<![CDATA[International news from metro.us/newyork]]> en-us <![CDATA[Lockerbie bomber Abdel Basset al-Megrahi has died in Libya]]>
Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, released from a Scottish prison in 2009 and returned to Libya because he was suffering from terminal cancer, had been in and out of hospital for weeks and was taken for an emergency blood transfusion in April.

Megrahi's health had deteriorated quickly overnight, his brother Abdulhakim told Reuters. "He was surrounded by his family and died in his house," he said. He was 60.

"He was too sick to utter anything on his deathbed," Abdulhakim said. "We want people to know he was innocent."

Megrahi was found guilty in 2001 of bombing Pan Am flight 103 as it flew to New York from London on December 21, 1988. All 259 people aboard the aircraft were killed and 11 people in the Scottish town of Lockerbie died from falling wreckage.

He was jailed in Scotland but sent back to Muammar Gaddafi's Libya by the Scottish authorities on compassionate grounds in 2009 because he was only expected to survive for months.

The decision angered many relatives of the victims, 189 of whom were American, and was criticized by the U.S. administration. A number of U.S. politicians pressed for his extradition to the United States.

Megrahi, an intelligence agent during Gaddafi's rule, was jailed in the town of Greenock in western Scotland after he was convicted for the bombing under Scottish law at a trial held in the Netherlands.

Megrahi told Reuters in October his role in the attack had been exaggerated and the truth about what really happened would emerge soon.

An intelligence agent during the rule of Gaddafi, Megrahi denied any role in suspected human rights abuses in his home country before the Libyan dictator's fall and death in a popular uprising last year.

Libya's now-ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) has said it would work with the Scottish government over the possible involvement of others in the 1988 bombing, an attack the country's new rulers are eager to distance themselves from. ]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1143537--lockerbie-bomber-abdel-basset-al-megrahi-has-died-in-libya Sun, 20 May 2012 10:16:05 -0400 Reuters http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1143537--lockerbie-bomber-abdel-basset-al-megrahi-has-died-in-libya <![CDATA[Could Europe decide the U.S. election?]]>
As workers assemble the family-owned company's hot-air fabric welders, used to manufacture everything from inflatable rafts to truck tarps, it's hard to know the recession of 2007-2009 ever happened.

Ten clocks on the wall of the plant in Navarre, Ohio, show local time from Norway to New Zealand and tell Miller Weldmaster's comeback story in a word: exports. Sixty percent of the company's business now comes from outside the United States.

Manufacturing growth, surging exports: These are central promises of Obama's reelection bid, especially in blue-collar industrial states that could determine the election.

Mindful of the Indiana surprise of 2008, when a spike in unemployment helped Obama win the reliably Republican state, the White House has every reason to fear payback in states like Ohio, this time from any deepening of Europe's financial crisis.

Already there are warning signs. One in four of Miller Weldmaster's machines is sold in Europe, and sales are down 5 percent so far this year. A further drop could force the company to consider layoffs.

"We've taken a sigh of relief - we've been over the crunch," says Jeff Sponseller, the company's vice president of sales and marketing. "The chance that this could happen again brings a lot of anxiety."

Other Ohio manufacturers share that concern. Royal Phillips Electronics, which exports X-ray machines from a 1,200-employee facility near Cleveland, warned in April that budget cuts and other austerity measures in Europe could hurt demand for its products. Glassmaker Owens-Illinois Inc, based in Perrysburg, said Europe's volatility could hit its earnings as well.

The U.S. Commerce Department estimates that more than a quarter of all manufacturing workers in Ohio depend on exports for their jobs.

Against this backdrop, the Obama administration has been involved in intense, behind-the-scenes maneuvering to steer Europe away from the financial brink.

For the past two years, Treasury officials, including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, have crisscrossed the Atlantic in pursuit of solutions to Europe's problems. The president has also been actively involved, speaking to European leaders by phone at key moments in the region's crisis.

His instant invitation to France's newly elected president, Francois Hollande, to White House talks on the eve of this weekend's Group of Eight summit is evidence of a central fact in the United States: The states that will do most to determine the outcome of November's presidential and congressional elections may not be swing states like Ohio but member states of the European Union.

