Under-pressure staff are said to be relying on false data and "massaging" official figures to mask the full extent of the immigration chaos at Britain's borders. The whistleblower, a middle manager who does not want to be identified, said UKBA staff lack the resources to track down asylum seekers. As a result, it is claimed, complicated immigration cases are being abandoned to save time, while detention centres employ a "one in, one out" policy that sees low-risk detainees released to allow more dangerous foreigners to be locked up. The whistleblower said British border checks had become "haphazard" and "a bad joke". "The whole place is a basket case," he told The Sunday Times (£). "Asylum seekers run rings around us and we are virtually powerless to do anything about it. It is depressing."

While one former Indo-Canadian border guard got five years for his part in a drug smuggling ring – another is currently on trial for his part in a different operation that brought millions of illicit drugs into Canada. Baljinder Kandola, a former Canadian border guard who was charged with being part of a cocaine-smuggling ring, was at a loss for words during much of his testimony on Tuesday to explain why he risked so much to help a millionaire auto-parts importer for nothing in return. Under cross-examination by Crown counsel James Torrance, Kandola said he agreed to wave his co-accused Shminder Singh Johal and associates in his three automotive companies through the border, helping them avoid inspection, reported the Province newspaper. Kandola — who worked at the Pacific Highway crossing from July 2001 until his arrest on Oct. 25, 2007 — admitted he made unauthorized use of Canadian Border Services Agency databases to come to the conclusion Johal had been subjected to inspections over the years unfairly. “He asked if I was able to wave him through,” Kandola told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Selwyn Romilly, who is hearing the case without a jury. “It would save him time and money, and he wouldn’t be harassed.” Torrance reminded Kandola of his testimony a day earlier, when he said he was risking his job, his pension and his standing in the Sikh community by breaking his oath to protect Canada’s borders. “What was [Johal] offering you in return?” asked the prosecutor. “He didn’t offer me anything,” replied Kandola. “In my mind he was bringing auto parts into Canada.” Torrance asked, “This [waving Johal through] was definitely something you shouldn’t do?” “Yes,” agreed the witness. “Then why would you want to help a successful millionaire businessman?” Kandola replied: “I don’t know, I’ve asked myself the same question.” Torrance turned to Kandola’s illegal use of the databases to come to the conclusion Johal was unfairly harassed. A “lookout” had been placed on Johal’s border crossings after a tip from the RCMP. “Did you not consider [Johal] was previously suspected of smuggling cocaine?” asked Torrance. “No,” said Kandola. “That was all cleared up by your queries [into the databases]?” “I guess so,” replied the defendant. Torrance then meticulously went through Kandola’s phone, text and CBSA database records to show that he called Johal to let him know when he was in position to wave him through the border and when the “lookout” was on or off during the wee hours of Feb. 10, 2007. Asked if he was paid by Johal when they met at a 7-Eleven store the next day, Kandola denied it. Kandola was arrested on Oct. 25, 2007, shortly after he waved through a car driven by Herman Riar that contained 208 kilograms of cocaine. Riar pleaded guilty to drug smuggling and was sentenced last year to 12 years in prison. Kandola and Johal have pleaded not guilty to charges of drug smuggling, illegal firearms, conspiracy and bribing an official. The trial in New Westminster is scheduled to last three more weeks.

The elite unit set up by Labour to fight major criminals has failed to catch crime bosses because it is ‘too difficult’ and may even have been infiltrated by the underworld, says a whistleblower. The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) is supposed to be Britain’s answer to the FBI. When it was launched, Tony Blair pledged the organisation would ‘make life hell’ for the country’s ‘Mr Bigs’. It recruited from the cream of the police, immigration, customs and MI5 and had more than 4,000 staff in offices all over the world.  But Tim Lee, a former intelligence officer with SOCA, claims the agency has been blighted by corruption and bureaucracy. Mr Lee, 58, who joined SOCA in Nottingham when it was formed in 2006, paints a damning picture of his five years in the organisation. He claims: An investigation into a crime boss was mysteriously dropped when a SOCA officer with alleged links to the suspect took over the running of the case. Allegations of serious sexual misconduct made by a female SOCA worker against a male colleague were covered up. Hostility arose between police, customs and immigration officers when operational units were first formed in 2006.

Just weeks before notorious B.C. skipper John Philip Stirling was caught near Colombia on a boat full of cocaine, he sent his neighbour in Chase — a community in B.C.'s Shuswap region — photos of himself lying on the floor beside a giant pile of money.

