Lindsay Lohan Arrested for Alleged Assault in Club

Update

By Stephen M. Silverman

UPDATED
11/29/2012 at 08:00 AM EST

• Originally published 11/29/2012 at 06:55 AM EST

Lindsay Lohan leaves the police precinct station in New York City

INF; Inset: Paul Morigi/WireImage

Lindsay Lohan was arrested and charged with third-degree assault at 4 a.m. Thursday in Manhattan' s Meatpacking District after an alleged altercation with a woman in a nightclub.

Det. Mark Nell of the NYPD told PEOPLE: "This morning at 4 a dispute broke out at Avenue located at 116 10th Avenue. A female 26-year-old assaulted a female 28-year old. Lindsay Lohan was arrested and charged with assault."

Asked what happened, Nell said, "She punched her in the face."

By 8 a.m., Nell said, Lohan "has now left the precinct and was given a desk appearance at a later date."

TMZ reports that Lohan, after telling the woman to give her some space, or words to the effect, reputedly punched the woman in the face.

New York's Daily News names the other woman as Tiffany Eve Mitchell, of West Palm Beach, Fla, who was at Avenue with her husband.

The paper also says she and Lohan were sitting in separate VIP sections when a scuffle erupted elsewhere in the club, and Mitchell possibly bumped into Lohan in order to avoid getting involved.

The other woman was not arrested or injured, according to WNBC News.

The alleged other woman, leaving the 10th Precinct

Splash News Online

There has been no comment from Lohan's publicist, but the New York Post quotes Lohan assistant Gavin Doyle, who apparently was at the club, as saying about the actress, "It's become a pastime to use her name and fame and blame things on her."

The Post also quotes a man believed to be Mitchell's husband. He reportedly said, "Lindsay Lohan got drunk and went crazy ... hit my wife."

Lohan currently is on informal probation for removing a necklace from a California jewelry store last year, and could face potential jail time if she is re-arrested.

• With reporting by LIZ McNEIL

Read More..

Simple measures cut infections caught in hospitals

CHICAGO (AP) — Preventing surgery-linked infections is a major concern for hospitals and it turns out some simple measures can make a big difference.

A project at seven big hospitals reduced infections after colorectal surgeries by nearly one-third. It prevented an estimated 135 infections, saving almost $4 million, the Joint Commission hospital regulating group and the American College of Surgeons announced Wednesday. The two groups directed the 2 1/2-year project.

Solutions included having patients shower with special germ-fighting soap before surgery, and having surgery teams change gowns, gloves and instruments during operations to prevent spreading germs picked up during the procedures.

Some hospitals used special wound-protecting devices on surgery openings to keep intestine germs from reaching the skin.

The average rate of infections linked with colorectal operations at the seven hospitals dropped from about 16 percent of patients during a 10-month phase when hospitals started adopting changes to almost 11 percent once all the changes had been made.

Hospital stays for patients who got infections dropped from an average of 15 days to 13 days, which helped cut costs.

"The improvements translate into safer patient care," said Dr. Mark Chassin, president of the Joint Commission. "Now it's our job to spread these effective interventions to all hospitals."

Almost 2 million health care-related infections occur each year nationwide; more than 90,000 of these are fatal.

Besides wanting to keep patients healthy, hospitals have a monetary incentive to prevent these infections. Medicare cuts payments to hospitals that have lots of certain health care-related infections, and those cuts are expected to increase under the new health care law.

The project involved surgeries for cancer and other colorectal problems. Infections linked with colorectal surgery are particularly common because intestinal tract bacteria are so abundant.

To succeed at reducing infection rates requires hospitals to commit to changing habits, "to really look in the mirror and identify these things," said Dr. Clifford Ko of the American College of Surgeons.

The hospitals involved were Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles; Cleveland Clinic in Ohio; Mayo Clinic-Rochester Methodist Hospital in Rochester, Minn.; North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System in Great Neck, NY; Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago; OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, Ill.; and Stanford Hospital & Clinics in Palo Alto, Calif.

___

Online:

Joint Commission: http://www.jointcommission.org

American College of Surgeons: http://www.facs.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..

Futures dip as investors worry about "fiscal cliff"

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock index futures fell on Wednesday, with the S&P 500 on course for a third straight day of decline, as investors worried about comments coming from Washington that "little progress" has been made in talks to avoid spending cuts and tax hikes.

