Mr de Menezes died when he was shot eight times on a Tube train at Stockwell station, south London, on 22 July, by officers who mistook him for a suicide bomber.Confirmation that the officers could be prosecuted came from Richard Latham, the lawyer for the IPCC, at a brief preliminary inquest hearing in London.He told Inner South District coroner’s court: “There is an intention to report before Christmas. Irene had never had any heart trouble,” he said.A year after Mrs Clark’s death, Merck voluntarily withdrew Vioxx from the market It was only then that Mr Clark made the link.. The drugs company should be up in the dock for murder.”Mrs Clark had suffered from rheumatoid arthritis in her knees and shoulders for some years. I was surprised at how smooth and quiet the engine is for a diesel; there is more noise from the road than the engine, and quite a lot of the former. Again, this isn’t what you’d expect from a car at this price, although the 16-way electrically adjustable driver’s seat righted that impression a little. So, after years of making OAP cat-food-run Civics, Honda has gone instead after the yoof market.

Meanwhile, the current Civic still does a pretty good job on school runs, commutes and all that.
What’s good about it? Overall, what you have is a very clever design that fits in passengers and luggage brilliantly well, often with room to spare. And a good standard level of equipment with Honda’s excellent reputation for quality and reliability Many families need look no further than the Civic. The woman on reception told us our shabby room was “nice and handy for the bar”. So we checked out right away – it’s always seemed to me to be a particular pleasure to spend a night at home when you thought you were going to be staying somewhere else. This invariably makes the journey home feel a happy one, filled with the delicious anticipation of sleeping in your own bed as if you’ve been endlessly on the road with a jazz band for nine months.But the strangest dents I picked up weren’t my fault for once: these are a number of smallish indentations in the boot lid as if its been bitten by an elephant.

Her GP prescribed her Vioxx, in a liquid rather than tablet form. It worked well, and Mrs Clark obtained a repeat prescription.On 1 August 2003, Mr Clarkfound her slumped at the top of the stairs in their home “The doctor said she had had a massive heart attack. Mr Clark, 69, from Gillingham, Kent, has now joined the legal action against Merck, with hundreds of other British people.He said: “I blame myself because I suggested she went to the doctor and asked for different medication because the old drugs weren’t doing her any good It’s a nightmare. And it’s not just arthritis charities – it’s going on everywhere in the voluntary sector, although it’s not shouted about. That tells you how murky it can be.”MSD was asked to comment on its donations and links to charities, but the company did not respond.’Company should be in dock’Donald Clark, 69, husband of Vioxx takerIrene Clark was a fit and healthy grandmother who spent every lunchtime supervising children in the playground of a nearby primary school.Yet within two months of being prescribed Vioxx, the 62-year-old suffered a massive heart attack and died.It was only when the drug was withdrawn in September last year that her husband, Donald, made the link with his wife’s death.

His relationship with the model Kate Moss has, at least in part, fuelled the burning media interest, but Pomphrey plays down her contribution.”Pete and Kate’s relationship has happened since I started making the film,” he said. “It was a one-off,” he says, “and I didn’t want to portray Pete as someone who wallows in a well of self-harm That scene was never intended for broadcast. He shakes his head ruefully and sighs: “It is very dangerous for that thunderbolt of attention to come upon you.”Only last week, that thunderbolt of attention crashed over both film-maker and subject when it emerged that an early rough cut of the documentary featured footage of Doherty mutilating himself with a broken bottle – a sequence that the writer, director, producer and cameraman of the programme says was never meant for the finished version. Pete is intelligent enough to understand the folly of tabloid fame.”Doherty also appears capable of handling the sometimes obsessive devotion of his young fans.