In the accompanying email, Stirling told Shawn Martin that he wouldn't repay cash he owed him despite being flush after a recent trip to the South American cocaine centre.

Bizarre details of Stirling's feud with his neighbours, Martin and his mother Myrna Beckman, over loans totalling $30,000 are laid out in a suit and counter-suit filed in August and September in Kamloops Supreme Court and obtained the Vancouver Sun.

Stirling was arrested by the U.S. Coast Guard on Oct. 18 just north of Colombia with 400 kilograms of cocaine secreted aboard his sailboat. He is currently detained in a Miami Detention Centre where he told officials "there was nothing wrong with cocaine trafficking and that the United States should mind its own business."

"He further remarked that if Canada didn't have such high taxes, (he and his co-accused) could get legitimate jobs."

If allegations in the B.C. court documents are accurate, some in the town of 2,500 were aware of Stirling's plan to import cocaine.

Martin and Beckman, who live down the road from Stirling and his wife Marlene, say in their court claim they heard at a barbecue last March "that the plaintiff John Stirling was in Colombia setting up a massive cocaine deal."

Martin and Beckman said their efforts to get repayment on several loans to the Stirlings were met with threats and harassment.

They also said accusations by the Stirlings that the neighbours were the aggressors in the dispute are ridiculous — Martin has dwarfism and gets around with crutches and a wheelchair; his mother, 63, is his caregiver.

Both Martin and Beckman declined to comment to the Sun because their case is before the courts. Marlene Stirling did not return calls.

The documents show that Stirling, a 60-year-old convicted cocaine trafficker, struck first against his neighbours, filing a suit on Aug. 29 asking for $10 million in damages.

Stirling said in a brief synopsis that over the last two years, his disabled neighbour and mom have threatened the Stirlings "with bodily harm and death."

"The defendants have written the plaintiffs blackmail letters for money," Stirling wrote. "The defendants have caused anxiety, depression, stress, loss of sleep requiring medical care to the petitioners.

"The defendants have caused travel to become necessary from Colombia for John Stirling at great expense and loss from work to protect his family . . . The defendants have or have attempted to hire Hells Angels to cause murder or physical harm to the plaintiffs and have made statements by phone and email of that intent," the Stirling claim said.

The neighbours fired back in a detailed defence filed Sept. 14, denying all the allegations and making a counter-claim.

They said that, unlike Stirling, they have no criminal record and no connection to the notorious biker gang.

"The defendants do not know any Hells Angels or Hells Angels associates and have never had dealings with them or hired them to do anything," Martin and Beckman said, adding the only information they have about the Angels came from the Stirlings themselves.

"The plaintiff Marlene Stirling also told the defendants that two Hells Angels members sat at her kitchen table and had coffee on multiple different times," the documents said.

They said they learned in an Internet search of Stirling's 2001 bust on his fishing boat, the Western Wind, with 2.5 tonnes of cocaine owned by the Hells Angels. He was never charged.

Tensions escalated between the former friends in August, when Stirling "was back from Colombia and was bragging that he had two suitcases full of money containing in excess of $200,000," the mother-son team said.

Martin fired off an email, "asking John to pay the rest of the money the plaintiffs owed the defendants for loans from June 1, 2007, to Feb. 23, 2011."

On Aug. 23, Stirling sent his neighbours "an email with a picture of him laying on the floor of his Adams' Lake residence with a pile of money in front of him, holding a piece of paper with Aug. 19, 2011, written on it," the claim said.

The email said: "I told you if you waited you would have got paid, but since you didn't, you will never receive a dime and everyone else has been paid back for their investment but you."

They said Stirling warned them that he would go to court and ruin them if they didn't back off.

"The defendants have videotape evidence of the plaintiff John Stirling threatening to kill more than one person at gunpoint," the documents said.

"On Sept. 10, 2011, the defendants were informed that the plaintiff John Stirling has been seeking to hire people to burn down the defendants' house and cause physical harm to them."

Martin and Beckman said "a man calling himself Ryan showed up at the defendants' residence wearing a black leather jacket with a Hells Angel patch and was looking for the plaintiff John Stirling because John apparently owed this guy Ryan money."

Martin said in the court statement that he called Stirlings' house and warned Marlene that someone was looking for John "and that he sounded really p—ed off."

