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Marvin Schur, a 93-year-old man from Bay City, Michigan has died after the electric company limited his electric use due to his failure to pay over US$1,000 in past-due payments. Bay City Electric Light & Power installed a power-limiting device on his home on January 13. The device would limit the amount of power the resident uses and would essentially shut it off if that limit is reached, or if the resident fails to pay the outstanding bill within 10 days of installation. In order for the electricity to be turned back on, the limiter must be

Former member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) Tommy Sheridan and his wife are to be tried for perjury. The charges stem from Tommy and Gail Sheridan's successful £200,000 defamation suit against British tabloid newspaper The News of the World in 2006, during which the judge said that conflicting evidence meant some witnesses were perjuring themselves. This led to an investigation by Lothian and Borders Police. The newspaper had accused Tommy Sheridan of having an affair. Sheridan established the Scottish Socialist Alliance in 1996, which bec

Shop Direct group, One of the United Kingdoms home shopping retailers are to cut 1,150 jobs as they shut down a call centre in Merseyside. The closure of the call centre was said to be part of the company’s transformation to an online-led business. 250 of the job loses are to be offered relocation within the company. Currently 56% of Shop Directs business is in the form of online sales. They set for this to rise to 70% of sales within two years. Chief Executive of Shop Direct, Mark Newton Jones, said that Shop Direct is a strong and growing b

A man from New Zealand has found data belonging to the United States Armed Forces on a used MP3 player. Chris Ogle was shopping at a thrift store in Oklahoma when he bought the player for $9. Upon returning home to Whangarei and connecting it to his computer, he discovered files listing data about US soldiers serving in Afghanistan and Iraq. Among the data is lists of Social Security numbers, as well as mission briefings and a list of pregnant soldiers. Most of the data is from 2005, and it does not appear its exposure will have a major impac

The Scottish Parliament has narrowly rejected the Scottish government's proposed £33 billion budget. The devolved parliament was tied 64-64 on the motion to approve the budget after two Green Party MSPs switched away from backing the minority Scottish National Party (SNP) administration. The Presiding Officer (speaker) of the parliament, Alex Fergusson, used his casting vote to reject the budget. Finance Secretary John Swinney of the SNP announced that he would immediately reintroduce it. The budget had the backing of the Scottish Conservative

Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, an openly gay Icelandic politician currently serving as the nation's Minister for Social Affairs, is soon to be appointed prime minister. The appointment will mark the first time ever that an openly gay individual has been appointed head of a national government. She will remain interim prime minister until the general election, rescheduled for May. Jóhanna, 66, has support from both parties in the new coalition government, and she says she will accept the position under the condition that both parties will trust her. O

Australia's Allan Davis won the 2009 Tour Down Under professional road cycling race. Sprint specialist Davis completed Sunday's final stage in the main pack to maintain the lead he had built up in time bonuses from sprint wins earlier in the race. 122 cyclists completed the six day race around a circuit starting and ending at Adelaide, South Australia. American cyclist Lance Armstrong also participated in the race, his first professional bike race since the 2005 Tour de France. It is not clear if the seven-time Tour de France winner intended

Starting February 1, Cospas-Sarsat will discontinue monitoring the frequencies that are used for analog-based emergency position-indicating radio beacons (EPIRB), the 121.5 and 243 MHz frequencies. Search and rescue (SAR) groups worldwide will only monitor the 406 MHz frequency, which is dedicated to digital locators. The 406 MHz digital band has many advantages over the older analog systems. Since the locators send data to satellites, rather than just provide a continuous signal, much more will be known about the emergency before a SAR group

Ten climbers at a ski resort in Zigana, Turkey have died in an avalanche. They were part of a group of seventeen from the nearby province of Trabzon. The avalanche occurred at 11:15 local time (9:15 UTC) yesterday on Mount Zigana in the Gumushane region of Turkey near the Black Sea coast. Winter sports are increasing in popularity across Turkey, as it is mountainous. The climbers were at a height of 7,260ft (2,200m) while crossing a deep valley, when the snow hit them. As search teams and locals arrived, they managed to pull seven climbers fre

In an interview on Israeli television, the country's foreign minister Tzipi Livni said that another offensive against Hamas, inside the Gaza Strip, was possible if the smuggling of weapons through tunnels under the strip is not halted. This comes just one day after Press TV reported that Israeli F-16 fighter jets once again began to fly over the Strip. "We embarked on the operation in order to bring quiet [to Southern Israel] - now there is quiet, and to stop the firing of rockets - now the firing has stopped. As far as I am concerned, we cou

The coalition government in Iceland has collapsed following the international banking crisis. Prime Minister Geir Haarde of the conservative Independence Party had begun talks with coalition partner party Social Democratic Alliance in the run-up to an early general election planned for May. It was reported yesterday that these talks had failed and the coalition was dissolved. The centre-left Social Democrats will now try to build a coalition with opposition parties, according to the BBC. The Independence Party currently has 25 of the 63 seats

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, otherwise known as the Tamil Tigers, have told the BBC that they are prepared to fight back against Sri Lankan forces. The vow follows reports that Sri Lankan forces are laying siege to the last rebel-held areas of the island. The Sri Lankan army have said that the "final battle" was underway and predicted that the Tamil rebellion is finished. There have been rumours that Velupillai Prabhakaran, the Tigers' leader since the conflict began, had fled in the face of the assault. But political leader B Nadesan