Investors will get readings on new-home sales and the Federal Reserve's Beige Book view of the state of the economy later on Wednesday, but the market is mainly focused on the negotiations about long-term budget deficit reduction.

President Barack Obama has invited to the White House chief executives from top corporations, including Goldman Sachs , Deloitte LLP, and Caterpillar Inc , to discuss U.S. fiscal problems.

Obama's meeting with influential leaders from the corporate world is part of his push for Congress to extend tax cuts for middle income Americans, one flashpoint in a standoff with Republicans in Congress over a series of tax hikes and spending cuts, dubbed the "fiscal cliff," that will go into effect next year if lawmakers and the president cannot come up with a deal to stop them.

"These CEOs know that the market will sell off without any resolution, so I think it's encouraging that they are meeting with the president," said Sal Arnuk, co-founder at Themis Trading at Chatham, New Jersey.

One possible result of the deficit reduction talks is a rise in the tax rate on dividends, prompting some firms to issue special dividends or move up plans for dividends.

The latest example is retailer Costco Wholesale Corp , which said it will pay a special $3 billion dividend to investors. The company posted monthly same-store sales that beat forecasts. The stock was up 4 percent at $100.25 in premarket trade.

U.S. stocks slid on Tuesday after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid expressed disappointment that there has been "little progress" in dealing with the "fiscal cliff."

S&P 500 futures were down 4.7 points and were below fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures fell 32 points and Nasdaq 100 futures were down 6.25 points.

Knight Capital Group Inc shares jumped nearly 20 percent to $3.52 in premarket trade on news that Getco LLC has sent a proposal for a merger between Getco and Knight Capital at a price of $3.50 per share, according to a regulatory filing.

Deep divisions at the Federal Reserve were on display on Tuesday, just two weeks before the U.S. central bank's next policy-setting meeting, with one top Fed official pushing for more easing, and another advocating limits. The Fed will release its Beige Book summary of regional economic conditions at 2 p.m. (1900 GMT).

New home sales data is due at 10 a.m. (1500 GMT). Economists in a Reuters survey forecast a reading of 390,000 for October versus the previous reading of 389,000.

Microsoft Corp has sold 40 million Windows 8 licenses in the month since the launch, according to one of the new co-heads of the Windows unit, setting a faster pace than Windows 7 three years ago.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc forecast quarterly and full year earnings well above analysts' expectations, helped by an expanded lineup of single-serve coffee makers and drinks, sending its shares up 22 percent in after-hours trade.

Nokia said on Wednesday that an arbitrator has ruled in its favor in a patent dispute with BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion over use of Nokia's patents related to wireless local access network technology.

The European Commission gave the go ahead for Spain to overhaul its stricken nationalized banks on Wednesday and opened the door for nearly 40 billion euros in euro zone aid to be disbursed, offering hope for an end to Spain's banking crisis.

(Reporting By Angela Moon; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

Read More..

Rebel Leaders in Congo Send Mixed Signals on Leaving Goma

Jerome Delay/Associated Press

A man said to be from a Rwandan rebel group was held Tuesday. Rwanda said fighters crossed from Congo and attacked a village.

NAIROBI, Kenya — Rebel leaders in the Democratic Republic of Congo sent out mixed signals on Tuesday, with some saying they were withdrawing troops from the strategic city of Goma, which they captured last week, while others maintained that such a pullout would occur only if the Congolese government met a lengthy list of demands.

On Tuesday night, Amani Kabasha, a rebel spokesman, said: “There are no conditions. We are withdrawing our troops starting tomorrow.”

But earlier Tuesday, Jean-Marie Runiga, head of the rebels’ political wing, said the rebels would leave Goma only if the Congolese government released political prisoners, investigated the murder of opposition supporters, dissolved the national election commission and convened a conference of opposition leaders and members of the Congolese diaspora — demands that the government immediately dismissed as a “farce.”

Perhaps equally worrisome, the Rwandan government said that 150 fighters from another renegade group crossed from Congo into Rwanda on Tuesday and attacked a village at dawn, setting off a battle with Rwandan troops. It was the first such incursion on Rwandan soil in years and added to the escalating tensions between Rwanda and Congo, neighbors that essentially went to war against each other twice in the 1990s.

