Mom drowns infant as partner watches on Skype

Mother drowns baby as sadist boyfriend watches on Skype

NORWAY: A woman in Norway wanted to discipline her one-year-old-infant and hence drowned her in a bucket while her British boyfriend watched the gruesome proceedings live on Skype. 

The Norwegian woman, Yasmin Chaudhry, married to a Pakistani national, wanted to teach her baby daughter a lesson for 'disobeying' her, reports Daily Mail.

The 26-year-old mother told the emergency medical professional the baby had fallen into the bucket by accident. However, when pressed by suspicious police officials, she revealed that she was asked to kill her baby by the boyfriend, the Mail said quoting The Sun newspaper.

The woman and her partner, whom she met over the interent, claim their intention was never to kill the infant. However, when the baby was pronounced dead by paramedics, they got scared and decided to hatch a story as a cover-up. The boyfriend is also being questioned over the matter.

Meanwhile, horrified officials have taken the woman's five-year-old son into care following the incident in October 2010.

The woman is estranged from her husband.

Tortured Afghan girl wants in-laws jailed

A 15-year-old Afghan girl who was tortured for months after her arranged marriage has spoken out for the first time since her rescue, saying she hopes her husband and his family are jailed for her abuse.

Sahar Gul became the bruised and bloodied face of women's rights in Afghanistan after she was rescued in late December when an uncle called police.

Speaking in an interview Saturday from a hospital in Kabul, Gul blamed her husband, his parents and his sister for her ordeal.

"I want them to be in jail," she said. "They gave me electric shock. ... They beat me with cables and tortured me."

She is being treated for multiple injuries that include broken fingers and ripped-out fingernails.

Police in Baghlan province where Gul was rescued have said her in-laws locked her up and tortured her after she refused to work as a prostitute. Her husband's parents and sister have been arrested.

They deny any wrongdoing.

Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for her husband, who serves in the Afghan army.

Her doctor, Feriba Omarzada, said Gul is recovering but is still traumatized.

Guls' story has shocked Afghanistan and prompted calls for more efforts to end underage marriage.

The legal marriage age in Afghanistan is 16, but the United Nations agency UN Women estimates that half of all girls are forced to marry under age 15.

Sword-swallower rushed to hospital after tearing his oesaphagus

UK: In one of the toughest acts, a man who is a sword swallower tore open his oesaphagus during a live show. With superhuman effort, the performer managed to finish his show before collapsing, reports The Western Mercury.

The stage performer, known as Hannibal Hellmurto, got into a sticky situation after he swallowed an electric-powered glass tube during a show in the city of Bradford in the UK. A four-inch hole ripped his oesaphagus, said the daily.

The man took five weeks to recover from his grave injury and during his recovery he had to be fed through a tube. 

Watch Hannibal Hellmurto swallow an electric-powered glass tube below:
 

Mother kills 'demon' child

In a horrific case, a woman stabbed, beat and killed her three-year-old child as she was convinced the little girl was possessed by demons, reports Herald Sun.

The woman allegedly told the police officials that monsters were coming for her child and she had to save her baby.

When the police officials arrived at the scene of the killing, they saw the dead baby cradled by her mother and blood all around. The mother has been sent to a psychiatric ward and has yet to be charged for her daughter's murder.

Teacher leads fake double life on Facebook

AUSTRALIA: A teacher in Australia's Queensland faces questions after creating an elaborate fantasy life involving a dead police partner, celebrities and charity.

The man claimed to be a 'tireless' charity worker who had been hired by Kids Helpline and that his young policewoman partner "Kellie" died just after Christmas, a few weeks after being shot on duty, reported The Sunday Mail.

The man managed to ooze a lot of sumpathy from all those who believed his tales.

"One thing that Kell said to me the day before she passed away will always stay with me: 'You have made me the happiest woman in the world . . . I love you Clintypoo . . . I'll always be with you'," Acworth wrote on his Facebook page last week.

In the virtual world, Acworth's hi-fi life was one of endless charity events, rubbing shoulders with celebrity friends and volunteering for good causes.

He was caught lying through his teeth when organisations like Kids Helpline said they had no record of a Clint Acworth working as either an employee or volunteer.

Parasite turns honey bees into zombies
 
US scientists say a fly parasite can turn honey bees into confused zombies before killing them, a discovery that could offer new clues to why bee colonies are collapsing.

So far, the parasite has only been detected in honey bees in California and South Dakota, researchers reported in the science journal PLoS ONE this week.

But if it turns out to be an emerging parasite, that "underlines the danger that could threaten honey bee colonies throughout North America," said the study led by San Francisco State University professor of biology John Hafernik.

Hafernik made the discovery by accident, when he collected some bees from outside a light fixture at the university to feed to a praying mantis he'd brought back from a field trip.

"But being an absent-minded professor, I left them in a vial on my desk and forgot about them. Then the next time I looked at the vial, there were all these fly pupae surrounding the bees," he said.

Soon, the bees began to die, but not in the usual way by sit-ting still and curling up. These bees kept trying to move their legs and get around, but they were too weak, said lead author Andrew Core, a graduate student in Hafernik's lab.

"They kept stretching them out and then falling over," said Core. "It really painted a picture of something like a zombie."

Further study showed that bees that left their hives at night were most likely to become infected with the fly parasite, identified as Apoc-ephalus borealis. Once bees were parasitized by the fly, they would abandon their hives and congregate near lights, a very unusual behaviour for bees.

"When we observed the bees for some time - the ones that were alive - we found that they walked around in circles, often with no sense of direction," said Core.

The parasite lays its eggs in the bee's abdomen. About a week after the bee dies, the fly larvae push their way into the world, often exiting from between the bee's head and mid-section.

Next, the team hopes to find out more about where the parasitization is taking place, and whether the "zombie bees" leave the colony of their own accord or if their disease is sensed by comrades who then push them out.

Researchers plan to use tiny radio tags and video monitoring to find clues to the mystery.

"We don't know the best way to stop parasitization, because one of the big things we're missing is where the flies are parasitizing the bees," Hafernik said. "We assume it's while the bees are out foraging, because we don't see the flies hanging around the bee hives. But it's still a bit of a black hole in terms of where it's actually happening."

Experts have theorized that the huge die-off of bees worldwide since 2006, a major threat to crops that depend on the honey-making insects for pollination, is not due to any one single factor.

Parasites, viral and bacterial infections, pesticides and poor nutrition resulting from the impact of human activities on the environment have all played a role in the decline.

The mysterious decimation of bee populations in the United States, Europe, Japan and else-where in recent years threatens agricultural production worth tens of billions of dollars.

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