On condition of anonymity, a senior EU official told Reuters it felt as if the Obama administration wanted the G8 to cooperate in the reelection campaign. "They see the debt crisis as the biggest likely drag on the U.S. economy between now and November," the official said, "and so they basically want to make sure that we find a way of muddling through."

Frantic shuttle diplomacy

U.S. officials say Europe's woes are already weighing on the U.S. economy, which grew at a tepid 2.2 percent in the first quarter of 2012.

Rather than a hit to exports, the real nightmare scenario for U.S. businesses, banks and policymakers alike would be a chaotic unraveling of the euro zone's financial system on the scale of the crash that followed the failure of U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers in 2008.

Then, banks in the United States and beyond were pushed to the verge of collapse by a seizing up of credit, strangling the global economy and more than halving the value of U.S. and global stock markets. The psychological impact demolished consumer confidence as well as the economic track record of the Republican administration, helping hand an historic election victory to Obama.

For the sake of the U.S. economy and the election that no doubt hangs on it, the White House has no wish for history to repeat itself.

Late last year, as U.S. and European officials alike worried the entire single European currency area might fall apart, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner embarked on a frantic round of shuttle diplomacy.

Between September and December he flew to Europe five times, sometimes passing through several capitals in a day. Those directly involved say conversations with senior policymakers were often blisteringly blunt.

Officials say the strategy has been clear: to explain what is at stake for the global economy, to offer up lessons from how the United States moved to fix its banks, and to push Europe to do whatever is necessary to hold itself together.

Geithner in April made a fresh call on the European Central Bank, which has been less aggressive than the U.S. Federal Reserve, to help alleviate the crisis.

Even when Europe's worries eased in the first few months of 2012, U.S. officials continued talking to their European counterparts on an almost weekly basis.

"We've been heavily and steadily engaged with them from the outset," Under Secretary to the Treasury for International Affairs Lael Brainard told Reuters. "It's too important for our exporters and our workers not to be."

Brainard, the lead U.S. official on the issue, is already planning her next trip to Europe. It will be her ninth since September.

How persuasive a pressure?

When U.S. officials first raised serious worries over the potential survivability of the euro zone at a meeting of finance ministers from the G7 advanced economies in Canada's frozen north in February 2010, they say European leaders simply did not grasp the potential scale or impact of the crisis.

Amid the igloos and the dogsleds - and questions over why Canada decided to host the event in such a costly and inaccessible location - they outlined their fears of a potential new crisis.

Since then, they complain, euro zone leaders have struggled time and again to get ahead of events, only to settle on measures that would be too little, too late.

Officials from both sides of the Atlantic with knowledge of these discussions say that even those agreements came after last-minute U.S. pressure, often culminating in direct intervention by Geithner and Obama himself.

Without such pressure, these sources say, the May 2010 meeting in Brussels, which agreed on the first 110 billion-euro bailout for Greece, might never have reached that conclusion.

U.S. officials say they were also instrumental in persuading Europe to perform much stricter stress tests on its banks.

Without the personal intervention of Obama, one Washington insider suggested, former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero might never have accepted that his troubled economy could no longer sustain its economic stimulus and needed to confront its budget deficit.

Not everyone in Europe agrees that European policy owed quite so much to U.S. pressure. Much of what Washington wanted, they suggest, was already in the works.

"In terms of the conversations, I think they were effective," said one well-placed European diplomat on condition of anonymity. "But everyone was already aware of the need to address these issues. They were pushing at an open door."

Presidential touch

The next European leader to get Obama's personal attention will be Francois Hollande. When Obama phoned him to congratulate him on his election victory on May 8, Hollande found himself invited to the White House much sooner than he or French officials had planned.

Given Hollande will be attending the meeting of G8 leaders this weekend and a NATO summit that immediately follows, his meeting with Obama on Friday has a practical logic. But analysts and officials say there is little doubt the U.S. president will use the opportunity to try to build rapport and stress again the importance of European cohesion.

During his campaign, Hollande sharply criticized German Chancellor Angela Merkel for her focus on austerity to solve the debt crisis. Yet on Tuesday, in a visit to Berlin hours after his inauguration, the two leaders agreed to a joint approach even as they acknowledged their differences.