Many Congo analysts have been expecting the rebels, who call themselves the M23, to eventually withdraw from Goma, one of the biggest cities in eastern Congo, because the rebels have only a few thousand troops and seem to be overstretched trying to defend all the territory they have seized in recent weeks.

Still, the capture of Goma severely damaged the credibility of President Joseph Kabila of Congo, setting off protests across the country, and it is not clear what his next move will be.

“This ain’t over yet,” said Jason Stearns, a well-regarded Congo analyst who runs a blog called Congo Siasa, or Congo politics.

“It will be difficult to find a compromise — the M23 deeply mistrust Kabila,” Mr. Stearns said, “while the Congolese government is wary of reintegrating their enemies yet again into the army.”

The M23 rebels began as a different rebel force — the National Congress for the Defense of the People or C.N.D.P. in French — before being integrated into Congo’s national army as part of a March 23, 2009, peace deal. This year, they reinvented themselves again into rebels, taking their name from the date of the unfulfilled peace accord.

Few analysts ever believed that the 2009 peace deal would stick because of the rebels’ links to Rwanda, which has a history of covertly fomenting rebellions in eastern Congo as a way to carve out a sphere of influence in one of the most mineral-rich areas of the world. Most of the M23’s top officers are Tutsi, the ethnic group that dominates Rwanda’s military and government, and the suspicion was that the Tutsi officers in the Congolese Army were actually taking their orders from Kigali, Rwanda’s capital, instead of Kinshasa, Congo’s capital.

The M23 rebels have made a major effort to promote non-Tutsi to civilian leadership positions, broadening their base of support and making them an even more pernicious threat to Mr. Kabila, who was already despised by many across Congo, suspected of stealing from public coffers while so many roads, bridges, hospitals and schools sink into rot.

A lingering question though is who actually is control of the organization. Despite handing out political posts to non-Tutsi like Mr. Runiga, who is referred to as “the president,” Tutsi military officers still call the shots. On Tuesday, it was the Tutsi officers who said that they were pulling out of Goma and that they would relocate their troops to 12 miles beyond the city, as called for in an agreement reached by several African heads of state trying to quell the Goma conflict.

The trouble with the M23 started this spring when Mr. Kabila, under pressure from Western governments, indicated he was going to arrest Bosco Ntaganda, a Congolese Tutsi general and former rebel commander nicknamed the Terminator, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court on war crimes charges. The Congolese government also planned to shake up the power structure of the troops in eastern Congo, which the M23 rebels said was a violation of the original 2009 deal.

The troops then mutinied and took over town after town, culminating in Goma’s capture last Tuesday.

Several rebel fighters have said that they never planned to stay in Goma, a city of as many as one million people, because ruling it would be a headache. But even if the M23 rebels depart Goma, many of their agents are likely to remain. Goma’s police force has been heavily infiltrated, as evidenced last week by Rwandan-speaking police officers strolling around in brand-new uniforms. Veteran police officers said that they had no idea who the new commanders were and that they suddenly popped up on Goma’s streets as the rebel soldiers were marching into town.

“All of us have been disarmed,” said one police officer who was frightened to have his name published. He said that only the new Rwandan-speaking officers were allowed to carry guns.

Read More..

U.S. for-profit colleges spend big on marketing while slashing other costs

(Reuters) – Google‘s biggest advertiser is neither a bank nor a retailer.

It’s the for-profit University of Phoenix, which has recently been spending nearly $ 400,000 a day on ads, more than any financial firm or retailer, the traditional big spenders on online advertising, according to search analytics firm SpyFu.

That kind of spending may seem surprising coming from a college, but marketing has become vital for the university and its for-profit rivals as enrollments plummet and they fight back against a host of criticisms, including low job-placement rates.

Colleges such as University of Phoenix, the industry leader owned by Apollo Group Inc, will not only have to boost enrollments to reverse their fortunes, analysts say. They will also need to consider cutting tuition fees as well as continue to slash costs and take market share from rivals.

“I have witnessed several versions of this cycle but none as extreme as this,” said Trace Urdan, an analyst with Wells Fargo Securities, who has been covering the U.S. for-profit education industry for about 15 years.

“We are going to see more pointed efforts at marketing and more price competition in an effort to try to capture more market share both from each other as well as from traditional schools,” Urdan said.

