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An Australian man accused of posing as a spiritual leader, blindfolding, drugging, and sexually assaulting a woman was refused bail in a NSW court.

Tony Golossian, 61, who is facing 151 charges of sexual offences against the women between 2001 to 2005, lured the 30 year old woman by telling her he could cure the black magic done o her family.

“Having read the allegations…I must say that if this is proven it would be one of the most bizarre and evil cases I have come across in more than 40 years,” Brisbanetimes.com quoted Magistrate Graham Johnson, as saying.

Police claim that the 30-year-old victim was blindfolded and sexually assaulted during prayer sessions at five hotels and motels across Sydney.

Glossian and co-accused Arthur Psichogios, 38, have been denied bail, although Glossian tried to fake a heart attack during the court hearing but the hospital declared he was just fine.

A Chinese dairy that sold milk powder linked to kidney stones in infants knew it contained a banned chemical weeks before ordering a recall, the health minister said Saturday.

One child has died and an official said the number of children sickened had risen to 432.

Investigators have detained 19 people and are questioning 78 to find out how melamine was added to milk supplied to Sanlu Group Co., China’s biggest milk powder producer, officials said at a news conference. They said some tainted powder was exported to Taiwan but none was sent to other foreign markets.

In Taiwan, authorities seized thousands of bags of Chinese milk powder. There was no word on whether any was consumed in Taiwan.

Chinese officials defended the speed of their response to the country’s latest product safety disaster. They said authorities were only told of the contamination Monday, even though Sanlu received complaints as early as March and its tests found melamine in August.

“For a comparatively long time, the Sanlu Group failed to report this incident to the government,” said Health Minister Gao Qiang. “The Sanlu Group should shoulder major responsibility for this.”

Gao gave no indication what penalties Sanlu might face but said those to blame would “be dealt with severely.”

Officials are investigating whether word of the contamination was suppressed, said Vice Gov. Yang Chongyong of Hebei province, where Sanlu Group is located.

“We will look into whether government at any level was negligent or whether any officials tried to withhold information,” Yang said. “If we find anyone did this, they will be held accountable.”

Yang said he did not know the identities of the people detained but said investigators were looking into whether dairy farmers added the chemical.

Gao said it might have been done to fool quality tests after water was added to fraudulently increase the milk’s volume. Melamine is rich in nitrogen, and standard tests for protein in food ingredients measure nitrogen levels.

The number of cases of kidney stones in babies who were fed Sanlu milk has risen to 432 in areas scattered around China, Gao said. He said Beijing was sending experts to treat them and will pay for their care.

“We are confident that with timely diagnosis and treatment, these infant patients will recover soon,” he said.

The incident reflects China’s enduring problems with product safety despite a shake-up of its regulatory system after a spate of warnings and recalls about tainted toothpaste, faulty tires and other goods.

The biggest group of victims is in China itself, where shoddy or counterfeit products are common. Infants, hospital patients and others have been killed or injured by tainted or fake milk, medicines, liquor and other products.

Authorities have seized 2,176 tons of Sanlu formula and ordered a recall totaling 8,218 tons, Yang said. That was far more than the 700 tons in Sanlu’s initial recall announcement on Thursday. Yang gave no indication whether the recall might increase.

Beijing has launched an emergency inspection of all 175 companies in China that produce infant formula, Gao said.

In Taiwan, Liu Fang-ming of the Taoyuan county government said the Chinese shipment of milk powder, which arrived in June, was 55,115 pounds. Liu said only 21,660 pounds had been recovered.

Taiwan and China split in 1949 amid civil war and have no formal relations, but indirect trade is booming. Gao said Beijing informed Taiwan through the agencies that maintain informal contact between the two governments.

Xinhua cited a Gansu provincial health department spokesman as saying he received reports on July 16 that 16 infants under a year old, all of whom drank Sanlu milk, were suffering a rare kidney ailment. He said the Health Ministry launched an epidemic survey.

“However, there seemed no food and safety survey had been done. Otherwise, the health, and even lives, of many infants could have been saved,” Xinhua said.

A Sanlu manager quoted by the newspaper Beijing News said the dairy received complaints in March and June but could not track down the problem.

“We finally imported foreign equipment in August and finally found the milk powder contained melamine,” said the manager, identified only by the surname Wang.

Sanlu buys milk from a nationwide network of suppliers that includes 60,000 family farms, according to its Web site.

This is China’s second high-profile case in four years involving harmful baby formula.