On the timing of Hollande's visit to Washington, "obviously, there is an element of convenience here," said Philip J. Crowley, a former State Department spokesman under the Obama administration. "But there is also a sense of urgency. European decisions could potentially intrude on the U.S. election."

Hollande's "pro-growth" agenda is more aligned with the Obama administration's own stimulus spending than that of his predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy, who supported the German-led "fiscal pact" that ties euro zone members to tough spending rules. Yet the United States is anxious that Hollande soften his election pledge to renegotiate the pact, potentially jeopardizing the rest of a meticulously negotiated crisis plan.

Finding a compromise between the focus of Paris on growth and Berlin's insistence on austerity could be easy when compared with the far more difficult decisions that confront Europe.

Greece faces elections in June that could determine its chances of staying in the euro zone. Should it leave, fears will intensify that other countries could follow suit. If Germany wants to preserve the euro, it may have to decide how deeply to underwrite the more troubled Mediterranean states.

"We have much less influence over Germany, where policy is driven by domestic politics," said Tyson Barker, a Europe specialist and fellow at the Truman National Security Project who says he talks to administration officials most days. "In Greece, which itself might be on the edge of political collapse, I'd say we have no influence at all."

Republicans ready to pounce

At home, Obama's hands are largely tied.

Any new U.S. funding to the International Monetary Fund, which could be used to help fight the euro zone crisis, is considered a nonstarter: With many voters still simmering over the 2008 Wall Street bailout, more U.S. funding for Europe would play straight into Republican hands.

Republicans have tried to revoke $100 billion in previously authorized IMF emergency funding. Although the measure was defeated in the Democratic-controlled Senate, party leaders could still generate awkward headlines for Obama by pushing it in the House of Representatives.

"We haven't seen a willingness by the European Union countries to change their addiction to government spending and borrowing," says Republican Representative Cathy McMorris Rogers, who is leading that effort. "It doesn't make sense to be funneling billions of dollars to bail out Greece, Portugal, Ireland, and other wealthy European countries."

Advisers to Mitt Romney, Obama's most likely challenger in November, argue that Obama's poor stewardship of the U.S. economy has left the United States exposed to the euro zone crisis and limited the administration's ability to respond.

"We think the Obama administration has limited credibility in Europe because they so badly mismanaged our economy here," said Kristen Silverberg, a former ambassador to the EU who advises the Romney campaign on European policy.

In reply, Obama's defenders argue that the recession in several European countries provides proof that his aggressive stimulus effort saved the United States from a deeper slump.

"When President Obama says, 'Look, we stabilized the financial system, we put in stimulus and the economy walked back from the brink of collapse' ... it's very hard to do the counterfactual. But now, Europe is the counterfactual," said Laura D'Andrea Tyson, a former economic adviser to President Bill Clinton who also served on Obama's jobs council.

Some say that argument will be too complicated to make on the campaign trail.

"Most voters aren't thinking about any of this," said Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist who wants further big stimulus spending in the United States. "Voters have children, they have lives, they have jobs. They're not interested in this stuff except insofar as they want to know if the economy's getting better."

Recovery at risk

Back in Ohio, jobs are easier to find than they were a year ago. The state's unemployment rate, at 7.5 percent, is at its lowest point since before Obama took office.

Miller Weldmaster is hiring electricians and welders, and a natural-gas boom is luring some workers away with the promise of six-figure incomes.

Still, memories of the recession are vivid, and the company is redoubling its marketing efforts to keep the gathering storm in Europe from eroding its sales further.

"When things get slow, the first thing that goes off people's list is capital equipment," Sponseller says. The political fallout from such a downturn, as John McCain discovered in Indiana four years ago, can make all the difference.

The electoral calculus for the 2012 campaign is brutally straightforward. "In good times incumbents are rewarded," says David Cohen, a political science professor at Ohio's University of Akron. "In bad economic times incumbents are punished."

