Amazing pictures of abandoned lioness and her heartwarming bond with men who saved her

German conservationist Valentin Gruener and Sirga showing the incredible bond between man and 

This is enough to warm even the wildest of hearts.
Deep in the African bush a lioness gives giant hug to the two men who saved her.
As a cub, Sirga was driven out of her pride and rescued by Valentin Gruener and Mikkel Legarth who could not stand by and watch her die.
Now the 110lb lioness has developed an incredible bond with the pair who are fighting to save her species in Botswana, southern Africa.

Heart-warming: Mikkel Legarth giving the lioness Sirga a hug in the wilds of Botswana

Sirga treats the two conservationists just like she would other lions and with their help she can now hunt for prey on her own.
She is now a beacon for hoped success of the Modisa Wildlife Project, founded in Botswana, Africa, by Mr Gruener, from Germany, and Mr Legarth, who is Danish, with the hope of saving the lion population.
Botswana is two and a half times the size of Britain and has vast areas of wilderness - but already increased farming is bringing lions and man into more and more conflict.

 

From a base camp in the African bush the Modisa Wildlife Project has been working with local farmers and Willie De Graaff, owner of Grassland Safari Lodge, to find a way long term solution.
The plan is to relocate the lions which are coming into contact with farmers to one large protected area where they have enough wild prey to feed on.
As these amazing shots show Mikkel and Valentin has an incredible affinity for the lions they rescue and not just Sirga.

Sirga when she was a lioness cub playing with Mr Legarth after she was rescued

Sirga treats the two men just like she would other lions and with their help she can now hunt for prey on her own

Their work has now been documented by photographer Nicolai Frederik Bonnin Rossen who himself got up-close-and-personal with the magnificent predators.
Mr Legarth, 30, said his bond with Sirga was just like as if she was part of his pride.
He said: 'A pride had three cubs and two were killed before Sirga was abandoned without food. It happened on our land and we could not standby and watch her die.

Mr Legarth, 30, said his bond with Sirga was just like as if she was part of his pride

The pair's work has been documented by photographer Nicolai Frederik Bonnin Rossen who himself got up-close-and-personal with the magnificent predators

Saved: As a cub Sirga was driven out from a pride and rescued by the German and Danish duo

'We didn't want Sirga to become like other lions in captivity, constantly fed by streams of tourists. She only interacts with me and Valentin.
'She hunts her own food, taking antelopes and she will let us be near her when she eats it which is remarkable.
'Sirga doesn't mind people, but she doesn't pay them any attention. Wild lions are scared of people, the problem comes if you release a lion that is used to people in the wild, that can cause problems.

Mr Legarth said: 'The first time you walk up to a lion all your body is telling you this is not something you should be doing'

Close: The amazing pictures show Sirga - a 110lb lioness - cuddling her new found friends

The Modisa Wildlife Project aims at removing lions from areas where they face certain death after coming into conflict with farmers

'With Sirga we want to release her to the wild eventually as a wild lion not as one that has met lots of people. That would be dangerous.'
The Modisa Wildlife Project aims at removing lions from areas where they face certain death after coming into conflict with farmers.
Mr Legarth added: 'If you release wild lions somewhere else, they will come straight back to where they were before because there is food there.

The pair with some of the lions from the project in Botswana, southern Africa

Sirga - a 110lb lioness - and her adopted pride Valentin Gruener and Mikkel Legarth

'And if you just dump a pride of lions in the middle of a new territory they will disturb the prides that are already there.
'In Botswana all lions are protected by the government - like swans being the property of the Crown in the UK. This also makes moving them a problem.
'What we have now are 10,000-hectare plots with 10 to 15 lions in fenced enclosure, they are wild lions but we do have to feed them.
'The first time you walk up to a lion all your body is telling you this is not something you should be doing.'

Mr Legarth added: 'We are located on Willie De Graaff's 10,000-hectare farm with lions, wild dogs and leopards that has been saved from certain death. We are now looking for sponsors that can support us with a long-term solution for those animals.'