“For his fans, Pete expresses a romantic disenchantment with society,” Pomphrey says “To them, he’s utterly adorable. I’ve seen him surrounded by a million fans, but I’ve never heard one ask, ‘Where do you get drugs?’ I’ve heard thousands ask him about his music.”In Pomphrey’s fly-on-the-dressing-room-wall documentary, Who the F*** Is Pete Doherty?, to be broadcast on Sunday, the former Libertine gives some indication of how it feels to be under the unremitting scrutiny of the tabloid press. “On the one hand, he really, really enjoys it, and on the other he also finds it really, really irksome,” Pomphrey says during a break from editing.
“The problem is that it’s there 24 hours a day Pete does get hounded. One night, we were leaving by the back door of a boozer and a tabloid photographer was just waiting there for us. We tried to get Pete into the van, but the photographer still managed to get his pictures.”But all this attention is not getting to him He’s quite thick-skinned, and he copes. What is life really like when you’re Pete Doherty, lead singer of Babyshambles, Kate Moss’s lover and celebrity junkie? Having spent the past 11 months making a film about the former Libertine, Roger Pomphrey is perfectly placed to answer that question.

President George Bush, his presidency foundering and his popularity at record lows at home, ran into new protests abroad yesterday at a Western hemisphere summit in Argentina – a gathering that is theoretically focussed on trade but which has so far only served to highlight the battered image of the US across Latin America. Mr Bush went into the 34-nation meeting intent on promoting traditional US doctrines of free trade and liberal market economics, with the goal of a giant free trade area, building on the existing agreements, that would stretch from Alaska to the Southern Ocean.
But not far from the sealed-off, massively protected hotel where the leaders met, some 10,000 demo-nstrators marched through the resort city of Mar del Plata. In the 1930s, when the Nazis condemned modern works as “degenerate”, the portrait was confiscated from a Frankfurt gallery and sold to purchase some politically acceptable hunting tapestries. Today it is now believed to be in a private collection.Other highly priced van Goghs include Irises, which sold for £28m in 1989, and Portrait de l’artiste sans barbe, which sold in 1998 for £37.1m.. When Saito died in 1996, it was unclear who owned the work – his heirs, his company or his creditors It was not the first time the work had disappeared. Portrait of Dr Gachet, by VINCENT VAN GOGH, £47.1M, MAY 1990 Dr Gachet was the Dutch artist’s doctor in the last months of his life and a man whose competence in that role has been much questioned.It is one of van Gogh’s most famous paintings and the subject of one of the most intriguing disappearing acts in art history.

When the hammer came down at Christie’s in New York 15 years ago, it emerged that the painting’s owner was Ryoei Saito, a major Japanese manufacturer, who locked it away. He is lending it to the National Gallery, London, where it is currently in the Rubens exhibition, but the work will eventually go to the Art Gallery of Ontario.The painting tells the brutal Biblical story of when King Herod ordered new-born boys to be killed to prevent one becoming the Messiah. For a long time it was on loan to a monastery in Austria because its then owner loathed it. At the age of 89, she decided to sell and consulted experts at Sotheby’s, London, who decided it was a Rubens.It was bought at auction by David Thomson, chairman of the Thomson newspaper group, for his father, Lord Thomson of Fleet. As long as 1989 Les Noces de Pierrette made £28m at auction; in 1997, La Reve sold for £27.4m and five years ago Femme aux Bras Croises made £28m. Massacre of the Innocents, by PETER PAUL RUBENS, £49.5M, JULY 2002 Painted between 1609 and 1611, after Rubens returned to his home town of Antwerp, Belgium, after formative years studying in Italy, this work is now regarded as a masterpiece.But until four years ago, it had been lost to view for 200 years having been wrongly attributed to Jan van den Hoecke, a minor follower of Rubens. Picasso is one of the most expensive artists in the world with several works having made exceptional prices in recent years.

He went on to the Council of Barnardo’s and served there for 17 years. He became Chairman of the Shaftesbury Civic Society and rescued it. Rice-Oxley was always at hand – at meetings of the International Labour Organisation and the International Maritime Organisation – to mediate and draft acceptable texts.He retired promptly on his 60th birthday, after being appointed CBE for services to shipping, to Shaftesbury in Dorset and began a new life. Over 100 nations belonged and shared their industrial relations woes. The strike did immense damage – we were “blown off course” said Wilson – and British ship-owners began increasingly to desert the British flag.All this was a bitter blow to Jim Rice-Oxley, who was essentially a man of peace and reconciliation.

