South Korea has decided to deploy two warships with missile-defense systems, one day after North Korea apparently moved a missile to its east coast.
Military officials told South Korean media the two warships would be deployed on east and west coasts.
Seoul has sought to play down North Korea’s latest move, saying they may be preparing for a missile test.
South Korea has decided to deploy two warships with missile-defense systems, one day after North Korea apparently moved a missile to its east coast
In recent weeks, North Korea has ramped up its rhetoric and made specific threats to target US territory.
One of the targets named by Pyongyang was the Pacific island of Guam, which hosts a US military base.
On Thursday, the US confirmed it would deploy a missile-defense system to Guam in response to the threats.
“The moves that we have been making are designed to ensure and to reassure the American people and our allies that we can defend the United States,” said US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.
A building collapse has killed at least 34 people in Thane, near Indian city of Mumbai, officials say.
Dozens are injured and many others are feared trapped beneath the seven-storey building under construction in Thane, Indian media report, quoting officials.
Indian police said the building was being constructed illegally and four floors were already occupied.
Building collapses are common in India. Poor construction material and practices are often blamed.
A growing population and a lack of space has seen an increase in the number of high rises, but many builders fail to take sufficient safety precautions, or obtain proper permission to build.
A building collapse has killed at least 34 people in Thane, near Indian city of Mumbai
A section of the building collapsed on Thursday evening, bringing the entire structure down, a police official in Thane, Maharashtra state, said.
He said at least nine children were among the dead.
Rescue efforts continued through the night.
The disaster management officials in Thane district said 57 people were injured.
Most of the victims were construction workers who were staying in the building, he added.
In December 2013 at least 13 people died when part of a half-constructed building collapsed in the Wagholi area of Maharashtra.
Last September at least six people were killed when a building collapsed in Pune city in Maharashtra.
Japan’s stock market has reached its highest level since 2008, after a recent central bank stimulus plan raised hope of economic revival.
The main Nikkei 225 stock index climbed as much as 4.7% to 13,225.62, its highest since August 2008.
The Bank of Japan (BOJ) said on Thursday it would double the country’s money supply to spur growth and halt falling prices.
The step was much bigger than expected and signaled a more aggressive approach towards driving growth.
Analysts said that BOJ moves had got the attention of investors both at home and abroad.
Japan’s stock market has reached its highest level since 2008, after a recent central bank stimulus plan raised hope of economic revival
“Many investors who were not even interested in Japan before have opened their eyes,” said Tetsuro Ii, chief executive of Commons Asset Management.
“They realized that if they continue to look at Japan the way they did before, they are going to lose.”
By pumping more money into the system, Japan is hoping to promote price growth, ending a cycle of deflation, recession and sputtering economic recovery.
At the same time, it is also seen as an attempt to weaken its currency and boost exports.
The Japanese yen has declined 4.5% against the US dollar in the past two days, and more than 5% against the euro.
Analysts said the yen was likely to remain weak in the coming months.
“The big party we are having in the markets now is, of course, the financials. Banks are getting more money for free, utilities with big investment projects are getting zero cost capital now,” said Martin Schulz from Fujitsu Research Institute.
“The big story, and the lasting story, will be the exporters. A weaker yen helps the exporters to earn money with Japanese technology in Asian markets in particular.”
On Thursday, the BOJ embarked on what some are calling a new era of monetary easing.
It will increase its purchase of government bonds by 50tn yen ($520bn; £350bn) annually, the equivalent of almost 10% of Japan’s gross domestic product, or total economic output.
BOJ governor Haruhiko Kuroda defended the size of the stimulus saying the government’s inflation target of 2% would remain out of reach if the central bank continued its incremental steps.
Haruhiko Kuroda said he would “do whatever it takes” to drive growth.
However, analysts say Japan’s new direction is likely to provoke a reaction from their main competitors.
The BOJ’s moves to buy additional bonds is an attempt to keep long-term interest rates low.
The bank hopes that pumping money into the system will make borrowing cheap and encourage consumers and businesses to spend.
The central bank has also said that it would buy riskier assets such as exchange-traded funds and real estate trust funds.
While such moves may help halt years of falling prices, some analysts have warned that there is a risk that so much liquidity in the markets may trigger an artificial rise in asset prices.
“We think there is a risk of a bubble,” said Hiroshi Shiraishi, senior economist at BNP Paribas Securities.
“If these types of asset purchases are going to work, then they work by distorting asset markets.”
However, on Friday Haruhiko Kuroda sought to allay those fears, saying the bank will keep a close eye on the markets.
“I don’t think there’s a bond or stock market bubble now and I don’t see one emerging any time soon,” he told Japan’s lower house of parliament.
An emotional Kevin Ware was speaking out in his first round of television interviews for the first time since his injury on Sunday night, thanking fans for their support and promised he would do his best to return to the court.
Kevin Ware, 20, said he will travel to the Final Four on his crutches and expects to be a big presence for the Cardinals on the team bench as they take on Wichita State on Saturday.
Cleared by doctors to accompany the team to Atlanta, the Louisville guard said he plans to be a full participant in the team’s preparation for the game.
Kevin Ware admitted to a gaggle of reporters at the university that he did not know Louisville had gone on to win the game until he woke up on Monday morning, with the NCAA trophy by his side.
Kevin Ware admitted to a gaggle of reporters at the university that he did not know Louisville had gone on to win the game until he woke up on Monday morning, with the NCAA trophy by his side
Speaking of the moment of the injury, he told ESPN: “I honestly didn’t feel pain. It was more shock. I’ve never felt anything like that.”
Donning a “Win it for Kevin” team shirt, Kevin Ware said the overwhelming support he has received has helped him maintain his spirits and strengthened his confidence of a full recovery.
He hopes by next season to be helping the Cardinals defend the national championship he believes they’ll win this weekend.
The normally reserved Kevin Ware calmly recalled how he felt when he suffered the devastating injury, saying he doesn’t think Louisville would be in the Final Four if he had lost his composure.
Kevin Ware told reporters during a press conference that he had no prior problems with his leg before the horrific injury, which forced six inches of his leg bone to break through his skin.
He told reporters: “When I went to contest the shot, it was like I always do. I guess I just landed wrong and I didn’t see where I was landing.”
While the injury may have gotten Kevin Ware worldwide attention – and more than 100,000 new Twitter followers – he says he never stopped thinking about his fellow Cardinals.