The concessions were granted by the Spanish cabinet on Friday

Benicio del Toro and Ricky Martin - Archive photos EFE

Puerto Rican pop singer Ricky Martin was given Spanish citizenship today, the country’s government said. The star, who came out in 2009 reportedly wants to take advantage of Spain’s gay marriage laws. Spokesman Jose Blanco told a news conference that ministers had agreed to grant him a “letter of naturalization”, issued in special circumstances, because of his “personal and professional links with Spain”. Spanish newspaper El Pais reported that Martin sought citizenship in order to marry boyfriend Carlos Gonzalez Abella, with whom he is bringing up his twin three-year-old sons. Spain passed legislation allowing same-sex marriages in 2005, only the third country to do so at the time, with 20,000 gay couples entering into marriage since. Appearing on the Larry King show last year, he had said: “I would get married… There are many countries around the world where same-sex marriage is a right. Not in Puerto Rico, unfortunately. And not in many states in America. “Yes, we could go to Spain and get married. We can go to Argentina and get married. But why do we have to go somewhere else? Why can’t I do it in my country where the laws are – you know, protecting me?” He added: “I can go to Spain. I have many friends in Spain. And get married. And make it very beautiful and symbolic. But… I [can't] do it in the backyard of my house. I want to have that option. I don’t want to be a second class citizen anymore. I pay my taxes. Why can’t I have that right?

A Sun journalist has been arrested as part of Scotland Yard's investigation into alleged payments to police officers by newspapers. The reporter is believed to be Jamie Pyatt, district editor of the paper. The arrested journalist was taken to a South West London police station at 10.30am on Friday. Pyatt, 48, has been working at the Sun since 1987. He is the sixth person arrested by detectives working in Operation Elveden, which was set up in July following allegations that police officers had received up to £130,000 over several years from the News of the World for information, including contact details of the royal family. News International refused to comment on the arrest and saying it had "a very clear duty of care to employees and would not be making any comment on individuals". Scotland Yard also refused to confirm the identity of the person it arrested, but said in a statement earlier that it had arrested a 48-year-old man in connection with Operation Elveden. Its statement said: "He was arrested outside London on suspicion of corruption allegations in contravention of section 1 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906, and is being brought to a south-west London police station." Operation Elveden is one of three Met investigations relating to alleged illegal activities by newspapers. The others are Operation Weeting and Operation Tuleta, set up to examine phone hacking and computer hacking, respectively. On Thursday, Scotland Yard confirmed to the Guardian that the number of people whose phones may have been hacked had reached 5,800 – 2,000 more than previously stated. So far 16 people have been arrested and bailed on allegations of phone hacking.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's fate hung by a thread Friday and desertions from his crumbling centre-right coalition may have already robbed him of the parliamentary numbers he needs to survive. Berlusconi, caught in the crossfire from European powers and a party revolt at home, agreed at a G20 summit in France to IMF monitoring of economic reforms which he has long promised but failed to implement. But this may soon be irrelevant for the Italian leader, who will return to Rome later Friday to face what looks increasingly like a deadly rebellion by his own supporters. With financial markets in turmoil over the situation in Greece and Italy viewed as the next domino to fall in the euro zone crisis, calls are mounting for a new government to carry through reforms convincing enough to regain international confidence. Berlusconi has consistently rejected calls to resign and says the only alternative to him is an early election next spring, rather than the technocrat or national unity government urged by many politicians and commentators. Yields on 10-year Italian bonds reached 6.36 percent by early afternoon, creeping closer to 7 percent, a level which could trigger a so-called "buyers' strike" where investors take fright and refuse to buy the paper. Two deputies from Berlusconi's PDL party this week defected to the centrist UDC, taking his support in the 630-seat lower house of parliament to 314 compared with the 316 he needed to win a confidence vote last month. But at least seven other former loyalists have called for a new government and could vote against the 75-year-old media magnate. "The (ruling) majority seems to be dissolving like a snowman in spring," said respected commentator Stefano Folli in the financial daily Il Sole 24 Ore. Other commentators spoke of an "inexorable" revolt against Berlusconi. Even Defence Ministry undersecretary Guido Crosetto, a Berlusconi loyalist, said on television: "I don't know how many days or weeks the government has left. Certainly a majority relying on a few votes cannot continue for long." PATRONAGE Berlusconi, one of Italy's richest men, still has significant powers of patronage and he and his closest aides are expected to spend the weekend trying to win back support for a parliamentary showdown Tuesday. Some rebels have already threatened to vote against Berlusconi in the vote to sign off on the 2010 budget. Berlusconi faced concerted calls to resign when he lost a previous vote on this routine measure, which was almost unprecedented. Although it is not a confidence motion, he would come under huge pressure if he suffered a second defeat. "Unpopular prescriptions are necessary and this challenge cannot be faced with a 51 percent government," said UDC leader Pier Ferdinando Casini, in a reference to Berlusconi's weakness and a widespread feeling that the reforms can only be passed with a broad consensus. The premier has promised European leaders that he will call a formal confidence motion within 15 days to pass amendments to a budget bill incorporating new measures to stimulate growth and cut Italy's huge debt. That will be in the Senate where he has a more solid majority but it could still bring him down. Berlusconi, beset by a string of sex scandals and court cases, has consistently resisted pressure from groups ranging from a powerful business lobby to the Catholic Church to stand down.