]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/national/article/1143363--could-europe-decide-the-u-s-election Thu, 17 May 2012 10:22:03 -0400 REUTERS http://www.metro.us/newyork/national/article/1143363--could-europe-decide-the-u-s-election <![CDATA[Officials say CIA 'foiled al-Qaida bomb plot' in Yemen]]>
Separately, the Department of Homeland Security said there was no active plot against the United States at this time. "We have no specific, credible information regarding an active terrorist plot against the U.S. at this time," DHS spokesman Matt Chandler said. ]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142412--officials-say-cia-foiled-al-qaida-bomb-plot-in-yemen Mon, 07 May 2012 19:02:42 -0400 REUTERS http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142412--officials-say-cia-foiled-al-qaida-bomb-plot-in-yemen <![CDATA[VIDEO: 'Golden Dawn' leader makes Fascist-style speech after Greek elections]]>
Greece has been in shambles for years now. The country's financial woes are nothing new.

Even so, you'd expect the country that prides itself on inventing democracy to make more sound decisions on election day.

The May 6 elections gave the Greek people a chance to voice their opinion on the austerity measures and the European bailout.

Let's just say that Greeks are not happy, and they expressed it with their ballots.

Here's the breakdown:

New Democracy, the conservative party, won the majority of the votes with 18.9%

PASOK, the socialist party that was in power the past several years when the spotlight was on Greece's troubles came in third with 13% of votes, after SYRIZA, a coalition of the radical left, with 16.7% of votes.

The surprise came with the hard-right, fascist party "Golden Dawn."

After the elections, Nikos Michaloliakos, the leader of "Golden Dawn" delivered a rousing speech, which you may be forgiven for finding incredibly frightening.

Watch the video below and ask yourself, 'Why would the people grant this man access to Greek Parliament?"

We don't have the answer, either.
]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142387--video-golden-dawn-leader-makes-fascist-style-speech-after-greek-elections Mon, 07 May 2012 17:07:36 -0400 MARY ANN GEORGANTOPOULOS, NEW YORK http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142387--video-golden-dawn-leader-makes-fascist-style-speech-after-greek-elections <![CDATA[Connyland: Zoo rave leads to dolphins' heroin overdose, report says]]>
The dolphins, Shadow and Chelmers, suffered painful deaths after zoo handlers rented space near their training tank for a massive club-style party attended by thousands of people.

The deaths, which occurred more than a year ago, were initially blamed on antibiotics administered to the dolphins by zoo pets, according to the Daily Express. However, a "leaked" toxicology report reveals that the heroin substitute Buprenorphin was detected in the dolphins' urine following the rave.

At the time of the death, zoo keeper Nadja Gasser told local media that Shadow died first, and it wasn't long before Chelmers suffered the same fate.

"He was drifting under the water and was clearly in trouble and so we jumped into the water. We tried to hold him. He was shaking all over and was foaming at the mouth," she said. "Eventually we got him out of the water. His tongue was hanging out. He could hardly breathe. He was given adrenalin, but it didn't help. After an hour the dolphin died."

In addition to the possibility that partiers dropped illegal drugs into the dolphins' tank, animal rights activists are also criticizing the zoo for allowing such a loud event to take place near the underwater mammals which have sensitive sonar hearing.

The zoo has denied any wrong-doing, though a spokesman said he plans to follow up with prosecutors about why they didn't follow up about the dolphins being poisoned with drugs.

]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142363--connyland-zoo-rave-leads-to-dolphins-heroin-overdose-report-says Mon, 07 May 2012 13:47:46 -0400 CASSANDRA GARRISON, NEW YORK http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142363--connyland-zoo-rave-leads-to-dolphins-heroin-overdose-report-says <![CDATA[Dead baby powder pills exist, apparently, in Korea]]>
The pills are believed to ward off diseases, according to customs agents who have busted 35 smuggling attempts since August. More than 17,450 pills disguised as "stamina boosters" have been seized in luggage or through mail, according to The Telegraph.

Korea Customs Service said the pills were made in northeastern China using the chopped flesh of babies, which was dried on a stove and then converted into a powder. However, unsurprisingly, the capsules contained harmful bacteria.

No charges have been filed in the smuggling cases because the amount is deemed small and not for retail sale, but rather for personal consumption, according to the agents.

So far, China's State Food and Drug Administration and its Health Ministry has yet to comment on the disturbing discoveries.