Operators of other for-profit colleges, whose ranks include the Washington Post Co’s Kaplan business, DeVry Inc and ITT Educational Services Inc, are also boosting their spending on marketing and are among the 25 biggest advertisers on Google.

But no one is spending like the University of Phoenix, which doubled its spending on Google ads to about $ 380,000 per day on average between October 12 and November 12, compared with $ 170,000 a day in the previous month, according to SpyFu.

Increased marketing alone will not be enough to fatten fast-shrinking profit margins and increase enrollments, however. Lower tuition fees and increased specialization of the type of programs offered, along with further streamlining of operations, will also be necessary, analysts say.

Industry bellwether University of Phoenix, which offers courses at about 230 campuses as well as online, announced plans last month to shut about half its locations and cut 800 jobs in order to save about $ 300 million a year by 2014.

New enrollments in the Apollo system are down nearly 50 percent in the past two years. As of August 31, enrollment totaled about 328,000.

Career Education Corp, which owns American InterContinental University and the Le Cordon Bleu colleges, and Lincoln Educational Services Corp have also announced closures.

LOW-COST MODEL

The $ 25 billion industry, which typically serves adults looking for a career change or a program to enhance job skills, is reeling after government investigations revealed fraud related to financial aid, worryingly high student debt loads and low rates of graduation and job placement.

“Many for-profit colleges make decisions that prioritize their bottom line, even when those decisions limit their students’ opportunities for academic success,” a U.S. Senate report said earlier this year.

Tuition fees, and therefore profits, is one area under pressure as potential students need to be convinced to take out loans in an uncertain job market.

Apollo, whose stock has lost about 65 percent of its value this year, implemented a tuition freeze earlier this year and promised students it will not increase prices through the course of their programs.

Apollo is also looking at different cost models, with a view to serving segments of the population that it cannot serve with current University of Phoenix tuition prices.

“We have certainly seen a lot more competition at the lower end of the price scale, and that’s something we are focusing on,” Apollo spokesman Mark Brennar said, while declining to offer specifics.

Wells Fargo’s Urdan said it is likely that Apollo wants to compete in the low-cost end of the market by building a second brand, which it would likely do by acquiring another college rather than starting from scratch.

As colleges lower their revenue base by cutting tuition fees even as they spend more on marketing, lower margins could become the norm, analysts say. That has spooked investors already worried about sliding enrollments.

The S&P 1500 Education Services index has lost three-quarters of its value since April 2010, including a 50 percent decline in 2012.

Some for-profit colleges already differentiate themselves in the crowded higher-education market by offering programs in a particular field or by targeting students of a particular background, and that trend could accelerate.

American Public Education, for example, is known for enrolling those who work in the military and public services, while Universal Technical Institute offers programs related to the automotive industry.

For-profit colleges play up their links to employers to attract students who may otherwise opt for traditional or community colleges, said Rob Lytle, head of the education practice at advisory firm Parthenon Group.

“They are about getting people workforce employability skills, and I think they are going to be focusing tighter on that,” said Lytle.

(Reporting by A. Ananthalakshmi in Bangalore; Editing by Ted Kerr)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Angus T. Jones's Video Surprises Two and a Half Men Set

By Mike Fleeman

11/28/2012 at 08:35 AM EST

After the Charlie Sheen tiger blood debacle, it would seem that nothing could shock the cast and crew of Two and a Half Men anymore.

Then came the Angus T. Jones video.

"This came as a surprise to most people. This isn't who he grew up as," a source on the show tells PEOPLE. "He's always been a good kid and he's very well-liked by everyone at the show."

The 19-year-old has blasted the CBS sitcom that pays him a reported $350,000 an episode, saying in a video posted on a religious website: "Please stop watching it. Please stop filling your head with filth."

The comments came during an apparent religious awakening for the actor in the Seventh-Day Adventist Church.

“We are happy that Angus has joined the Seventh-Day Adventist family and has found a place in which he feels comfortable to worship and grow his faith,” says George Johnson, a church spokesman. “Recently, Angus made some statements concerning his spiritual journey and expressed his views concerning the television program
Two and a Half Men.

