Western Freedom

Due to the recent terror attacks in Mumbai, Goa authorities take caution. New Year parties are banned here over security fears, - Sky News announced.

The luxury Oberoi and Taj Mahal hotels will partially reopen almost one month after Islamic militants stormed the buildings in a rampage that left 172 people dead. Members of banned Pakistan-based group Lashkar e Taiba are accused of staging the attacks that kicked off a three-day siege.

Nine of the alleged gunmen were killed and one is in police custody. Now, in a blow to the Indian resort state of Goa where year-end parties are a big draw for tourists, the authorities have cancelled all beach celebrations. Taj Mahal hotel in Mumbai gets ready for Christmas Taj Mahal gets ready for Christmas “We have decided that beach parties would not be allowed from December 23 to January 5,” Goa chief minister Digamber Kamat said. The former Portuguese colony’s reputation has already suffered this year after a string of high-profile crimes, including the murder of British teenager. Scarlett Keeling’s death lifted the lid on a culture of drink and drugs and prompted concerns about safety. Kamat’s ruling following a high-level review of security with state home minister Ravi Naik.

Murdered: Scarlett Keeling Naik said all other festivities and celebrations would continue, assuring visitors that there was no cause for concern. “There is no ban for the functions in the hotels. Also the traditional celebrations will go on uninterrupted,” he added. Over two million tourists visit the state each year but arrivals have fallen 20% since November’s Mumbai attacks, according to the Tour and Travel Association of Goa.

Workers who got three days’ notice that their factory was shutting its doors have occupied the building and say they won’t go home without assurances they’ll get severance and vacation pay.

About 250 union workers occupied the Republic Windows and Doors plant in shifts Saturday while union leaders outside criticized a Wall Street bailout they say is leaving laborers behind.

Leah Fried, an organizer with the United Electrical Workers, said the Chicago-based vinyl window manufacturer failed to give 60 days’ notice required by law before shutting down.

During the two-day peaceful takeover, workers have been shoveling snow and cleaning the building, Fried said.

“We’re doing something we haven’t done since the 1930s, so we’re trying to make it work,” she said, referring to a tactic most famously used in 1936-37 by General Motors factory workers in Flint, Mich., to help unionize the U.S. auto industry.

Associated Press:

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Somali pirates hijacked a supertanker hundreds of miles off the Horn of Africa, seizing the Saudi-owned ship loaded with crude and its 25-member crew, the U.S. Navy said Monday.

It was the largest ship pirates have seized, and the farthest out to sea they have successfully struck.

The hijacking highlighted the vulnerability of even very large ships and pointed to widening ambitions and capabilities among ransom-hungry pirates who have carried out a surge of attacks this year off Somalia.

Saturday’s hijacking of the MV Sirius Star tanker occurred in the Indian Ocean far south of the zone patrolled by international warships in the busy Gulf of Aden shipping channel, which leads to and from the Suez Canal. A U.S. Navy spokesman said the bandits were taking it to a Somali port that has become a haven for seized ships and bandits trying to force ransoms for them.

Maritime security experts said they have tracked a troubling spread in pirate activity southward into a vast area of ocean that would be extremely difficult and costly to patrol, and this hijacking fits that pattern.

“It is very alarming,” said Cyrus Mody, manager of the International Maritime Bureau. “It had been slightly more easy to get it under control in the Gulf of Aden because it is a comparatively smaller area of water which has to be patrolled, but this is huge.”

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One can watch live results in real time at special CNN page.

There will be also CNN’s projections on elections results. They say that:

To project elections, CNN and its election experts use scientific statistical procedures to make estimates of the final vote count in each race. CNN will broadcast a projected winner only after an extensive review of data from a number of sources.

“America’s moment of truth” - so UK Guardian names current american elections. Recent estimations show that Obama’s victory is more probable:

With all the main polls putting Obama well ahead, political analysts from right and left said they expected him to easily reach the 270 of 538 electoral votes needed to win the presidency, and many predicted a landslide, with him taking 350 or more electoral seats. (source)

This campaign has already become the most expensive one in all America’s history: candidates spent more than $2 bln up to now .