]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142350--dead-baby-powder-pills-exist-apparently-in-korea Mon, 07 May 2012 12:04:25 -0400 CASSANDRA GARRISON, NEW YORK http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142350--dead-baby-powder-pills-exist-apparently-in-korea <![CDATA[Lawmakers: Taliban stronger after US surge]]>
“I think we both say that what we found is the Taliban is stronger,” Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein told “Fox News Sunday” in an interview that included House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, who agreed with her statement. The two lawmakers returned last week from a trip to Afghanistan.

The Defense Department said last week in a report to Congress that its surge of 33,000 extra troops in Afghanistan ordered in late 2009 had weakened the Taliban but that the insurgency remained resilient.

The report said overall insurgent attacks declined in 2011 for the first time in five years, even though violence increased in areas surrounding the Taliban's southern stronghold of Kandahar, a region where U.S. efforts have been focused since 2009.

Feinstein, a Democrat, said radical Islamist religious schools in Pakistan were providing new recruits to the Afghan insurgency. ]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142289--lawmakers-taliban-stronger-after-us-surge Sun, 06 May 2012 19:01:27 -0400 REUTERS http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142289--lawmakers-taliban-stronger-after-us-surge <![CDATA[Chen Guangcheng: Clinton applauds China allowing dissident to apply to study in U.S.]]>
But rights activists sounded a note of caution over expectations of a quick way out for Chen, saying Beijing could be worried that appearing to be soft might embolden other challengers to Communist Party rule ahead of a power handover late this year.

The announcement by the Chinese Foreign Ministry followed a dramatic and very public appeal by Chen, who spoke by phone to a U.S. congressional hearing on his case, asking to be allowed to spend time in the United States after fleeing 19 months of extra-judicial captivity in his home village.

"If he wants to study abroad, he can apply through normal channels to the relevant departments in accordance with the law, just like any other Chinese citizen," ministry spokesman Liu Weimin said in a brief statement, adding Chen was still being treated in hospital.

Clinton, in Beijing for strategic and economic talks, said the U.S. ambassador to Beijing, Gary Locke, had spoken to Chen again on Friday when he had confirmed he wanted to go to the United States to study, along with his family.

"Over the course of the day progress has been made to help him have the future that he wants and we will be staying in touch with him as this process moves forward," she said.

"This is not just about well known activists; it's about the human rights and aspirations of more than a billion people here in China and billions more around the world and it's about the future of this great nation and all nations," Clinton added.

U.S. officials said they now expect to have regular access for both American diplomats and doctors. They also said that checks had shown that Chen had three broken bones from his escape, and his foot was put in a cast.

UNIVERSITY FELLOWSHIP

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Chen had been offered a fellowship from an American university, where he can be accompanied by his wife and two children.

She said Washington expected Beijing to quickly deal with his application to travel abroad. "The United States government would then give visa requests for him and his immediate family priority attention," Nuland said in a statement.

The crisis erupted last week when Chen sought refuge in the U.S. embassy. He stayed there for six days until Wednesday when U.S. officials took him to a Beijing hospital after assurances from the Chinese government that he and his family would receive better treatment.

But within hours, Chen, 40, had changed his mind, scuppering what had seemed to be a delicately constructed deal between Chinese and U.S. diplomats to allow him to receive treatment for a broken foot and be reunited with his wife and children.

Chen was anxious about his future and the fate of family members who apparently helped his escape and were detained by authorities in the rural eastern province of Shandong.

The issue cast a shadow over this week's visit to Beijing by Clinton for talks intended to improve ties between the world's two biggest economies.

Despite the friction, a U.S. official said China would raise foreign ownership limits in domestic joint venture securities firms and allow them to trade commodities and financial futures in a move to further liberalize capital markets. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said China had also made significant reforms to its currency regime, long a bone of contention.

Clinton told Chinese President Hu Jintao ties were the strongest they had ever been. But Beijing has nevertheless accused the United States of meddling in its affairs in the Chen case.

Chinese human rights lawyer Tang Jitian cautioned that the authorities could easily hold up the paperwork to delay Chen leaving the country. China's security forces might not be as keen as its diplomats for a quick exit.

"This notice from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is positive news, but how it will play out we don't know. For instance, getting the approval for the paperwork to go, there are many potential pitfalls," said Tang. "We can't be 100 percent optimistic."