Culled from DAILY MAIL

Scientists discover a new body part in the KNEE which could explain why so many injured joints give way during exercise

 

Two knee surgeons in Belgium have found a new body part - a previously unknown ligament in the human knee.
The surgeons, at University Hospitals Leuven, believe their finding could explain why people with repaired knee injuries find the joint sometimes gives way during exercise.
Orthopaedic surgeons Dr Steven Claes and Professor Johan Bellemans conducted research into anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears in an attempt to discover why this injury can cause the knee to give way.
 

Two knee surgeons in Belgium have found a previously unknown ligament in the centre of the human knee (pictured horizontally). The new ligament - marked by the arrows below the blue box - has been called the anterolateral ligament and 97 per cent of people are thought to have one. (LCL stands for lateral collateral ligament)

The researchers, who have been investigating the injuries for four years, began by studying an 1879 article by the French surgeon Paul Segond who speculated about the existence of an additional ligament located in the centre of the front part of the knee.
They dissected 41 knees that had been donated for medical research and discovered that the speculation was correct in all but one of the knees.
The Belgian surgeons are the first to identify the ligament, which has been named the anterolateral ligament (ALL).
They believe it is present in 97 per cent of human knees.

Having discovered the ligament, they set about trying to establish the role it plays in causing injured knees to give way.
They discovered that this phenomenon is caused by injury to the ALL.
This finding could revolutionise the way in which knee injuries are treated - Dr Claes and Professor Bellemans are currently working on a surgical technique to correct ALL injuries.
The surgeons’ findings, published in the Journal of Anatomy, have been praised by the Anatomical Society as ‘very refreshing’.

The newly discovered ligament is thought to be responsible for injured knees giving way during exercise - a previously unexplained problem experienced by many people with anterior cruciate ligament tears

It commended the researchers for reminding the medical world that, despite the emergence of advanced technology, our knowledge of the basic anatomy of the human body is not yet complete.
ACL tears are common among athletes in sports such as football, basketball and skiing.
The ACL is one of the four major ligaments in the knee and is critical to providing stability in the joint.
A tear tends to cause swelling and pain in the knee as well as instability.
It often has to be treated surgically.
Culled from DAILY MAIL

China claims it has nuclear submarines capable of attacking cities throughout the United States

Deterrent: China's state-run media has reported that it now has subs capable of launching nuclear weapons at the United States 

The Chinese government has revealed for the first time that it has nuclear submarines capable of attacking cities throughout the United States.
Last week, state-run Chinese news agencies - such as China Central TV, the People’s Daily, the Global Times, the PLA Daily, the China Youth Daily and the Guangmin Daily - ran identical reports about the 'awesomeness' of the People's Liberation Army's submarine force.
'This is the first time in 42 years since the establishment of our navy’s strategic submarine force that we reveal on such a large scale the secrets of our first-generation underwater nuclear force,' the Global Times said in a lengthy article titled 'China for the First Time Possesses Effective Underwater Nuclear Deterrence against the United States.'

Chinese news agencies also reported on the Army's lethal intentions should it ever use the nuclear weapons the submarines are capable of launching.
'Because the Midwest states of the U.S. are sparsely populated, in order to increase the lethality, [our] nuclear attacks should mainly target the key cities on the West Coast of the United States, such as Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego,' the Global Times said. 'The 12 JL-2 nuclear warheads carried by one single Type 094 SSBN can kill and wound 5 million to 12 million Americans.
But West Coast cities aren't the only metropolitan areas in the U.S. that face the threat of a nuclear attack from the Chinese, according to the country's state-run media.

Patrol: The Chinese media says that the country's submarine fleet currently is on routine patrol

'If we launch our DF 31A ICBMs over the North Pole, we can easily destroy a whole list of metropolises on the East Coast and the New England region of the U.S., including Annapolis, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Portland, Baltimore and Norfolk, whose population accounts for about one-eighth of America’s total residents,' the Global Times said.
The JL-2 missiles have a range of about 8,700 miles and could hit almost the entire continental U.S. with independently targetable re-entry  vehicle warheads. The Type 094 Jin Class submarine was developed in 2010 and is capable of launching 12 to 16 JL-2 missiles.

 

The Chinese submarine fleet reportedly is the the second-largest in the world. According to Chinese media, the fleet includes 70 subs, 10 of which are nuclear powered. At least four of those subs are capable of launching the JL-2 missiles.