He continued as a valued member of the Merchant Navy Training Board – indeed as Chairman until the age of 77, well into his retirement. And he played a major part in the establishment of the National Sea Training College at Gravesend where boys were trained for the merchant navy.In 1975 the shipping industry decided to merge its two main offices, the Chamber of Shipping and the British Shipping Federation, into one: the General Council of British Shipping. Rice-Oxley did not get the top job – it went to an outstanding outsider from the Department of Trade – but he loyally accepted the situation.He continued to run the BSF side of things and, most importantly, the International Shipping Federation This, as its name suggests, was the BSF run big. The NUS started a strike which was to last over six weeks and which Harold Wilson characterised as run by “a tightly knit group of politically motivated men”. But the following year the cosy relationship between the Shipping Federation and the National Union of Seamen was broken by the National Seamen’s Reform Movement led by Jim Slater and Sam McClusky. Rice-Oxley, now married to his dear wife Barbara, was posted to the Newcastle office where he learned the arts of negotiation and administration.Back at headquarters in London in 1951, Rice-Oxley steadily climbed the BSF ladder, becoming Director in 1965. For his services in Greece he was mentioned in despatches.On demobilisation in 1946 what to do? It was a problem that agonised many of us.

You can see how perverse the practice of politics is. Here I am thoroughly in favour of benefit reform and education choice yet delighted to see both fail if that brings down Tony Blair (whom I not only admire but prefer to any possible successor). And I don’t even practise politics, I just jeer, leer and sneer from the sidelines. In the next few months, we shall learn whether the political will exists even to begin to reverse this process.The writer served as Secretary of State for International Development between 1997 and 2003. Welcome, Paedocypris progenetica. One moment, you were pottering about unnoticed in a swamp in Sumatra; the next, you were being hailed as the animal with the smallest backbone in the world.

Not a bad example of the instant nature of fame today, I should have said. Remind me, what is the name of that girl with the blond hair in Celebrity Big Brother?

But, PP, if I may call you that, you have other lessons to offer. I, for one, am always very glad to make the acquaintance of someone with a smaller backbone than mine. It is also fine to see something being acclaimed for its smallness, an increasingly fashionable quality since this newspaper demonstrated how it can be achieved without losing substance.. About once a decade – seldom more – the people of Britain have an opportunity to opt for a fundamental change in political direction and style of governance.

No amount of aid and/or debt relief will bring development to Africa unless conflicts are ended and state structures capable of providing order and development put in place. This is the problem in Sudan, Congo, Angola, C?d’Ivoire and many other places.It is already too late to prevent the ethnic cleansing of 2 million people in Darfur. But they were not willing to mandate a UN force with peace enforcement powers, because they did not care enough about the people of Darfur and because they were distracted and weakened by events in Iraq. Instead, the African Union agreed to provide the troops, but they lacked planes, helicopters and other equipment. The EU and others helped with finance, but the money kept running out. Although those who were deployed performed admirably, with inadequate numbers and logistics the killing and raping continued and the ethnic cleansing has been “successfully” completed.

Understandably, exuberance led to a pitch invasion, and Reading’s players ended up taking their applause from a position midway up the Main Stand.
Since it was spontaneous, it somehow felt all the more joyous. There had been warnings to keep off the pitch after the final whistle, but a first promotion to the top flight is not to be celebrated with an anodyne lap of honour in front of fans calmly standing in their places. A doze became a gleeful rout that, with Sheffield United slipping up against Stoke, was enough to confirm them as champions, something that had been in doubt only to mathematicians and extreme pessimists. In the end, it was the Championship party Reading deserved, as they put an insipid first half behind them to blow away Derby in the second. Clint Hill pumped the free-kick into the penalty area and Paddy Kenny could only punch weakly away. Skoko was on hand to head back over the goalkeeper and into the net from 20 yards.Kenny then redeemed himself by pushing Skoko’s next shot on to the post. “That might have been the turning point in our whole season,” said Warnock.It certainly proved vital on the day as Hans Sigurdsson dwelt too long on the ball with Stoke flooding forward.