In 2004, more than 200 infants suffered malnutrition and at least 12 died after being fed phony formula with no nutrients. Some 40 companies were found to be making phony formula and 47 people were arrested.

A suicide attack against a US private security firm in southern Afghanistan killed two civilians and wounded six others, while a NATO soldier was killed in a roadside bomb blast in the same region, officials said Thursday.

The bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into a convoy of a US private security company in southern city of Kandahar, the provincial capital of the same name, Thursday afternoon, killing two civilians, Zelmai Ayoubi, spokesman for the provincial governor said.

He said six other civilians were wounded in the attack, but there were no casualties among the personnel of the company.

However, a police officer at the site of the attack told DPA on condition of anonimity that two foreign nationals who were riding in one of the vehicles were also wounded.

Meanwhile, a NATO soldier serving under the banner of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) was killed in a roadside bomb blast in southern Afghanistan Wednesday, the alliance said in a statement.

The statement did not reveal the nationality of the deceased soldier.

But the British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC, citing the UK defence ministry, said that a British soldier was killed in southern Helmand province in an explosion.

Around 8,000-strong British forces are stationed in Helmand province. The British forces are part of some 53,000 NATO-led ISAF troops that have been deployed to Afghanistan from some 40 nations.

Taliban militants have recently increased the use of roadside and suicide attacks, both tactics widely believed to have been copied from Iraqi insurgents.

The Bloc Quebecois said on Friday it had concluded that Prime Minister Stephen Harper would likely make an early election call.

Gilles Duceppe, leader of the separatist party, told reporters after a meeting with Harper that the prime minister would call an election.

“I think his plan is made. He wants an election. Period,” Duceppe said.

Harper, whose minority government needs the support of at least one opposition party to pass legislation and stay in power, has asked for meetings with opposition leaders to see if there is common ground that would make the fall session of Parliament productive.

Harper has increasingly said that Parliament is dysfunctional and suggested he may trigger a general election to provide a fresh mandate. He has been considering launching the campaign next week for a vote on October 14.

On Saturday he will meet with New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton, who has said he considers the whole exercise a charade. Liberal leader Stephane Dion, head of the largest opposition party, has said he is not available to talk to Harper until September 9.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has asked the Security Council to extend the mandate of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) by another 12 months until the end of August next year.

In a letter to the Council’s president that was made public on Friday, Ban noted that the mission “continues to play a crucial role in ensuring peace and stability in southern Lebanon, as well as full respect for the Blue Line” along the Lebanese-Israeli border. Blue line constitutes border between Israel and Lebanon.

UNIFIL is tasked with ensuring that the area between the Blue Line and the Litani river is free of unauthorised weapons, personnel and assets, and also cooperates with the Lebanese armed forces so that they can fulfill their security responsibilities.

“I hope that the recent formation of a new government (in Lebanon) will contribute to an improvement of the overall security environment that would permit, in the near future, the return to southern Lebanon of units of the (Lebanese) armed forces that have been redeployed to maintain security in other parts of the country,” Ban wrote.

The Secretary-General reiterated that it is essential that the international community help the armed forces to become a more effective military organisation.

As of 15 July, UNIFIL, whose mandate is currently due to expire on 31 August, had 12,284 military personnel from 27 troop-contributing countries. Additional units from Indonesia and Malaysia are slated to be deployed soon.

Britain’s opposition Conservatives opened up a record lead in opinion polls Thursday, further hammering Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s Labour Party shortly after he returned from his summer break.

The new Ipsos MORI survey comes just a day after Brown insisted he would win the next general election, despite bleak overall poll ratings and persistent talk of a leadership challenge.

According to the pollsters, backing for the Conservatives among likely voters was 48 percent, while support for Labour was just 24 percent, with the polling firm saying it believed the 24-percentage-point gap was the widest in the history of British telephone polling.

Were those results replicated in a general election, due by May 2010 at the latest, the Conservatives would likely win a landslide victory.

The gap is markedly narrower, however, among all eligible voters, with 42 percent backing the Tories against 28 percent for Labour.

Brown, who returned from his summer holiday Monday, was asked on Wednesday if he thought he could emerge victorious from the next general election, which must be held by mid-2010, despite the odds against him.

“We’re going to go on and win,” he told reporters en route to the Beijing Olympics closing ceremony, where the Olympic flag will be handed over to London ahead of its Games in 2012.