Range: Missiles launched from the subs are capable of hitting cities throughout the United States

Each of the reports from China's state-run media stressed that the PLA's submarine fleet currently is on routine strategic patrol, 'which means that China for the first time has acquired the strategic deterrence and second strike capability against the United States.'

'Our JL-2 SLBMs have become the fourth type of Chinese nuclear missiles that threaten the continental United States, after our DF-31A, DF-5A and DF-5B ICBMs,' said the Global Times.
Culled from DAILY MAIL

Scientists invent artificial BLOOD made of water, protein and salt that works in mice

Artificial blood that could one day be used in humans without side effects has been created in Romania

Artificial blood that could one day be used in humans without side effects has been created by scientists in Romania.

The blood contains water and salts along with a protein known as hemerythrin which is extracted from sea worms.

Researchers from Babeş-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, hope it could help end blood supply shortages and prevent infections through donations.

Dr Radu Silaghi-Dumitrescu added that it may even lead to the creation of ‘instant blood’ that can be transported and turns into artificial blood when water is added.

Up until now, efforts to create artificial blood have failed as the fluid was unable to withstand the chemical and mechanical stresses placed on it. 

According Dr Silaghi-Dumitrescu, unlike hemoglobin, hemerythrin remains stable when exposed to physical and chemical stress.

The blood contains water and salts along with a protein known as hemerythrin which is extracted from sea worms such as this deep sea Polychaete Annelid

So far the artificial blood has been tested on laboratory mice who didn't experience any adverse side effects.  

Laura Sinpetru from Softpedia reports that the researchers hope to roll the artificial blood out in clinical trials involving human volunteers within a year or two.

The work builds on research by Edinburgh and Bristol University who, in 2011, made thousands of millions of red blood cells from stem cells taken from bone marrow.

Edinburgh University’s Professor Marc Turner hopes to make a supply of cells with the O-negative blood type.

The work builds on research by Edinburgh and Bristol University who, in 2011, made thousands of millions of red blood cells from stem cells (pictured)

This ‘universal donor’ blood could be given to up to 98 per cent of the population.

A supply of safe blood would also be a boon in developing countries, where thousands of lives are lost  to conditions such as haemorrhages after childbirth.

The French have started early-stage human trials with stem cell blood and other researchers around the world are making haemoglobin, the red blood cell protein used to ferry oxygen around the body.

Ideas being pursued elsewhere include using haemoglobin taken from cows as a blood substitute.

Some 1.6 million Britons give blood each year. In the UK, stocks can fall during holiday periods, with supplies of the highly versatile O-negative type particularly vulnerable.

Culled from DAILY MAIL

World's tallest man marries woman 2ft 7in shorter than him

The World's tallest man Sultan Kosen poses with his fiancee Merve Dibo during their henna night, the ceremony held one day before the wedding

As the world’s tallest man, 8ft 3in Sultan Kosen despaired of finding a soulmate who would prove a perfect fit.
So the gentle giant says it’s nothing short of a miracle that he has met his love match in Merve Dibo.
And despite a height difference of 2ft 7in, Mr Kosen, 30, celebrated the biggest day of his life yesterday – tying the knot with his 20-year-old bride in his native Turkey.

The couple dance the halay, a Turkish national dance. The Turkish farmer - who at eight ft three in, dwarfs his five feet 8 in fiance - is to marry Merve Dibo in a ceremony today

Kosen, 30, has long been searching for a woman to share his life with, and had reportedly given up hope - until he met Ms Dibo

Before meeting Miss Dibo, Mr Kosen had spoken of his difficulties in finding a partner, as most potential girlfriends were put off by his size.
But yesterday the part-time farmer, who had ordered a custom-made suit and size 28 shoes for his wedding, said he was thrilled to have found ‘the person for me’. 

 

He added: ‘It was unfortunate that I could not find a suitable girl of my own size. But now I will have my own family and private life.’
Mr Kosen, who is one of only ten people ever to top 8ft, suffers from a rare disorder called pituitary gigantism, which causes his body to continually produce growth hormones..