Craig Short dispossessed him and sent Webber away for the goal that salvaged a precious point.”The performance was very good but we gave the game away,” said Johan Boskamp, the Stoke manager, who will fly to Iceland a week tomorrow to discuss his future “It was their only chance of the afternoon.”. Perhaps that was why they began with uncharacteristic laxness, while their mid-table opponents looked like the team with more to play for.The opening goal stemmed from a soft foul conceded by Paul Ifill. “We were much better in the second half and we’re delighted with a point – I don’t think there are many tougher places to come than here.”United had already known by the time they kicked off that both their nearest challengers, Watford and Leeds, had lost their latest games. Stoke, whose long-term future at both boardroom and managerial level remains unclear, produced a strong-running performance that probably deserved all three points.”We were a yard off the pace in the first half,” said Neil Warnock. Danny Webber struck with eight minutes remaining as Stoke appealed for a free-kick.

It is inspired by the Festival and a chance to cash in by renting out property to the luvvies and tourists who flood Scotland’s capital Today’s exodus, though, is like no other Some 50,000 people will head along the M8 to Glasgow. The former Macclesfield forward had already seen a first-half left-foot strike ruled out for offside when Stuart Green crossed from the right and Parkin powered in his header.For Leeds, Eddie Lewis’s third-minute free-kick forced a fine save from Boaz Myhill, but Neil Sullivan in the visitors’ goal was the busier keeper saving well from Green, Parkin, Kevin Ellison and, best of all, from a downward header by Leon Cort.. “We’ve lost form in the last third of the field,” the Leeds manager admitted, “I’ve not said a lot to the players. They are obviously disappointed because the prize is so great. I can’t fault the effort, but for all the good positions we got ourselves into we kept either firing blanks or lacking imagination.”
In fact it was Hull, looking the more composed in defence, who also carried the greater threat in attack and Jon Parkin’s 76th-minute goal was the least they deserved.

But with this fifth game without a win, indeed without a goal in three of them, the jitters are all coming from Kevin Blackwell’s side who are not even entering the play-offs in the sort of form that encourages thoughts of progress. They’re in a situation where change is uncomfortable for them, it’s threatening. They want their blazers, their England tours, sit on panels making bullshit decisions that cost people money.”Charged last December with improper conduct (“It made me sound like a pervert”) for criticising a referee, he received a £10,000 fine, suspended for 12 months, which has hardly had the desired effect of tempering his public observations: “I say things for the benefit of my club, and if it happens to upset people, too bad.”Having started so young, Jordan may even be out of football altogether at an age when most entrepreneurs are beginning to think about dipping their toe in the shark-infested waters. “My intention is to get Palace back in the Premiership a.s.a.p., and stabilise for a season.

What you need is a room at the Periscope Hotel, one of the new breed of boutique lodgings. The name means “the ouzo place”, and besides excellent food, it offers nearly 700 varieties of the aniseed drink.Even so, you may still be the sort of traveller who wakes up not knowing where you are. Ignatidou says the traditional British complaint about the after-effects of ouzo or retsina (or, in extreme cases of recklessness, both) has a simple remedy: “You are drinking too much, and too fast. If you drink slowly, you will not have any problem.”To appreciate the local liquor, seek out the Ouzadiko Restaurant in the unlikely location of the Lemos International Shopping Centre in Kolonaki. Countless holidaymakers have also discovered that Greece also produces some potentially dangerous drinks based on aniseed and pine resin. Elementary, and superb.The land of Bacchus has yielded some excellent wines, especially young whites; try Savatiano, from Spata, for a very reasonable €14 (£10).