“Nothing like seeing my teammates. We’re brothers and I wouldn’t trade these guys in for anything in the world.”
Film critic Roger Ebert has died at 70 after a long battle with cancer, his newspaper the Chicago Sun-Times has reported.
Roger Ebert, known for his thumbs-up or down television reviews with partner and friend Gene Siskel, became a film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times in 1967.
He was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2002, losing his jaw and his ability to speak in a subsequent surgery.
Roger Ebert later resumed writing full-time and also returned to television.
On Tuesday, Roger Ebert revealed on his popular blog that he faced a fresh bout with cancer and was taking a “leave of presence”, writing fewer reviews.
The film critic suffered a hip fracture in December that he said “had recently been revealed to be a cancer”.
Film critic Roger Ebert has died at 70 after a long battle with cancer
“It is being treated with radiation, which has made it impossible for me to attend as many movies as I used to,” he wrote.
However, Roger Ebert vowed to continue his work.
President Barack Obama, who lived most of his adult life in Chicago, praised Roger Ebert’s honesty about films he disliked – and his effusiveness about those he enjoyed, as well as the critic’s ability to capture the “unique power of the movies to take us somewhere magical”.
“For a generation of Americans – and especially Chicagoans – Roger was the movies,” Barack Obama said in a statement released by the White House.
“The movies won’t be the same without Roger, and our thoughts and prayers are with Chaz and the rest of the Ebert family.”
Roger Ebert’s columns were syndicated in hundreds of newspapers worldwide, and he won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize for criticism in 1975 – the first film critic to do so.
In the same year, a film review show starring Roger Ebert and cross-town rival Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune premiered on local television. Within a few years the programme – with its thumbs-up or down judgements – was broadcast nationally, making Siskel and Ebert household names in the US.
The programme, in various guises, continued until Gene Siskel’s death in 1999.
Roger Ebert was the author of more than 15 books about the movies. And he took time off from reviewing films to write one – 1970’s Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. And he was an early investor in Google – a move that made him millions.
His TV career was curtailed in 2002 when he was diagnosed with papillary thyroid cancer.
A portion of his lower jaw was removed in a 2006 cancer surgery, and he lost the ability to speak, eat or drink.
Roger Ebert turned to the internet, where his writings continued to garner enormous audiences. Wearing a prosthetic chin and with his reviews read by voice-over actors, he eventually returned to television.
Roger Joseph Ebert was born in Urbana, Illinois on June 18, 1942. He began covering high school sports for a local newspaper at 15 and was editor of his university’s student newspaper.
He spent a year on scholarship at the University of Cape Town in South Africa before beginning work on a doctorate in English at the University of Chicago.
Shortly after that he joined the Chicago Sun-Times part-time and was named its movie critic in 1967.
In 1992 Roger Ebert married lawyer Chaz Hammelsmith, whom he once called “the great fact of my life”.
In his last blog, Roger Ebert wrote: “It really stinks that the cancer has returned and that I have spent too many days in the hospital.
“So, on bad days I may write about the vulnerability that accompanies illness. On good days, I may wax ecstatic about a movie so good it transports me beyond illness.”
Pope Francis prepares to tackle some of the Catholic Church’s major problems and he starts with the Vatican Bank, which has been accused of laundering money.
The pontiff is starting with the bank as he plans to reform the Church into a model of austerity and honesty.
Pope Francis has spent the first weeks of his papacy officiating at services and demonstrating how true servants of God should be.
Those close to Pope Francis, speaking on the condition of anonymity, say that he is considering plans to remove the head of the Vatican Bank, Cardinal Tarciscio Bertone, who is the Vatican’s second-in-command and is largely blamed for failing to stop infighting and corruption within the Holy See.
The officials warned that it would take time to change the bank, or to close it, but that it could certainly happen. One official doubted the likelihood that it would close, but that instead it would undergo serious restructuring.
Pope Francis prepares to tackle some of the Catholic Church’s major problems and he starts with the Vatican Bank, which has been accused of laundering money
Pope Francis, the officials say, has also indicated that he plans to tackle a number of other issues including scandals involving the sexual abuse of children around the world. The actions of a small minority of individuals has tainted the reputation of the 1.2 billion member church. Sadly, those problems have been exacerbated by the failure of Church leadership to cooperate with local authorities and to protect children in some cases.
It is expected that Pope Francis will also deal with this issue quite definitively, although no specifics have yet been discussed.
In many ways, Pope Francis represents a serious coup for the Church. Many Cardinals have been upset with how the Italian Cardinals, which dominate the Curia, have been operating. Therefore, it makes sense that after much prayer and petition, God should choose a relative outsider of great piety and spirit to cleanse His Church.
Insiders say that Pope Benedict XVI left a carefully composed secret report for Pope Francis. That report supposedly contains secret documents and a frank assessment of the scandals facing the Church. They discuss troubles with the Vatican bank as well as the Vatileaks scandal in which secret documents were smuggled out of the Vatican by Pope Benedict’s butler, Paolo Gabriele.
Paolo Gabriele was sentenced to 18 months in prison but was later pardoned and released by Pope Benedict XVI before Christmas.
Meanwhile watchdog organizations will continue monitoring the Vatican Bank and report on its progress.
France’s President Francois Hollande is facing a financial scandal after it emerged that his former Socialist Party treasurer Jean-Jacques Augier invested in two Cayman Islands offshore companies.
Jean-Jacques Augier, who managed Francois Hollande’s campaign funds, told the daily Le Monde that there was “nothing illegal” in his tax haven affairs.
Meanwhile, ex-budget minister Jerome Cahuzac has been charged with fraud.
Ministers are under pressure to reveal what they knew about his tax evasion.
Speaking during a two-day visit to Morocco, Francois Hollande insisted he knew “nothing” about the “private activities” of Jean-Jacques Augier.
He said it was up to France’s tax authorities to investigate the matter, AFP reported.
Francois Hollande is facing a financial scandal after it emerged that his former Socialist Party treasurer Jean-Jacques Augier invested in two Cayman Islands offshore companies
On Wednesday Francois Hollande used a national address to promise that in future all ministers and MPs would have to declare fully their personal finances.
The pressure is growing for a full government reshuffle – just 10 months after Francois Hollande took office.
Jerome Cahuzac admitted this week that he had hidden about 600,000 euros ($770,000) in a Swiss bank account.