"These comments are of a personal nature, reflecting his views after having undergone changes during his spiritual journey," Johnson continues. "We welcome him with open arms to the worldwide Seventh-Day Adventist Church family and are excited about his commitment to God through his recent baptism at his church."

Neither Jones nor reps for the show have spoken out.

The actor won't be on the set this week – which was previously planned because his character isn't involved in this episode.

"The cast was really surprised by the video," says a second source on set. "At first they didn't believe he'd say those things. ... He always has a great attitude, which is why everyone was surprised. He's friendly and talented and great at his job."

• Reporting by MONICA RIZZO, AILI NAHAS and MELODY CHIU

Read More..

CDC: HIV spread high in young gay males

NEW YORK (AP) — Health officials say 1 in 5 new HIV infections occur in a tiny segment of the population — young men who are gay or bisexual.

The government on Tuesday released new numbers that spotlight how the spread of the AIDS virus is heavily concentrated in young males who have sex with other males. Only about a quarter of new infections in the 13-to-24 age group are from injecting drugs or heterosexual sex.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said blacks represented more than half of new infections in youths. The estimates are based on 2010 figures.

Overall, new U.S. HIV infections have held steady at around 50,000 annually. About 12,000 are in teens and young adults, and most youth with HIV haven't been tested.

___

Online:

CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns

Read More..

Stock futures flat on fiscal cliff, investors eye data

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock futures were little changed on Tuesday as worry over the threat to the economy posed by the "fiscal cliff" offset optimism from a deal to ease Greece's debt burden.

Market sentiment improved after European finance ministers and the International Monetary Fund clinched agreement late on Monday on reducing Greece's debt in a breakthrough to release urgently needed loans to keep Greece from defaulting.

But as Democrats and Republicans in Washington prepared to resume budget negotiations, futures cut gains to trade flat and the market reverted to a cautious stance.

S&P 500 futures were up 1.3 points and in line with fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures fell 9 points, while Nasdaq 100 futures were up 5.75 points.

As of Monday's close, the S&P 500 was holding above the 1,400 level it retook last week. But volume continued to be weak as traders awaited any advance in talks between the Obama administration and Congress to avert a series of spending cuts and tax increases scheduled to begin next year. Last week, the broad index rose nearly 4 percent.

"Advancing volume trends have failed to surge during the S&P 500's 4 percent bounce from its November 16 low, suggesting recent strength can be attributed to a lack of selling pressure rather than fresh buying demand," said Ari Wald, analyst at the PrinceRidge Group in New York.

"We would like to see this spread turn positive to confirm an upward S&P 500 reversal," he said.

Government data on October durable goods orders showed a gauge of planned spending by businesses increased by the most in five months. But a fourth straight month of declines in shipments underscored the damage that fears of tighter fiscal policy next year are having on the economy. Market reaction to the Commerce Department was muted.

Standard & Poor's releases its S&P Case/Shiller Home Price Index for September at 9 a.m. (1400 GMT). Economists expect an adjusted 20 city index to rise 0.4 percent, versus a 0.5 percent increase in the previous month.

Conference Board releases November consumer confidence at 10 a.m. (1500 GMT). Economists expect a reading of 73.0, compared with 72.2 in October.

ConAgra Foods Inc will acquire Ralcorp, the largest private label food manufacturer in the U.S. for about $6.8 billion.

ConocoPhillips' partners in Kazakhstan's Kashagan field have 60 days to exercise pre-emption rights to prevent India's ONGC Videsh from buying an 8.4 percent stake in the project held by the U.S. company, the Indian firm's managing director said.

Europe is preparing to follow the United States in delaying the introduction of stricter rules on bank capital, while it lobbies for a rethink of the U.S. stance, EU sources said.

However, the head of the Basel Committee at the Bank of International Settlements told Reuters on Tuesday that the introduction of stricter capital rules for banks will go ahead as planned on January 1.

(Reporting By Angela Moon; Editing by Theodore d'Afflisio and Kenneth Barry)

Read More..

Egypt’s President Said to Limit Scope of Judicial Decree

Tara Todras-Whitehill for The New York Times

Egyptians at a burned-out school in Cairo on Monday before the funeral of an activist who was injured in a clash and died Sunday.