Kosen also holds the Guinness World Record for the size of his 27.5cm hands and feet, which are recorded 36.5 centimetres - a massive size 28

Sultan suffers from a rare disorder called pituitary gigantism, which causes his body to continually produce the growth hormone

He began shooting up at the age of ten, became the tallest man in the world in 2009 and finally stopped growing in 2011.
The all-time record holder was Robert Wadlow from Illinois, who died in 1940 measuring just over 8ft 11in.

Culled from DAILY MAIL

16yr-old son kills his mother for confiscating his mobile phone

School friend Mike O'Connor described Helms as a 'giant teddy' and a friendly kid who sometimes fought with his parents

A 16-year-old boy is facing first degree murder charges after his mom’s body was found at the family’s home in the early hours of Saturday.
The body of Tina Helms Spencer, 36, was found murdered in the backyard shed at the property in Mesa, Arizona.
Her son, Mike Helms, has been booked into juvenile detention on charges including first-degree murder, aggravated assault and tampering with evidence.
A 17-year-old friend of the son was booked into juvenile detention on charges of first-degree murder as an accomplice, evidence tampering and concealment of a body.
Police say the 16-year-old had been grounded and had his phone taken away.

After his mom returned home from work, they allegedly had a heated argument over the phone and he decided to kill her.
Cops were alerted after receiving a phone call from the son’s stepfather. He also had been attacked by the boy after returning home from work but had managed to escape after a short struggle. 

Helms has been booked into juvenile detention on charges including first-degree murder, aggravated assault and tampering with evidence

When police arrived, a vehicle was missing from the home and there were signs of a struggle.
During the investigation, police ended up speaking with a 17-year-old friend of the son at his nearby home, when the 16-year-old arrived, he was immediately taken into custody.
Authorities expect a hearing will be held to determine if the juveniles will be charged as adults.
A hammer and a frying pan were found at the scene, which police believe were involved in the incident.
Police say the 16-year-old asked his friend to act as a lookout so he could attack her when she came home. 
Both boys allegedly moved Spencer to the shed, attempted to clean up the scene and then the 17-year-old left.
Afterward, police say the 16-year-old decided to also kill his stepfather, but they don't believe the 17-year-old was part of that plan.
A school friend of Helms described him as a friendly kid, a junior ROTC cadet in high school.
'He's a giant teddy. He's tough on the outside. He puts up that front, but when you get to know him, he's a standup guy,' Mike O'Connor told FOX10.

'He didn't really have home issues he talked about. If he did, it was typical stuff. One week he'd have a fight with this parents, the next week he was talking about how his mom was awesome and helping him out with something.'
Culled from DAILY MAIL

Syrians download new app that gives them signal anytime they are about to be hit by a missile

The technology was designed by Dlshad Othman, who is originally from Syria

A 27-year-old software engineer claims to have developed an app which tells people in Syria if they are about to be hit by a missile.
The app allegedly tracks when a Scud missile is fired and by using a formula involving trajectory and speed, it can calculate where it is likely to land, he says.
Warnings are then sent to people who have downloaded the app telling them to seek shelter. 
The technology was designed by Dlshad Othman, who is originally from Syria.
Mr Othman attended a conference hosted by Google in New York this week where he spoke about the device. 
Emails are then sent to the website www.aymta.com which tracks the position of the missile and where it is likely to land. 
Mr Othman said he believes his website is the one of its kind in Syria. The word 'aymta' is Arabic for 'when'. 
The engineer said he remembered a friend posting Facebook in north Syria that a missile had passed over head which gave him the idea for the website. 
He says the website took him two months to design and it was officially launched in June.

Information is gathered by seven spotters who are located in the hills outside Damascus. 
The spotters are all volunteers and according to Mr Othman it takes eight to 12 minutes for a missile to reach a northern target. 

Technology: The engineer designed the website www.aymta.com (pictured) which tracks missiles

The activist fled Syria in 2011 after fears he was going to be killed. He had been serving in the Syrian Army. 
He now lives in Washington D.C. and is hoping to adapt the app for other countries.
This week residents in a town besieged by President Bashar al-Assad's forces appealed to the world to 'save us from death' in an open letter describing desperate conditions and suffering.
Hundreds of men, women and children in Mouadamiya had died and thousands had been wounded, they said.
Mouadamiya, on the southwest outskirts of the capital Damascus, was occupied by anti-Assad rebels last year and the government has been trying to win it back since then.