French newspapers are calling it the biggest political crisis for Francois Hollande since his election last year, the AFP news agency reports.
He had promised voters morality and integrity in public life after what were nicknamed the “bling-bling” years of his conservative predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy.
But this year Francois Hollande’s opinion poll ratings have slumped, as the country remains mired in recession and unemployment at 10.6%.
In the latest financial twist, Le Monde reports that Francois Hollande’s ex-treasurer Jean-Jacques Augier became a shareholder in a Cayman Islands company called International Bookstores Ltd in 2005.
Jean-Jacques Augier said that venture came about because of a large publishing investment in China.
He insisted that he had “no personal bank account in the Caymans nor any direct personal investment in that territory”.
But Francois Hollande’s administration has been chasing the wealthy with such investments abroad, our correspondent says. So Jean-Jacques Augier’s affairs are a problem for him.
Earlier this week it emerged that the former budget minister, Jerome Cahuzac, had lied to the president, parliament and the public about the offshore accounts he had held for more than 20 years.
Anonymous has claimed it has been “hacking” and vandalizing social networking profiles linked to North Korea.
The hacking group has issued several warnings since North Korea’s threats have intensified.
Uriminzokkiri, a news site, has been forced offline – while Twitter and Flickr accounts have been breached.
Anonymous also claimed to have accessed 15,000 usernames and passwords from a university database.
As part of action which the loosely organized collective has called “Operation Free Korea”, the hackers have called for leader Kim Jong-un to step down, a democratic government to be put in place – and for North Koreans to get uncensored internet access.
Anonymous has claimed it has been “hacking” and vandalizing social networking profiles linked to North Korea
Currently, only a select few in the country have access to the “internet” – which is more akin to a closed company intranet with only a select few websites that are government-run.
North Korea recently allowed foreigners to access mobile internet, but this service has since been shut off.
In a message posted online, members of Anonymous wrote: “To the citizens of North Korea we suggest to rise up and bring [this] oppressive government down!
“We are holding your back and your hand, while you take the journey to freedom, democracy and peace.
“You are not alone. Don’t fear us, we are not terrorist, we are the good guys from the internet. AnonKorea and all the other Anons are here to set you free.”
Urminzokkiri’s Twitter feed started displaying messages reading “hacked” at around 07:00 BST. The account’s avatar was changed to a picture of two people dancing, with the words “Tango down”.
On Urminzokkiri’s Flickr photo page, other images, including a “wanted” poster mocking Kim Jong-un, were also posted.
Anonymous has posted what it said was a sample of the hacked information.
However, some have questioned the reliability of the details as some of the email addresses were in fact Chinese.
Also unreachable on Thursday was the website of Air Koryo, North Korea’s airline, which launched its online booking site late last year.
Like the main Urminzokkiri homepage, it is suspected the Air Koryo site has been hit with a Distributed Denial of Service attacked (DDoS) – a technique which involves flooding a website with too much traffic for it to handle.
Although a highly secretive nation, North Korea puts considerable effort in to having a strong presence online.
Various YouTube accounts attached to the North Korean regime post news items and propaganda videos on a regular basis.
Amanda Bynes recent behavior has been described as “tragic” by a woman claiming to be a relative in an interview published by InTouchmagazine.
On her 27th birthday, on April 3, Amanda Bynes was snapped taking a picture of paparazzi and hiding her face.
To top that, there was a man in the background holding up a tabloid spread about her asking: “What happened to this child star?”
A day after Amanda Bynes stepped out on her birthday, alone and looking disheveled, the woman tells InTouch: “She’s completely resisting any help that her family wants to give her.”
The publication apparently contacted the actress parents’ home on March 28 when the interview was conducted.
On her 27th birthday, Amanda Bynes was snapped taking a picture of paparazzi and hiding her face with a man in the background holding up a tabloid spread about her
Friends have allegedly said Amanda Bynes’ parents don’t know what to do as the actress has cut contact with everyone since she moved from Los Angeles to New York following some legal trouble and to pursue her dreams of becoming a fashion designer.
Amanda Bynes has reportedly settled two hit-and-run cases after reaching a civil compromise with her victims, saving herself from a potential 12 months in jail.
The actress was pictured on yesterday walking aimlessly around NYC by herself in a disheveled state.
Her newly tinted pink hair was mattered and hidden underneath a fur-trimmed hooded jacket and she covered her eyes behind dark sunglasses.
Amanda Bynes was wearing almost the same outfit that she wore two days prior – tracksuit pants, sandals and a cotton top.
This time, she had removed her white socks to reveal her unkempt feet which looked in need of a pedicure.
Her signature cheek piercings (microdermal implants), favorite sunglasses and rings were all on show along with her familiar pout and distinctive eyebrows.
Amanda Bynes had fans baffled this week after claiming the first pictures of her with rose-colored hair were actually of an imposter.
In a strange tweet posted on Tuesday night, Amanda Bynes wrote: “Fake or real microdermals same glasses! I don’t own those clothes and I’m a blonde! Haha!”
Afterwards, Amanda Bynes posted pictures to try proving she is a blonde once and for all.
But by Wednesday morning, the Twitter rant had been deleted, replaced with “Rawr” and a new image showing only half of her face, not revealing her hair.
On Thursday Amanda Bynes simply wrote: “When you’re in love, only one persons opinion of you matters.”
Facebook is releasing Home software that puts feeds from the social network on the home page of Android phones.
Home software will act like a “wrapper” for the Android operating system and become the main way to use a phone.
Notifications, images and messages will appear on the main screen of the phone instead of being accessible via a downloadable app.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said the change would put people, not apps, at the heart of the mobile experience.
In a presentation given at Facebook’s campus, Mark Zuckerberg said phone apps were a legacy of the computer world in which people clicked on an icon to start a program.
While this worked well with desktops and laptops, it made less sense with phones, he said.
Mark Zuckerberg unveils Facebook Home for Android
“Now there’s a new use case that’s more and more important,” he said.
“We have our phones with us all the time and we want to know more what’s happening to our friends.”
Facebook’s Home software will hide apps and instead pipe all the content and chat carried on via the social network to the home screen.
The software “wrapper” will also change the way that people swap messages or content by letting them respond by tapping on pop-up images, known as chat heads, rather than opening up apps and navigating through menus.
Facebook Home will be available via Google’s Play Store as a download.