Last month, his Foreign Secretary David Miliband penned a newspaper article on the future direction of the Labour Party which many commentators interpreted as a possible first salvo in a leadership challenge.

Brown told reporters he had “no difficulty” with the article, adding that it could have been written by “any member of the cabinet” and his relations with Miliband were “fine.”

He pledged to tackle issues like rising gas and electricity bills and petrol prices — which he said were of most concern to Britons — in September, when the political season effectively restarts with conferences held by the main parties.

Labour will likely be disheartened to find, however, that according to the poll’s findings, it is rated below the Conservatives on every aspect of policy except for healthcare, where it holds a narrow three-point lead.

Crucially, the government, which had cultivate a reputation for economic competence prior to the global economic downturn, claims just 23 percent backing for its ability to run the economy, against 38 percent for the Conservatives.

The results mark a sharp turnaround for Labour, which held a double-digit lead in most opinion polls in late September 2007, but has been hurt as the British economy has taken a turn for the worst, coupled with a series of personal data loss blunders and heavy losses in recent by-elections.

Brown faces another potentially embarrassing by-election in his native Scotland, triggered by the death of a Labour lawmaker earlier this month.

John MacDougall’s majority of over 10,000 votes in Glenrothes, just north of Edinburgh, would normally be considered a safe cushion, but after losing a 13,500 majority to the Scottish National Party (SNP) in another by-election in Glasgow last month, it could struggle to defend the constituency.

Ipsos MORI questioned a total of 1,005 voters by telephone between August 15 and 17, of whom 522 were described as likely to vote.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe will officially open parliament on Tuesday despite opposition warnings that such a move would endanger crucial power-sharing talks.

Parliament clerk Austin Zvoma told reporters the new parliament would convene on Monday.

Tendai Biti, secretary-general of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, said in a statement earlier that convening parliament would break a framework agreement governing power-sharing talks to try to end Zimbabwe’s political crisis.

“Any decision to convene parliament will be a clear repudiation of the Memorandum of Understanding, and an indication beyond reasonable doubt of ZANU-PF’s unwillingness to continue to be part of the talks. In short convening parliament decapitates the dialogue,” Biti said.

In March elections, the ruling ZANU-PF lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since independence from Britain in 1980, but Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC did not win an overall majority either.

The balance of power rests in the hands of a breakaway opposition faction led by Arthur Mutambara.

He has moved closer to Mugabe in recent weeks and any deal between them could weaken Tsvangirai, Zimbabwe’s most powerful opposition leader, and add to political uncertainty.

The MDC initially said on Tuesday it had no objection to the opening of parliament but would reject any moves by Mugabe to appoint a cabinet before a power-sharing deal is reached.

Zimbabwe’s Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa, ZANU-PF’s chief negotiator in the talks, said: “Yesterday, they said they had no problem with parliament opening, and today they have a problem? I have no comment on that.”

Power-sharing negotiations began last month to resolve the impasse resulting from Mugabe’s unopposed re-election in June. The vote was condemned around the world and boycotted by Tsvangirai because of attacks on his supporters.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Tuesday he would decide in coming weeks whether an election is needed this year to give a new mandate to a Parliament that he has increasingly described as dysfunctional.

The head of the Liberal Party, Stephane Dion, also said he was considering pulling the plug on the minority Conservative government, but remained coy on whether he would do so this year, saying timing was key.

And one poll suggested that after 2-1/2 years, much longer than the normal Canadian minority government, voters are becoming more eager for an election.

For most of his mandate so far, Harper has said he hoped to govern until the fixed election date of October 19, 2009, but he has lately expressed growing frustration with what he calls Liberal obstruction.

“What I will have to decide over the next few weeks is whether or not we can have a productive fall session of Parliament, or whether in fact the government — a government — needs a new mandate,” Harper told reporters.

The Conservatives won the last general election in January 2006 with only a minority of seats in the House of Commons, meaning they must rely on the support of at least one opposition party to govern.

Polls put the Conservatives close to the Liberals in public support, and Harper allowed that the most likely result of a new vote would be another minority government.

“I think polls do indicate that the next election in all likelihood would be a minority, one way or the other,” Harper said during a funding announcement in Hamilton, Ontario.

He said he would seek the input of some opposition leaders in analyzing the situation to “ensure that, one way or another, we can have a productive Parliament in the future.” Dion said his officials and Harper’s were trying to set up such a meeting.