'Save us from death': The residents of Mouadamiya begged the world for help as the country remains in turmoil

'For nearly one year, the city of Mouadamiya has been under siege with no access to food, electricity, medicine, communications, and fuel,' said the letter, distributed by the opposition Syrian National Council today.
'We have been hit by rockets, artillery shells, napalm, white phosphorous, and chemical weapons,' it said.
The writers, who did not give their names, said they had managed to find enough power to run a computer and connect to the internet to send the letter.

Conflict: President Bashar al-Assad speaking here during an interview 

The SNC said nearly 12,000 people face starvation and death in Mouadamiya. About 90 percent of Mouadamiya has been destroyed, few doctors remained, and residents were eating 'leaves of trees.
The government says the residents of Mouadamiya are being 'held hostage' by terrorists, the term it uses for armed opposition groups. It denies using chemical weapons.
United Nations humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said last week that despite the government evacuating 3,000 people this month, thousands more remain trapped inside Mouadamiya.
She said that United Nations teams had been denied access.
Local doctors say hunger has become severe in recent months.
More than 100,000 people have died during the war, which started with peaceful protests against four decades of Assad family rule in March 2011 then escalated into a civil war with sectarian overtones.
Western powers have mostly backed opposition forces while Russia and Iran support Assad.
Moscow and Washington are planning to hold peace talks in Geneva next month but the warring parties have not expressed a willingness to compromise.
Culled from DAILY MAIL

Colombian woman arrested for selling her TWELVE daughters' virginities for £125 each

A Colombian mother has been caught selling her 12 young daughters' virginities for just £125 each, police said.
Margarita de Jesus Zapata Moreno, 45, was detained in Bogota earlier this week after one of her girls, now 16 and pregnant, contacted police.
The teen was angry after her mother ordered her to abort her child, it is claimed.

Margarita de Jesus Zapata Moreno (second right) is accused of selling the virginities of her 12 daughters. Tito Cornelio Daza, (second left) who is accused of fathering a child with one of Moreno's daughters, was also arrested 

Tito Cornelio Daza, 51, reportedly the biological father of the girl's baby, was also arrested.
Univision reports that Zapata, who has a total of 14 children, would sell their virginities once they turned 12-years-old.

 

She would then allegedly force them to prostitute themselves to pay the bills.
'It hurts that a mother would do this,' police chief Carlos Melendez, investigating the case, told reporters.
'The mother contacted highly solvent but depraved men so they could have sex with the minors when they turned 12,' he added.

Two of her 14 children, not subjected to the alleged sex work, are in the care of social services in Bogata

Zapata, who has denied the allegations, faces 10 years in prison if convicted.
She currently remains at El Buen Pastro prison, while Daza is being held at Modelo Prison.
Both are accused of carnal abuse of a minor under 14-years-old, and the enforcement of prostitution.
Her two other children not subjected to the sex work, a boy of 11 and a girl of 9, are now understood to be in the care of social services.
The daughter who reported her mother is now receiving psychological help from the Colombian Family Welfare Institute.

Culled from DAILY MAIL

The rape case that shocked South Africa: 2 toddlers aged two & three abducted and raped to death allegedly by 5 men

Horrific: Cousins Yonelisa and Zandile Mali were raped and murdered in the township of Diepsloot

Two young girls aged just two and three were kidnapped, raped and murdered in the town of Diepsloot, on the outskirts of Johannesburg.
It was an attack that spread shock and anger across a nation all too familiar with violent crime, where several sex attacks happen every minute.
Cousins Yonelisa and Zandile Mali were snatched from their doorstep in broad daylight and their bodies discovered in a public toilet nearby, on October 15.

Brazen: The girls were snatched from outside Yonelisa's house, CNN reported

Yonelisa was the only child of Thokozani Mali. She said that the girls were playing just outside the house and she was checking on them every five minutes. Then they went silent, CNN reported.

She alerted relatives, neighbours and police, who combed the area – one of the most violent places in the country - in a bid to find them.
She told CNN that she cannot bear to talk about her loss.
She said: ‘I am trying to be strong. When I am sleeping, she always next to me, so when I think of that I feel like crying.’
Five men have been arrested for the kidnap, rape and murder of the girls and briefly appeared at a Pretoria court on Thursday. Their identities have yet to be made public.
Public protests followed the discovery of the bodies, with one person holding a banner that read ‘hand these dogs over to us and the people of Diepslot’.