The software will be available from April 12 on six phones – three from HTC and three from Samsung. Only four of these handsets are available now. The others are set to launch alongside Facebook Home.
No information was given about whether home would be re-developed to work with Apple or Microsoft phones.
Facebook said users could try the software rather than have to commit to use it all the time. Initially, the code will only be available for phones but a version for tablets is under development.
Cory Ondrejka, Facebook’s head of engineering, said the company started its push to make everything it did centre on mobiles in early 2012.
Figures from Facebook suggest that users spend about 25% of their time on their handsets looking at their feeds and chatting with friends.
Facebook’s fourth quarter earnings revealed that about 23% of the money it made from advertising came from adverts shown to mobile users.
Prior to the news conference, many people speculated that Facebook would announce a branded handset.
Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook shied away from doing this because even the best selling phones would only reach a small percentage of its user base.
“This can start to be a change in the relationship that we have with how we use these computing devices,” he said.
ECB President Mario Draghi has said the initial plan to make small savers pay for the Cyprus bailout was “not smart”.
Mario Draghi said a proposal to make “insured depositors” pay did not come from the European Central Bank, the European Commission or the IMF.
He said the proposal only arose in talks with the Cypriot authorities, and was “swiftly corrected”.
Mario Draghi was speaking after the ECB held eurozone interest rates at 0.75% again.
It was the ninth month in a row that the interest rates had been kept unchanged, but Mario Draghi indicated that the ECB was ready to act, if necessary.
He also suggested that the problems seen for some time in smaller, weaker economies such as Spain, were spreading to stronger economies.
Cyprus eventually agreed a 10 billion-euro ($12.8 billion) international bailout, which will see depositors with more than 100,000 euros lose some of their savings.
Accounts which have less than 100,000 euros in them will not be affected, but would have been under the original bailout proposals.
ECB President Mario Draghi has said the initial plan to make small savers pay for the Cyprus bailout was not smart
Speaking about the bailout, Mario Draghi said that the initial plan to impose a levy on all depositors “was not smart to say the least”.
He said the ECB did not envisage savers covered by a guarantee – that is, those with up to 100,000 euros in savings – being forced to contribute towards the country’s rescue plan.
“You have a pecking order, and here the insured depositors should be the very last category to be touched,” he said.
“The [European] Commission draft directive foresees exactly this.”
Mario Draghi also told a news conference that the Cyprus bailout was not a blueprint for what would happen in further bailouts.
“Cyprus is no template,” he said.
Mario Draghi was asked whether it would have been better for Cyprus to leave the euro.
“What was wrong with Cyprus’s economy doesn’t stop being wrong if they are outside the euro,” he said.
“So, the fiscal budget stabilization, consolidation, the restructuring of the banking system would be needed anyway, whether you are in or out. To be out doesn’t preserve the country from the need for action.”
Leaving the euro would entail a big risk for Cyprus, and that an exit from the currency could find the country having to pursue reforms “in a much more difficult environment”, he added.
Mario Draghi also said that the recent crisis in Cyprus had “reinforced the Governing Council’s determination to support the euro”.
Despite continuing signs of economic weakness across the eurozone, the ECB president said rates were on hold “for the time being” by consensus.
He said he expected to see a gradual economic recovery in the second part of 2013.
However, Mario draghi said that growth was “subject to downside risks”. Risks included slow implementation of structural reforms by governments, or weak domestic demand.
“These factors have the potential to dampen the improvement in confidence and thereby delay the recovery,” he added.
After his comments the euro fell to its lowest level in more than four months against the dollar, to $1.2745 – the weakest since mid-November – before recovering its losses.
However, Mario Draghi said that inflation would be contained in the medium term, but the bank would act if necessary.
“Our monetary policy stance will remain accommodative for as long as needed,” he said.
“In the coming weeks, we will monitor very closely all the incoming information on economic and monetary developments, and assess the impact on the outlook for price stability.”
Mario Draghi also reiterated that the ECB could not step into the gap left by a lack of action by eurozone governments to solve the region’s debt crisis,
“We cannot replace lack of capital in the banking system or the lack of actions by governments. The most stimulative measures is to pay the arrears.”
The latest indication of the state of the eurozone economy came on Thursday from financial information service Markit, which said the region’s economic contraction had worsened last month.
Its closely-watched composite purchasing managers’ index (PMI), which tracks both the services and manufacturing sectors, also suggested that the German economy slowed to “near stagnation” last month, while France’s recorded its biggest contraction for four years.
LucasArts, the games developer responsible for the Star Wars series of games, will be shut down by the Walt Disney Company.
Disney plans to license the Star Wars games brand to other developers.
However, Star Wars 1313, which has already been developed for demonstration at industry events is expected to be halted.
Disney inherited LucasArts in October last year, when it bought LucasFilm for $4.05 billion.
The closure will involve an unknown number of redundancies.
Disney will close LucasArts and plans to license the Star Wars games brand to other developers
Lucasfilm Ltd. spokesman Miles Perkins said it would now focus on licensing its Star Wars brand externally.
A “small team” will remain to handle licensing partnerships.
“Both current Star Wars games projects have been halted,” Miles Perkins confirmed.
LucasArts was founded in May 1982 as the video game development group of Lucasfilm Limited, the film production company by Star Wars creator George Lucas.
The film producer, screenwriter and director wanted his company to branch out into other areas of entertainment, so he cooperated with Atari to produce video games.
Action games Ballblazer and Rescue on Fractalus! were the first results of the collaboration.
Lucasfilm and its interactive games division, is several months into an internal cost-cutting review.
The decision to close LucasArts comes as the developer and publisher, once known for adventure games like Secret of Monkey Island has struggled to produce a hit in an industry currently dominated by action games.
June Shannon showed off her slimmer figure and her revamped blonde hairdo on a stroll with daughter Honey Boo Boo in New York.
It seems that June Shannon doesn’t want to admit her ongoing makeover was intentional.
“No, I have not felt no pressure to change,” Mama June told the Huffington Post.
“I was blond about six years ago and I wanted to go back blond, so I went back blond and I loved it.
“I have lost 115 pounds, but that’s because I’m on the go. We love fried food, but I lost that weight because I’m more active doing things.”