An Ipsos-Reid poll released on Tuesday found that while in the spring, only 27 percent of Canadians wanted an election, that number has grown to 40 percent, slightly ahead of the 38 percent who currently see no need for a vote.

The poll, released by the CanWest newspapers, also found the Conservatives ahead 36 percent to 30 percent for the Liberals — just inside the margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. The Conservatives advanced two points since Ipsos Reid’s survey two weeks earlier.

By contrast, a Harris-Decima poll released last week put the Liberals ahead by 33 percent to 32 percent.

Harper said the two smallest opposition parties in Parliament — the separatist Bloc Quebecois and the New Democrats — both want an election now but that Dion has been dithering.

“Mr. Dion has indicated that the government should be defeated, but he’s not sure when he’ll do that, because he hasn’t got good enough polls. I don’t think that’s a particularly responsible position,” Harper said.

Dion quickly scheduled a news conference to respond to the prime minister, and said he would take into account the fact that more Canadians than before want an election.

“I’m considering different possibilities, and one of them is certainly to stop (having) strategic voting when we disagree with this government, and then to trigger an election is something we may do,” Dion said.

But he said it was not his job to force an election just because Harper wanted him to do so: “My job is to replace him, and timing is important.”

With each pronouncement, Harper is making it clearer that he does not consider himself bound to wait for an election on next year’s fixed date. It was his government put in the law establishing fixed election dates.

The law has generally been understood to mean the prime minister would not trigger an election himself, but it does allow for the dissolution of Parliament before the fixed date if the government is defeated in a vote of confidence.

Dion acknowledged Harper has the constitutional authority to force an election but said he would be violating the spirit of his own law if he did so.

Russia took the first steps toward a troop pullback from Georgia on Tuesday but at the same time paraded blindfolded and bound Georgian prisoners on armored vehicles and seized four U.S. Humvees.

The mixed signals came as NATO allies met in emergency session in Belgium and demanded Russia fulfill its promise to withdraw its forces from the small former Soviet republic.

A small Russian column including three tanks, three trucks, five armored personnel carriers and a rocket-launcher left Gori, the central city that straddles a vital east-west highway. A Russian officer said they were headed for South Ossetia, the disputed province at the heart of the conflict, then home to Russia.

The move toward withdrawal came on the same day as a powerful image of Russia’s grip over Georgia: Russian trucks and armored vehicles carrying about 20 Georgian men, blindfolded, handcuffed and held at gunpoint.

They were taken from the western city of Poti to the nearby, Russian-controlled military base in Senaki, according to Poti’s mayor, who said he had been told they would be released on Wednesday.

Mayor Vano Taginadze said the men, Georgian military and police troops, had been taken captive because the Georgians refused to let Russian armored vehicles into the port of Poti, along Georgia’s Black Sea coast.

A Georgian defense spokeswoman said eight servicemen detained while trying to guard the port were among those held.

Also in Poti, Russian soldiers commandeered four Humvees that had been used in U.S.-Georgian military exercises and were destined to be shipped back to the United States.

The Pentagon said it was looking into the theft. Georgian Deputy Defense Minister Batu Kutelia said Russian forces seized the vehicles.

Russian forces in Poti also blocked access to the city’s naval and commercial ports on Tuesday morning and towed the missile boat Dioskuria, one of the navy’s most sophisticated vessels, out of sight of observers. A loud explosion was heard minutes later, and a Georgian interior spokesman said the Russians had blown up the boat.

The acts of force demonstrated anew that Russia, days after agreeing to a cease-fire with Georgia, remained in control in much of the country, and that the state of the Georgian military was far from stable.

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said Russia was not only flouting its withdrawal commitment but that its forces were “not losing time” in damaging Georgia by destroying infrastructure.

“Right now there are Russian soldiers and tanks at Poti,” Georgian Finance Minister Nika Gilavri said. “They want to open every single container” and inspect them.

Georgian television showed footage of a tense standoff at a military training base in northwestern Georgia, where Russian troops tried to enter but were turned away by Georgia police. There was no violence, but the report said the Russians threatened to return and destroy the base if they were not allowed in.

The two nations did exchange 20 prisoners of war — 15 Georgians and five Russians, according to the head of Georgia’s Security Council — in an effort to reduce tensions.

On the diplomatic front, NATO foreign ministers suspended their formal contacts with Russia as punishment. Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said “there can be no business as usual with Russia under present circumstances.”

But the NATO allies, bowing to pressure from European nations that depend heavily on Russia for energy, stopped short of more severe penalties being pushed by the United States.