CAIRO — With public pressure mounting, President Mohamed Morsi appeared to pull back Monday from his attempt to assert an authority beyond the reach of any court. His allies in the Muslim Brotherhood canceled plans for a large demonstration in his support, signaling a chance to calm an escalating battle that has paralyzed a divided nation.

After Mr. Morsi met for hours with the judges of Egypt’s Supreme Judicial Council, his spokesman read an “explanation” on television that appeared to backtrack from a presidential decree placing Mr. Morsi’s official edicts above judicial scrutiny — even while saying the president had not actually changed a word of the statement.

Though details of the talks remained hazy, and it was not clear whether the opposition or the court would accept his position, Mr. Morsi’s gesture was another demonstration that Egyptians would no longer allow their rulers to operate above the law. But there appeared little chance that the gesture alone would be enough to quell the crisis set off by his perceived power grab.

Hundreds of opponents of Mr. Morsi protested in Tahrir Square on Tuesday, Reuters reported, with the crowd expected to grow in the late afternoon.

The presidential spokesman, Yasser Ali, said for the first time that Mr. Morsi had sought only to assert pre-existing powers already approved by the courts under previous precedents, not to free himself from judicial oversight.

He said that the president meant all along to follow an established Egyptian legal doctrine suspending judicial scrutiny of presidential “acts of sovereignty” that work “to protect the main institutions of the state.” The judicial council had said Sunday that it could bless aspects of the decree deemed to qualify under the doctrine.

Mr. Morsi had maintained from the start that his purpose was to empower himself to prevent judges appointed by former President Hosni Mubarak from dissolving the constituent assembly, which is led by his fellow Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party. The courts have already dissolved the Islamist-led Parliament and an earlier constituent assembly, and the Supreme Constitutional Court was widely expected to rule against this one next week.

But the text of the original decree had exempted all presidential edicts from judicial review until the ratification of a constitution, not just those edicts related to the assembly or justified as “acts of sovereignty.”

Legal experts said that the spokesman’s explanations of the president’s intentions, if put into effect, would amount to a revision of the decree Mr. Morsi issued last Thursday. But lawyers said that the verbal statements alone carried little legal weight.

How the courts would apply the doctrine remained hard to predict. And Mr. Morsi’s opposition indicated it was holding out for far greater concessions, including the breakup of the whole constituent assembly.

Speaking at a news conference while Mr. Morsi was meeting with the judges, the opposition activist and intellectual Abdel Haleem Qandeil called for “a long-term battle,” declaring that withdrawal of Mr. Morsi’s new powers was only the first step toward the opposition’s goal of “the withdrawal of the legitimacy of Morsi’s presence in the presidential palace.” Completely withdrawing the edict would be “a minimum,” he said.

Khaled Ali, a human rights lawyer and former presidential candidate, pointed to the growing crowd of protesters camped out in Tahrir Square for a fourth night. “The one who did the action has to take it back,” Mr. Ali said.

Moataz Abdel Fattah, a political scientist at Cairo University, said Mr. Morsi was saving face during a strategic retreat. “He is trying to simply say, ‘I am not a new pharaoh; I am just trying to stabilize the institutions that we already have,’ ” he said. “But for the liberals, this is now their moment, and for sure they are not going to waste it, because he has given them an excellent opportunity to score.”

Read More..

Card firms’ block on WikiLeaks did not break rules: EU

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – A block on processing donations for WikiLeaks by Visa Europe and other credit card companies is unlikely to have violated EU anti-trust rules, the European Commission said on Tuesday.

DataCell, a company that collected donations for WikiLeaks, complained to the Commission about Visa Europe, MasterCard Europe and American Express Co after they stopped processing donations for WikiLeaks in December 2010. Their decisions followed criticism by the United States of WikiLeaks’ release of thousands of sensitive U.S. diplomatic cables.

“On the basis of the information available, the Commission considers that the complaint does not merit further investigation because it is unlikely that any infringement of EU competition rules could be established,” said a spokesman for the Commission, the EU executive.

He added, however, that the Commission would look at new information from DataCell before taking a final decision.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been staying in Ecuador’s embassy in central London since June to avoid extradition to Sweden to face rape and sexual assault allegations.

Assange said there were no lawful grounds for the card companies’ actions, which he said had cost Wikileaks 95 percent of its revenue and threatened his organization’s existence.

(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee and Adrian Croft; Editing by Louise Heavens)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..