June Shannon showed off her slimmer figure and her revamped blonde hairdo on a stroll with daughter Honey Boo Boo in New York
Certainly a walk through Manhattan will provide some healthy exercise, but while June Shannon was content with just walking, Honey Boo Boo was all about a hot dog.
Honey Boo Boo demolished one of New York’s finest as her mother looked on.
The reality star wore a bright pink tutu and matching hooded top with her name written in curly style on the top left hand corner.
Her look was completed with some white gladiator sandals with a cork wedge
Here Comes Honey Boo Boo is one of many of the American broadcasters shows to screen in the UK when it launches next month.
The TLC channel will begin to broadcast to the UK on April 30th.
Jay Leno will reportedly receive a $15 million payoff as he steps down as host of NBC’s The Tonight Show months ahead of the end of his contract.
The payout is part of Jay Leno’s deal to leave The Tonight Show – which he has hosted for 22 years – before his contract expires in September 2014, making way for Jimmy Fallon as the new host.
According to the New York Daily News, the payoff – which equates to Jay Leno’s annual salary on the show – is peanuts for the comedian, who makes the biggest bucks for standup in Las Vegas.
As the shake-up was confirmed after weeks of speculation, Jay Leno told Jimmy Fallon he was “counting on” him to keep network ratings high.
In his opening monologue of Wednesday’s show Jay Leno said: “I just have one request of Jimmy. We’ve all fought, kicked and scratched to get this network up to fifth place, okay?
“Now we have to keep it there. Jimmy don’t let it slip into sixth. We’re counting on you.”
Jay Leno will reportedly receive a $15 million payoff as he steps down as host of NBC’s The Tonight Show months ahead of the end of his contract
The replacement move, which had been anticipated for weeks, was announced yesterday and will officially take place following NBC’s broadcast of the Winter Olympics.
Jimmy Fallon will more than double his multi-million dollar salary when he takes over from outgoing host Jay Leno next year on The Tonight Show.
Industry insiders predict that Jimmy Fallon will see the $5 million he gets for fronting The Late Show boosted to $12 million when he goes head-to-head with CBS’ David Letterman and ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel in February.
Although Jimmy Fallon’s pay packet will be 3 million less than the $15 million Jay Leno takes home, it still represents a massive show of faith in Fallon, who has been working late night television for less than 5 years.
Jay Leno 62, who was temporarily removed from The Tonight Show in 2009 in favor of Conan O’Brien, had made repeated jokes about his bosses and the network in recent weeks while rumors swirled over the latest move.
But he and Jimmy Fallon, 38, presented a united front while announcing the news. They recently made a parody video set to a tune from West Side Story that lampooned their situation.
“The main difference between this and the other time is I’m part of the process. The last time the decision was made without me. I came into work one day and – you’re out,” Jay Leno said, comparing his previous ouster and now.
“This time around there really aren’t any complications like there were the last time,” he added, according to the New York Times.
“This time it feels right.”
Jay Leno also said in a press release: “Congratulations Jimmy. I hope you’re as lucky as me and hold on to the job until you’re the old guy. If you need me, I’ll be at the garage.”
The Tonight Show will be relocated from Los Angeles to New York, where the program started in 1954 when Steve Allen was its host.
Jay Leno – aside from the brief interruption when Conan O’Brien hosted the program – has been the show’s presenter since 1992.
He has routinely been tops in the ratings, even as NBC’s primetime and daytime programming has fallen off.
“I’m glad I’ve kept it No. 1,” Jay Leno said.
“When I started people said, <<Oh the only reason you’re winning is because of ‘ER>>, or <<The only reason you’re winning is because Hugh Grant came on and said that one thing>>. Well, at least now I can say the only reason we’re winning is cause we’re winning.”
After leaving, Jay Leno said he expects to be “back on the road, being a comedian again”.
Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels, who also produces Late Night, will take over as producer of the new Tonight Show.
Jimmy Fallon’s replacement at 12:35 a.m. was not named, although Seth Meyers of SNL is considered a strong candidate.
NBC is worried that ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel, whose show recently started at the 11:35 p.m. time slot, will establish himself as a go-to late night performer for a younger generation if the network didn’t move swiftly to install Jimmy Fallon.
North Korea has shifted a missile with “considerable range” to its east coast, South Korea’s Foreign Minister Kim Kwan-jin has announced.
Kim Kwan-jin played down concerns that the missile could target the US mainland, and said North Korea’s intentions were not yet clear.
Pyongyang earlier renewed threats of a nuclear strike against the US, though its missiles are not believed to be capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
The US is responding to North Korea by moving missile defense shields to Guam.
Meanwhile, Russia said Pyongyang’s attempts to “violate decisions of the UN Security Council are categorically unacceptable”.
“This radically complicates, if it doesn’t in practice shut off, the prospects for resuming six-party talks,” foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said in a statement on Thursday.
North Korea has shifted a missile with “considerable range” to its east coast
The talks involving North and South Korea, the US, Russia, China and Japan were last held in late 2008.
Japan said it was co-operating closely with the US and South Korea to monitor North Korea’s next move.
Japan’s PM Shinzo Abe said that although the rhetoric was “increasingly provocative”, Tokyo would “calmly” watch the situation.
Government spokesman Yoshihide Suga earlier told reporters that Japan was braced for a “worst-case scenario”.
The Pentagon said the shield on its Pacific island territory would be ready within weeks, adding to warships already sent to the area.
North Korea has previously named Guam among a list of possible targets for attack that included Hawaii and the US mainland.
Japanese and South Korean reports had suggested the missile being moved by North Korea was a long-range one with a capability of hitting the US west coast.
However, experts believe North Korea’s most powerful rocket, which it test-fired last December, has a range of 3,700 miles (6,000 km) and can reach no further than Alaska.
Kim Kwan-jin told MPs in a parliamentary defense committee meeting that the missile had “considerable range”.
“The missile does not seem to be aimed at the US mainland. It could be aimed at test firing or military drills,” he said.
Analysts have interpreted Kim Kwan-jin’s description as referring to the Musudan missile, estimated to have a range up to 2,500 miles (4,000 km). Guam would be within that range.
North Korea is believed to have its main military research centres in the east.
It has test-fired missiles from there before, and its three nuclear weapons tests were carried out in the east.
Despite its belligerent rhetoric, North Korea has not taken direct military action since 2010, when it shelled a South Korean island and killed four people.
In recent weeks North Korea has threatened nuclear strikes and attacks on specific targets in the US and South Korea.
