News Snippets
• Two men from Minnesota, USA will attempt the first summertime crossing of the Arctic Ocean, a trek sponsored by the environmental group Greenpeace to show how global warming is melting the northern ice cap. The team's crossing of the North Pole in early July is timed to coincide with an economic summit in Scotland, where Greenpeace will press US President George W. Bush to sign the Kyoto protocol on curbing greenhouse gas emissions, Greenpeace USA spokesperson Carol Gregory said.
• Bihar has introduced e-governance in Saharsa district. The scheme uses the E-mitra satellite connection to provide uninterrupted online services like information on position of development schemes, the list of beneficiaries under Below Poverty Line (BPL), Antyoday/Annapoorna schemes and Indira Awas Yojna.
• With electronic jockeys on board and carrying the hopes of celebrity owners and punters from around the world, 17 unlikely athletes have taken off in an endurance race deemed by some as the toughest in the world. The athletes are albatrosses, and their annual migration up to 9,600 km to Africa from their homes on three tiny islands off the Australian island state of Tasmania has become the Big Bird Race. The competitors also have celebrity "owners' including Heather Mills McCartney, wife of Beatle Paul McCartney, yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur, British television host Michael Parkinson and Australian singer Olivia Newton-John.