Choose the ground floor to appreciate the robust, friendly architecture (the same terms describe the service, and the food), or the first floor for a view of the Parthenon to accompany the encyclopedia of Greek flavours: dakos from Crete (dried barley bread with tomato and goat’s cheese) followed by meat dishes from Macedonia, accompanied by salads as verdant as spring in the foothills of Mount Olympus. Two immediate consequences for the visitor: plenty of internet caf? and the prospect at last of a decent curry. Yet to opt for a chicken tikka masala when the city has so much else to offer would be a sin worthy of ostracism.At the Cafe Avissinia, which is about as central as any restaurant can get – on Avissinia Square in Monastiraki – you have to battle with the locals for a table. “Most people stay up until six in the morning,” says Sofia Ignatidou. The current centre of indulgence, whether you are looking for jazz, techno or a taverna, has moved to the formerly run-down Psiri neighbourhood just west of the centre. It is around here that you will also find some of the new Athenians – workers from the Indian sub-continent and the former Soviet Union.

I wanted to carve an arc across Piedmont, from the austerity of the Alps via the indulgences of Turin to the serenity of Piedmont’s superior lake, Lago Maggiore. Last week, I managed to complete the set with the link through the Fr?s Tunnel from Modane in France – and found it the best of the bunch.Here’s the plan. Starting in the days of Transalpino (the agency) with a rail trip through the Alps, I have been gradually collecting images of Transalpino (the experience). Whichever route or mode of transport you choose – road or rail, from France or Switzerland – this is a sensual treat. In a single flourish, you leave the subterranean confines of Europe’s greatest mountain range and emerge into a vision of magnificence. Invariably in my experience you always find warmer, sunnier weather than you left behind; all the better for appreciating the valley that unfolds beneath you.

Transalpino: that used to be the name of a student travel agency, which sadly went bust around 20 years ago. Happily, today you can apply the label to the best way to arrive in Piedmont: transitting an Alpine tunnel. That daredevil bareback race evolved into Italy’s oldest recorded palio (eight years older, in fact, than Siena’s) and currently takes place in Asti’s Piazza Alfieri every September. It is the culmination of 10 days of wine and food festivals, flag-throwing and swanning about in medieval costumes as only Italians can swan. Yet this is no show for tourists; the 21 competing wards really want to win Cheating is not unknown. Alba grits its teeth, then shows just what it thinks with a Donkey Palio, the comic highlight of its October truffle fair.. It was in 1275, while besieging archrival Alba, that Asti’s troops came up with a cheeky new way of showing their disdain of Alba’s defenders – by holding a horse race around the city walls, right under their noses.

It was a mix of horror that she could have died and pride over what she had done,” she said.Maysan is one of the most dangerous areas in south-ern Iraq. Last week, five members of the 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards rushed a wounded colleague to the medical centre as mortar rounds fell within metres, one detonating a stockpile of aviation fuel.The platoon commander, Capt James Shaw, described Guardsmen Daniel Probyn, Dave Greenhalgh and Damion Pointin as well as L/Cpl Greg Mann and Drummer Barry Orrell as exceptional. A round went over and hit a battery at knee height, so if he hadn’t pulled me down my knee or my leg would have been shot.”They dragged the injured sergeant inside, where she administered first aid as he was driven to be airlifted to hospital. Pte Norris, a Royal Army Medical Corps soldier nicknamed Chuck, is the only female attached to C Company, 1st Battalion The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment, which is half way through its tour.

She has been recommended for a bravery award.L/Cpl Lisa Newburn, 22, of the Royal Army Medical Corps, and Flt Lt Jennifer Reardon, 27, of the Royal Air Force, have been mentioned in despatches but it is predicted Pte Norris will receive the higher award of Queen’s Gallantry Medal, or even the Military Cross.Back at her home in Stourbridge, West Midlands, her mother, Susan Norris, 55, said that she had received a thank-you from the sergeant’s mother.”Michelle played it down. She said yesterday: “I heard ‘dings’ off the Warrior, I thought it was stones Then I heard the turret get hit… All of a sudden, the driver, Pte Nani Ratawake, shouted to me that my commander had been hit.”Not long out of training and never having dealt with a combat casualty before, Pte Norris climbed on top to the turret to find the sergeant had been shot in the mouth. “I then heard the crack and a thump of a round going past my head.