The communist country has announced a formal declaration of war on the South, and pledged to reopen a mothballed nuclear reactor in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions.
In its latest statement, attributed to a military spokesman, North Korea appeared to refer to continuing military exercises between the US and South Korea in which the US has flown nuclear-capable bombers over the South.
The statement said the “ever-escalating US hostile policy towards the DPRK [North Korea] and its reckless nuclear threat will be smashed”.
North Korea promised to use “cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means of the DPRK” and said the “merciless operation of its revolutionary armed forces in this regard has been finally examined and ratified”.
The US Department of Defense said on Wednesday it would deploy the ballistic Terminal High Altitude Area Defense System (THAAD) to Guam in the coming weeks.
The THAAD system includes a truck-mounted launcher and interceptor missiles.
US officials recently also announced that the USS John McCain, a destroyer capable of intercepting missiles, had been positioned off the Korean peninsula.
Some analysts say Pyongyang’s angry statements are of more concern than usual because it is unclear exactly what North Korea hopes to achieve.
As well as the angry statements, North Korea has also shut down an emergency telephone line between Seoul and Pyongyang and stopped South Koreans from working at Kaesong Industrial Complex in the North.
Kaesong industrial park, one of the last remaining symbols of co-operation between the neighbors, is staffed mainly by North Koreans but funded and managed by South Korean firms.
Hack attacks hitting online services and exchanges dealing in Bitcoins led to a drop in the value of the virtual currency.
Trading on the MTGox exchange, which handles most trades in Bitcoins, was sluggish yesterday as the site fought off an attack.
The attack helped to force a swift fall in the price of Bitcoins.
In addition, the Instawallet website – where people store Bitcoins – is offline indefinitely after an attack.
Hack attacks hitting online services and exchanges dealing in Bitcoins led to a drop in the value of the virtual currency
The value of Bitcoins surged to a new high this week with each one worth about $142. Barely a week ago, each virtual coin was worth only $90.
But Bitcoins dropped sharply in value as the MTGox exchange came under a sustained attack by hackers. The vast majority of trade in Bitcoins takes place via the site.
In a tweet on its Twitter feed, MTGox said it was fighting off a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, which involves a site being bombarded with huge amounts of data. The attack was one of several against the site this week.
The attacks, coupled with a spike in trading volumes, combined to cause delays in trades being confirmed and led the value of Bitcoins to drop sharply to about $120.
The attacks could be the work of malicious hackers who were trying to “game” the exchange and manipulate the value of Bitcoins so they could cash in, MTGox said in an interview with ComputerWorld. Attackers are thought to be working to a cycle in which they sell Bitcoins when values are high, then mount an attack that forces prices to crash, buy up the cheaper coins and then let the value climb again.
MTGox said it did not know when or if the attacks would cease but said Bitcoin owners should not panic and sell off as values fluctuated. A spokesman for the exchange added that it was in the middle of rebuilding its trading technology but the new system, which would do a better job of handling the high volume of trades, would not be ready until the end of this year.
In a separate development, Instawallet has shut down “indefinitely” after hackers “fraudulently accessed” its core database. In a statement posted on the Instawallet site it said it planned to open a claim process shortly so people could reclaim their Bitcoin balance.
Dunkin Donuts is testing glazed donut sandwich, a new kind of breakfast sandwich featuring two crisp slices of bacon and a “pepper fried egg”.
The new menu item is appearing in select eastern Massachusetts outlets, according to Dunkin Donuts.
The glazed donut sandwich is said to be a shockingly low 360 calories according to a Dunkin’ spokeswoman speaking to theAtlantic Wire.
Adding up the ingredients, one regular glazed donut according to their website is approximately 260 calories leaving a figured 100 calories’ room for the bacon and egg.
Dunkin Donuts is testing glazed donut sandwich, a new kind of breakfast sandwich featuring two crisp slices of bacon and a pepper fried egg
Dunkin Donuts aren’t any set plans to expand the glazed donut sandwich nationally as of yet, however, with reviews of the item still coming in according to the company.
“We are pleased with the response so far, however, we cannot share any specific sales data. That said, the product has only been in restaurants for two days so we have limited information available,” a Dunkin’ spokesperson told the Wire.
The glazed donut sandwich would be sold at a suggested retail price of $2.99.
Such an item isn’t exactly new, however, at least for other food outlets.
Paula Deen’s The Lady’s Brunch Burger features two Krispy Kreme doughnuts as the buns around layers of ground beef, eggs and bacon.
Other items like donut ice cream sandwiches have been seen at smaller eateries around the country.
Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands will officially re-open the Rijksmuseum next week, marking the end of a painful restoration project.
The work at the Dutch state museum in the heart of Amsterdam ran five years over schedule and millions of euros over budget.
The Rijksmuseum has been closed since 2003. Renovation was delayed by flooding, asbestos and a dispute over access for cyclists.
“It was kind of Murphy’s Law,” says museum director Wim Pijbes.
“What could go wrong, did go wrong.”
Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands will officially re-open the Rijksmuseum next week, marking the end of a painful restoration project
Wim Pijbes added: “It has been closed for 10 years, but now it can go on for decades.”
On Wednesday, Johannes Vermeer’s The Milkmaid was re-hung, making it the last major work to return to the museum.
The painting sits in the Gallery of Honour, a breathtaking cathedral to the Dutch Golden Age, showcasing works by Rembrandt, Jan Steen and Franz Hals.
The old masters draw the eye, but so do the intricately decorated ceilings and pillars that frame them – all painstakingly recreated after being painted over in the post-war years.
In the halls flanking the grand gallery, the decoration is more modern. British artist Richard Wright, a former Turner Prize winner, has dusted the ceilings with almost 50,000 stars, hand-painted in a swirling, shifting constellation.
It all serves to set up the Rijksmuseum’s biggest star – Rembrandt’s Night Watch.
A gigantic Baroque painting of 17th Century city guards teeming with drama and movement, it is the only work to be hung in its original place.
“Everything has changed,” says Taco Dibbits, the museum’s director of collections.
“We have more than one million objects and we used to display them by material. You had a gallery for glass, a gallery for porcelain, a gallery for paintings.
“Now we have mixed all the media and presented the visitor the story of art from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century.”
The Rijksmuseum’s paintings mingle amongst cabinets, kitchenware, magazine covers, dolls’ houses and pottery in a splendid, higgledy-piggledy array.
