actos was a very effective treatment.

Rosiglitazone and pioglitazone, which has the trade name Actos, are used to control blood sugar levels in patients with type-2 diabetes and both are known to increase the risk of heart failure.

The research team at the University of East Anglia compared the risks associated with each drug by analysing 16 studies of more 800,000 patients.

Rosiglitazone increased the risk of heart attack by 16%, heart failure by 23%, and death by 14% compared with pioglitazone.
Alternative

The report says: "For patients who need thiazolidinedione treatment, continued use of rosiglitazone may lead to excess heart attacks, heart failure and mortality, compared with pioglitazone, the effect on public health may be considerable."

Dr Yoon Loke, from the Univeristy of East Anglia, told the BBC: "For patients who have come off rosiglitazone, pioglitazone would be a sensible alternative."

"Although it's like jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire in some ways, pioglitazone can lead to fractures in women, is being evaluated for risk in bladder cancer and increases the risk of heart failure."

Deepa Khatri, clinical advisor at Diabetes UK, said people with diabetes should have as much choice as possible.

"Actos (pioglitazone) is still available on the European market for people with diabetes.

"For many people, Actos is a very effective treatment to help control blood glucose levels and Diabetes UK believes this drug should continue to be made available to ensure people with diabetes have as much choice as possible.

"Alternatives to Actos are available, however is it very important that people discuss treatment options with their healthcare team to assess the most appropriate form of medication to suit their individual needs."
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