The Russian Ambassador to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, dismissed the impact of the emergency meeting in Brussels, Belgium: “The mountain gave birth to a mouse.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said NATO was trying to make a victim of Georgia’s “criminal regime.” Georgia’s desire for NATO membership is strongly opposed by Russia.

Lavrov also said it was Georgian troops who needed to pull back to their permanent bases first. The U.N. Security Council also was holding emergency consultations on the conflict.

The White House made clear it expected Russia to move faster. “It didn’t take them really three or four days to get into Georgia, and it really shouldn’t take them three or four days to get out,” spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.

The hostilities began earlier this month. Georgia cracked down on South Ossetia, which is internationally recognized as within Georgian borders but tilts toward Moscow and has expressed its independence, and Russia answered by sending its troops and tanks across the Georgian border.

A cease-fire signed by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili calls for Russian forces to pull back to the positions they held before Aug. 7.

The Kremlin said Medvedev told French President Nicolas Sarkozy by phone Tuesday that Russian troops would withdraw from most of Georgia by Friday — some to Russia, others to South Ossetia and a surrounding “security zone” set in 1999.

More American C-130 transport planes brought in tons of relief supplies for the tens of thousands displaced by the conflict, and the U.S. said it would help for as long as needed.

U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Jon Miller said he was told food is the major issue for people west of the capital, Tbilisi, because only sporadic convoys carrying rations had been able to get through.

Georgian government officials said Russian checkpoints had made it difficult to get supplies into some areas, including Poti.

Tensions also flared between Russia and another former Soviet republic seeking NATO membership, Ukraine. The two countries sparred over Russia’s use of a naval base in the port of Sevastopol, which it is renting from Ukraine. The Kremlin wants the Russian ships to remain in Sevastopol even when the current lease expires in 2017.

Ukraine’s pro-Western President, Viktor Yushchenko, sided with Georgia in its conflict with Russia and moved to restrict the movement of Russian ships in the port. Ukraine’s foreign minister later said Ukraine would not physically prevent Russian ships from entering and leaving the base.

Tropical Storm Fay pounded Cuba with torrential rain and wind Monday, prompting authorities to evacuate dozens of low-lying communities, cancel carnival celebrations in a central of province and warn of flooding.

Forecasters said Fay, which earlier left at least five people dead in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, crossed central Cuba early Monday and was expected to pass near the Florida Keys that night.

A hurricane watch remained in effect for the capital, Havana, and eastward to Cuba’s central Sancti Spiritus province.

A tropical storm watch was issued Monday for the northwestern Bahamas.

Cuban state media reported little damage or major flooding so far, but authorities in four provinces evacuated nearly 5,000 residents from low-lying communities and pulled fishing boats from the water. Officials also set up temporary shelters and food distribution centers.

In central Cienfuegos province, officials suspended traditional carnival celebrations. State media said authorities were ready to “protect” the 24,000 foreign tourists in the famous beach resort of Varadero, but provided no more details.

Winds damaged the roofs of some homes in little-populated areas and water accumulated on roads and highways.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said Fay is expected to dump up to 8 inches of rain on Cuba, with 12 inches in isolated cases. It warned that much rain could produce flash floods and mudslides.

In the city of Niquero, near the southern coast and one of the hardest-hit areas, authorities converted a hotel into a shelter for evacuees.

“It’s raining intensely, but the wind comes and goes,” said a receptionist at the Hotel Niquero, who said he was not authorized to have his name appear in the foreign press.

Officials also suspended some ferry service on Isla de la Juventud, an island off Cuba’s southern coast. In the southeastern province of Granma, a banana plantation sustained minor flooding and storm winds damaged some homes, state media reported.

At 5 a.m. EDT Monday, the storm’s center was located over central Cuba and about 155 miles south-southeast of Key West and was moving toward the north-northwest near 12 mph. Maximum sustained wind speeds were near 50 mph. Forecasters expected the storm to begin moving to the north soon.

Florida has declared a state of emergency and authorities in the Florida Keys closed schools, opened shelters and urged visitors to leave. Residents and tourists, however, seemed in no hurry to evacuate.

Traffic leaving Key West and the Lower Keys on Sunday afternoon was light but steady as the sky darkened with storm clouds and the National Weather Service issued watches and warnings.

Fay, the sixth storm of the 2008 Atlantic season, was expected by forecasters to strengthen slowly to a hurricane.