It illustrates the cross-pollination between decorative and visual art – for instance, how Japanese prints inspired a Parisian vase-maker, whose designs prompted Van Gogh to paint Amandelbloom In Bloel (Almond Tree In Bloom) – but it also presents some striking juxtapositions.
In the 20th Century Gallery, a kitsch German chess set, with snipers as pawns and a Panzer tank for the kings, is vaguely comedic, until visitors notice the Auschwitz prison uniform worn by 16-year-old Dutch girl Isabel Wachenheimer, which hangs silently nearby in grim disapproval.
In total, there are 800 years of Dutch history retold in more than 8,000 objects across the Rijksmuseum’s 80 galleries.
There is a brand new entrance hall in the shape of a voluminous atrium, flooded with natural light from the five-storey-high glass ceiling.
Wim Pijbes describes it as Amsterdam’s equivalent to Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall – a free-to-enter public auditorium which will host performances, parties and new exhibits.
By tunnelling under a cycle path that runs through the centre of the museum (the proposed closure of which caused uproar) it unites the east and west wings for the first time. It also created a few headaches.
“We found beautiful new spaces, but being below the building means you dig into water,” Wim Pijbes says.
In fact, with Amsterdam already under sea level, digging down meant the Rijksmuseum flooded. Workers floated around in dinghys as they fought the water table.
Even now, skeptics wonder if the museum is jeopardizing its collection.
“For foreigners, it is really frightening to be under sea level, and even more frightening to have the collection below sea level,” says Wim Pijbes.
“But for the Dutch, it’s everyday life.”
He insists that “complex engineering work” means the lower galleries are safe. But these aren’t the only measures taken to protect the artworks.
The museum is newly illuminated by 3,800 individual LED lights, which lack the paint-destroying heat and UV rays of incandescent bulbs.
They were installed by Dutch lighting specialists Philips, who also claim the LEDs enhance the viewing experience.
Visitors will get to decide for themselves when the Rijksmuseum throws open its doors on April 13.
After the gala opening, hosted by the abdicating Queen, the first day’s entry will be free. After that, the directors predict more than two million people will come to the gallery every year, restoring it as one of Europe’s most important museums.
President Barack Obama has decided to give 5% of his salary back to the government to show solidarity with the federal workers who took pay cuts during the sequester.
According to White House sources, Barack Obama will surrender 5% of his compensation in an effort to do his part during the period of fiscal cutbacks, the Associated Press reported.
The president’s move comes as hundreds of thousands of public service workers will be sent home without pay for a number of days over the next six months in an effort to cut spending.
President Barack Obama will give 5 percent of his salary back to the government to show solidarity with the federal workers who took pay cuts during the sequester
The US President’s annual salary is $400,000, meaning that a 5% pay cut would amount to $20,000 for the year.
That said, it is unclear whether Barack Obama will extend this measure so that it lasts a year, and he will only likely continue it as the sequester is in effect.
As a result, the cut will be retroactive, starting at the beginning of this month as that is when the sequester went into effect.
The cut will amount to about $1,666 per month.
Barack Obama isn’t the only politician making an effort to show solidarity with his lesser-paid colleagues, as a bevy of other Democrats have done the same.
According to USA Today, US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and his deputy director Ashton Carter have announced that they will not accept a portion of their salaries during the period of the sequester.
They did not specify how much of their salary they will be giving up.
Senators Claire McCaskill and Mark Begich- both Democrats- have publicly stated that they will be making similar gestures. Cynics could take issue with Mark Begich’s involvement, as he announced plans to work with Republican Senator Tom Coburn to figure out areas to cut the projected $85 billion in spending that is needed to help fix the country’s financial crisis.
Adding to his possible motives, it also comes the year before he is up for re-election in Alaska.
There have not been any reports of Republicans making similar gestures.
A McDonald’s outpost in Winchendon, Massachusetts, is demanding a bachelor degree in a call-out for a full time cashier.
It used to be high school drop outs flipping burgers at McDonald’s but now the applicants must have 1-2 years of cashier experience before they’ll be trusted with the Big-Mac-selling responsibility, according to the advert.
“Get a weekly paycheck with a side order of food, folks and fun,” the independent McDonald’s franchise boasts.
A McDonald’s outpost in Winchendon, Massachusetts, is demanding a bachelor degree in a call-out for a full time cashier
In the ad, uploaded on jobdiagnosis.com, the Winchendon McDonald’s restaurant says it wants “friendly people… to smile while serving lots of guests daily”, and declares “work with your friends or make some new ones!”.
While it may be tricky to score the clearly competitive role, it’ll be worth it, according to the chain.
The successful applicant has the chance to work their way up the company ladder, the ad insists, boating impressive “advancement opportunities”.
The McDonald’s website also lists the full time position in Spanish, but doesn’t give a salary.
A management position also listed starts at $10 an hour, with a sign on bonus if the applicant has previously worked at a McDonald’s branch.
With colleges churning out more graduates and youth unemployment at 11.5%, youth advocates reckon the unusually high qualifications McDonald’s is demanding are a sign of the times.
“Sadly we’ve taxed-and-spent our way to an economy in which there’s intense competition for just about any job… and young people are getting screwed over even worse than the country overall,” Evan Feinberg, president of the Washington-based youth advocacy group Generation Opportunity, told the Washington Examiner.
Former cyclist Lance Armstrong is planning to return to competitive sport as a swimmer.
Lance Armstrong, 41, has entered the Masters South Central Zone Swimming Championships in Texas this weekend.
The sportsman is able to compete as US Masters Swimming events are not subject to USA or World Anti-Doping Agency codes.
Former cyclist Lance Armstrong is planning to return to competitive sport as a swimmer
Lance Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles after deciding not to defend doping charges filed against him in August 2012.
He is scheduled to compete in freestyle races over 500 yards, 1,000 yards and 1,650 yards at the event held in his home city of Austin.
Lance Armstrong will compete with swimmers his own age or older. His first race, the 1,650 yards freestyle, takes place on Friday.
US Masters Swimming executive director Rob Butcher said he had not received any objections to Lance Armstrong competing in the event.
“The purpose of our organisation is to encourage adults to swim,” Rob Butcher told the Austin American-Statesman newspaper.
Lance Armstrong was charged by the US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) in June 2012 with using performance-enhancing drugs.