STARBUCKS-SIPPING TROUBLEMAKER

One of China's main official newspapers accused Chen of being a pawn of American subversion of Communist Party power and described U.S. ambassador Locke as a backpack-wearing, Starbucks-sipping troublemaker.

"Chen Guangcheng has become a tool and a pawn for American politicians to blacken China," the Beijing Daily said.

Chen, in translated comments, also told the congressional hearing that villagers who had helped him were "receiving retribution" and he was most concerned about the safety of his mother and brothers.

His village remained under lockdown. Guards chased away two Reuters reporters who attempted to enter the village on Friday. The four heavy-set guards ran slowly, yelling at the reporters as their car drove away.

Chen, who campaigned against forced abortions under China's "one-child" policy, sought refuge in the U.S. embassy after escaping from house arrest in a village in Shandong on April 22.

The Chen case comes at a tricky time for China, which is engaged in a leadership change. The carefully choreographed transition has already been knocked out of step by the downfall of ambitious senior Communist Party official Bo Xilai in a scandal linked to the apparent murder of a British businessman.

]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142199--chen-guangcheng-clinton-applauds-china-allowing-dissident-to-apply-to-study-in-u-s Fri, 04 May 2012 10:36:09 -0400 Reuters http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142199--chen-guangcheng-clinton-applauds-china-allowing-dissident-to-apply-to-study-in-u-s <![CDATA[Sex, farting, and drugs: The real Hitler revealed]]>
Some historical documents set to be auctioned off at a price between $1,500 to $2,000 each are painting a very different picture of the Nazi dictator. As reported by the Washington Examiner, the cache of documents includes interviews with Hitler's doctors and the diary entries of one physician who wrote down things he heard the Nazi leader say.

His doctors noted that Hitler had several medical complaints, one of them being flatulence, which was blamed on his vegetarian diet. He took pills in an attempt to quell the embarrassing problem.

Hitler also expressed his desire for beautiful women, but his libido eventually decreased, though he was living with Eva Braun, his long-time companion. Hitler injected himself with semen from young bulls in an effort to stimulate his sexual desire, as recorded by Dr. Theodore Morrell.

"Sexual organs showed no indications of abnormality or pathology and secondary sex characteristics were normally developed. Hitler was very fond of the society of attractive women, particularly during the years of his rise to power. In later years his libido was apparently sublimated with the increase in...responsibility. Morrell believes that Hitler, although not strongly inclined to sexual activity, did have sexual intercourse with Eva Braun, though they were accustomed to sleep in separate beds," one document said.

Another report from Dr. Erwin Giesing said Hitler used cocaine to "clear his sinuses," and began craving it more because it made him happy. Giesing wrote that he had to cut Hitler's "dosage."

Giesing also wrote that he overheard Hitler, in a voice that was "unnaturally loud and a little bit screaming," make comments about his own political influence.

"My only opponent is Stalin, who is almost on the same level as I am...Bolshevism will lose against Nationalism, and I will crush East Asia," Hitler said, according to Giesing. "Churchill and Roosevelt are neither politically nor militarily a factor. England will break-up...America will take whatever is left and wipe the English empire from history...I will be the one who tips the scale between the Russians and the Anglo-Americans."

Many of the documents are in German. The cache will be auctioned May 8th and 9th at Alexander Historical Auctions.

]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/national/article/1142095--sex-farting-and-drugs-the-real-hitler-revealed Thu, 03 May 2012 15:16:55 -0400 METRO.US, NEW YORK http://www.metro.us/newyork/national/article/1142095--sex-farting-and-drugs-the-real-hitler-revealed <![CDATA[Don't have sex in our gondolas, says Chinese park service]]>
Luckily, with the efforts of officials in China's Henan province, at least one of our pet peeves is over: No longer will people be having sex in the cable cars, if this sign is to be believed.

Truly, if this gondola is a-rockin', it might fall off its cables and plummet into the ground below.

Apparently gondola-sexing is a problem among Chinese youth, which means maybe we don't need to worry so much after all. ]]> http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142080--don-t-have-sex-in-our-gondolas-says-chinese-park-service Thu, 03 May 2012 12:27:26 -0400 NATE JONES, NATE JONES http://www.metro.us/newyork/international/article/1142080--don-t-have-sex-in-our-gondolas-says-chinese-park-service