Distraught: Yonelisa's mother, Thokozani Mali, cannot bring herself to talk about what happened

The murder of the girls, and torture of a young boy in Katlehong, were condemned by South African President Jacob Zuma last week.
He said: ‘These gruesome incidents of extreme torture and murder of our children do not belong to the society that we are continuously striving to build together.
‘Whilst we appeal to the communities not to take the matters into their hands, we also want to urge them to work with law enforcement authorities to find the perpetrators and prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law.’
There are 55,000 reported cases of sexual violence a year in South Africa, according to the country's Medical Research Council. But the organisation says that the real figure is masked by the fact that many attacks go unreported.

Violent: Diepsloot is one of the most crime-ridden areas in South Africa

Culled from DAILY MAIL

How Gaddafi kidnapped and raped dozens of women to fulfill his perverted desires

For almost seven years, Soraya was raped, beaten, abused and even urinated on by a man who claimed to be the great emancipator of women in the Arab world.

When Soraya told her story, Cojean did not doubt it for a second, as she  had heard many similar tales of  Gaddafi’s crimes before — but only second-hand, never from the victims themselves
Though we do not know the girl’s real name, in a powerful new book called Gaddafi’s Harem, written by the French journalist Annick Cojean, she is simply called Soraya.

Fuelled by cocaine, whisky, cigarettes and Viagra, Gaddafi used sex not only as a physical weapon, but as a political tool through which he could exert his power.

Gaddafi  as a young man in 1973 shortly after seizing power. He was known to abduct women from their own wedding ceremonies as the ultimate show of omnipotence 

Gaddafi was all too aware of this. The wives and daughters of senior figures were blackmailed, bribed, cajoled and forced into having sex.
Gaddafi not only enjoyed the act of degrading these girls and women, but relished the power it gave him over other men.

As one of Gaddafi’s close collaborators admitted after the tyrant’s death, sex was ‘all he seriously thought about’ and ‘he governed, humiliated, subjugated and sanctioned through sex’.
Read more
 

Tennessee couple rented out their daughters for porn videos: Police

A Tennessee couple are facing criminal charges for "renting out" their underage daughters as sex performers for porn videos, reports say.
According to the Johnson City Press, a federal grand jury last week charged Connie Sue McCall, 40, and her husband, Ronnie Lee McCall, 61, with selling three of their four daughters to take part in sex films. The couple, of Johnson City, were also charged with "coercion and enticement of a minor and two counts of production of child pornography."
Authorities say they believe the three girls -- now 12, 15 and 17, according to NBC affiliate WCYB-TV -- were taken to several different locations and forced to perform sexual acts with adults for the films. The McCalls, who had reportedly been users of a drug known as "bath salts," may have been selling their daughters for sex for two or more years, investigators say.
Police first grew suspicious of the McCalls in the summer of 2012, WCYB-TV reports. They were reportedly arrested for child neglect after authorities uncovered horrific, unsanitary conditions in their home.
"Just filth and extremely deplorable," Debbie Dunn, an investigator with the Johnson City Police Department, told local outlet WATE-TV of the McCalls' home.
Investigators say the McCalls' youngest daughter, believed to be 5 or 6, was found to have been suffering from a slew of problems at the time.
"She had black teeth, and holes in all the teeth, just really inexcusable," Dunn said. The little girl reportedly also had head and body lice, flea bites and ringworm.
During questioning, the McCalls' children reportedly told the authorities about the pornography they were involved in, which led to a larger investigation.
First Judicial District Attorney General Tony Clark told WATE-TV that the McCall case has shocked him.
"When you have parents allegedly making money off their kids through pornography and exploitation, even after 20 years, it's one of the worst cases I've ever seen," he said.
All four of the McCall girls are said to be in state custody now.
According to WCYB-TV, Ronnie McCall has entered a plea of not guilty in federal court; his wife is scheduled to be arraigned on Oct. 23. The couple reportedly face at least 30 years in prison if convicted.
Culled from HUFF POST