The cyclist filed a lawsuit against the organisation the following month, accusing it of “corrupt inducements” to other cyclists to testify against him.
However, Lance Armstrong then announced he would not fight the charges and was given a life ban by USADA.
In January, Lance Armstrong confessed to taking performance-enhancing drugs during all seven of his Tour de France wins between 1999 and 2005 in a television interview with Oprah Winfrey.
Novelist Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, whose scripts for Howards End and A Room With A View earned her two Oscars, has died at home in New York at the age of 85.
Ruth Prawer Jhabvala made more than 20 films with producer Ismail Merchant and director James Ivory over 40 years.
The writer also won the Booker Prize for her 1975 novel Heat and Dust, meaning she was the only person to have won an Oscar and the Booker.
Novelist Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, whose scripts for Howards End and A Room With A View earned her two Oscars, has died at home in New York at the age of 85
Born in Germany, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala fled the Nazis as a schoolgirl in 1939 with her parents and brother to begin a new life in Britain. She spent much of her life in India.
Ruth Prawer Jhabvala had been suffering from a pulmonary disorder and is survived by husband Cyrus and daughters Renana, Ava and Firoza-Bibi.
After meeting her future husband in London, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala moved with him to his native India in the 1950s, where she was visited by Isamil Merchant and James Ivory to ask if they could make a film of her 1960 novel The Householder.
She agreed to write the screenplay and it was to mark the beginning of a fruitful partnership.
The trio’s films included A Room With a View and Howards End, for which Ruth Prawer Jhabvala collected the Academy Award in 1987 and 1993 respectively. Both were adapted from novels by EM Forster.
The novelist was nominated for a third Oscar in 1994 for the script for The Remains of the Day.
Actress Emma Thompson, who starred in The Remains of the Day and Howards End, said of Ruth Prawer Jhabvala in 1993: “She’s a novelist, so she understands the art of adapting novels better than most anyone else.
“She understands the process, the <<buzz of implication>> that surrounds words… Ruth understands it completely.”
The German economy slowed to “near stagnation” in March 2013, while France’s recorded its biggest contraction for four years, according to a Markit survey.
The Markit composite purchasing managers’ index (PMI), which measures both the manufacturing and services sectors, declined to 50.6 in Germany last month, from 53.3 in February.
Any figure above 50 indicates growth.
France’s reading fell to 41.9 points, its worst since March 2009.
For the eurozone as a whole, the index fell to 46.5 from 47.9 in February.
The Markit composite PMI, which measures both the manufacturing and services sectors, declined to 50.6 in Germany last month, from 53.3 in February
Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit, said the latest data painted a gloomy picture.
“The [eurozone] recession is deepening once again as businesses report that they have become increasingly worried about the region’s debt crisis and political instability,” Chris Williamson said.
“The unresolved election in Italy was commonly cited as a key factor clouding the economic outlook in March, and the botched bail-out of Cyprus could well filter through to a further worsening of business sentiment across the region in April.”
Chris Williamson added that the weak showing from Germany “suggests that the only source of bright light in an otherwise gloomy region has once again begun to fade”.
Germany’s index reading was the worst in the country for three months.
Single-day passes for this year Lollapalooza music festival sold out in less than two hours on Wednesday, April 3.
The single-day tickets for Lollapalooza 2013 in Chicago’s Grant Park went on sale at 10 a.m., and by 11:45 a.m., the promoters announced tickets had sold out.
Three-day passes also sold out last month, in less than three hours; VIP passes sold out on Tuesday.
Single-day passes for this year Lollapalooza music festival sold out in less than two hours
The only tickets left for Lollapalooza 2013 are through pricey Travel Packages, which include three-night stays at Chicago hotels, plus general admission or VIP tickets for the festival. Prices for Travel Packages begin at $1,599 for general admission tickets for two people, and run as high as $9,299 for VIP platinum packages for two people.
Running from August 2 to August 4, Lollapalooza is being headlined this year by Nine Inch Nails, The Killers, Mumford & Sons, The Cure, Phoenix, Postal Service, Vampire Weekend, New Order, the Lumineers, and Queens of the Stone Age.
The Bank of Japan (BOJ) has announced it will dramatically expand the country’s money supply, as it tries to stimulate the economy growth.
The Japanese central bank vowed to boost an asset purchase programme and meet a 2% inflation target in two years, after a two-day meeting, the first chaired by new governor Haruhiko Kuroda.
Japan’s economy, the world’s third-largest, has been battling more than a decade of falling prices.
Haruhiko Kuroda had previously said he would do “whatever it takes” to drive growth.
The Bank of Japan has announced it will dramatically expand the country’s money supply, as it tries to stimulate the economy growth
“The BOJ will conduct money-market operations so that the monetary base will increase at an annual pace of about 60 trillion yen to 70 trillion yen [$645 billion to $755 billion],” the BOJ said in a statement.
This increase in the money supply is expected to stoke inflation.
Many analysts have said that falling prices discourage people from spending, and companies from investing, and that has trapped Japan in a cycle of sluggish growth and recession.
The yen fell against the US dollar, and Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index rose 2.2% on the central bank’s decision, indicating markets were reacting positively to the stimulus measures.
“The measures announced overall were bold, and more than what had been expected,” said Hiroshi Maeba, from UBS in Japan.
“The markets clearly saw that the BOJ did all it can at this point and responded accordingly.”
PM Shinzo Abe, who was elected last year, has been pushing for the BOJ to do more to help the economy.
His plan, a combination of big government spending as well as an aggressive central bank asset buying programme, has been dubbed Abenomics.
Haruhiko Kuroda, who was nominated by Shinzo Abe for the top job at the central bank, is seen as sharing those views, which are a departure from the BOJ’s previous stance.
On Thursday, the central bank said it would also increase its purchases of Japanese government bonds to a total of 50 ttillion yen, a move aimed at bringing down interest rates and spurring lending.
The BOJ also extended the average maturity of the bonds it purchases from three years to seven years. Finally, the bank said it would also buy relatively riskier assets such as exchange-traded funds and real estate trust funds.
The decisions passed with unanimous votes from the board of the BOJ, an indication that this would mark the beginning of Haruhiko Kuroda’s shift towards more aggressive monetary easing.
However, some observers have expressed concern that this new strategy will leave Japan, which already has the largest debt pile of any industrialized nation, even more in the red.