Two dozen members of a Chicago street gang have been charged with drug trafficking and passport fraud, the U.S. Department of Justice said Thursday. The charges against the members of the Belizean Bloods street gang, said to operate in Chicago and Evanston, Ill., were contained in an indictment unsealed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, a release said. The charges arise from two coordinated investigations that included agents from multiple federal law enforcement agencies as well as the Chicago and Evanston Police Departments, the department said. In 2009, the Chicago Field Office of the U.S. State Department's Diplomatic Security Service began investigating alleged passport fraud by Belizean nationals, while at the same time the FBI and Evanston and Chicago police were investigating alleged narcotics trafficking by suspected members of the Belizean Bloods

The recent arrests of three alleged drug gang leaders from Mexico and the shooting of a sheriff's deputy in South Texas are raising fears among some Lone Star State officials that the brutal drug wars plaguing Mexico are taking hold north of the Rio Grande. On Sunday, Deputy Hugo Rodriguez of Hidalgo County in the southern tip of Texas was shot several times when he pulled over a vehicle containing a person kidnapped by members of Mexico's Gulf Cartel, County Sheriff Lupe Trevino said. Rodriguez's bulletproof vest saved his life, Trevino said. "I have always said we have never reported spillover violence, but I have to say that this particular incident is our first example," Trevino said. Trevino said cartel leaders told members to enter the United States to search for marijuana stolen from the cartel. The Mexican gang used members of a Texas-based street gang, mostly illegal immigrants, to seek out the drugs, Trevino said. And three alleged high-ranking leaders of the Gulf Cartel have been arrested in Texas in the past two weeks after seeking refuge in the United States in the aftermath of internal gang warfare, according to federal court documents released this week. "Amazingly, these individuals are using Texas as a safe haven to protect themselves from the very violence that they have created," U.S. Senator John Cornyn, a Republican from Texas, told reporters this week. The internal warfare was sparked by the September murder in Mexico of Samuel Flores Borrego, a top Gulf Cartel leader, according to the court documents. His death has led to a power struggle between two factions of the Gulf Cartel. DRUG ARREST Rafael Cardenas Vela, 38, the nephew of a co-founder of the Gulf Cartel, was arrested October 21 in Port Isabel, Texas, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He is charged with conspiracy to possess and distribute drugs and using a fraudulent passport. Two other Gulf Cartel members, Eudoxio Ramos Garcia and Jose Luis Zuniga Hernandez, have been arrested in Texas in the past week, according to ICE. All three arrests are related to the split in the Gulf Cartel, said Scott Stewart, vice president of tactical intelligence for the Austin-based private intelligence firm STRATFOR. "The friction between two parts of the Gulf Cartel has been brewing for the past couple of months, and now it appears it is breaking out into all out war," Stewart told Reuters on Thursday. "It is quite possible that the information that led to Cardenas' arrest was actually leaked to U.S. authorities by his rivals in the cartel." Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott on Wednesday wrote in a letter to President Barack Obama that the three arrests and the shooting of the deputy show that the administration is failing to secure the border. "I implore you to aggressively confront this escalating threat," Abbott wrote. A call to the White House press office was not immediately returned on Thursday. Monica Weisberg-Stewart, a McAllen business owner and the chairwoman of the security committee of the Texas Border Coalition, said incidents like the ones from the past two weeks aren't new in South Texas. "There is still less crime down here on the border than there is in most parts of the country," said Weisberg-Stewart, whose coalition includes elected officials and business owners. "What we need is to work on establishing a true sense of security, and not take reactive steps, which will give us a false sense of security."

COLOMBIAN lingerie model dubbed "Narco Queen" was handed six years in jail yesterday after trying to ship cocaine to Europe in her suitcases. Stunning Angie Sanclemente Valencia, 31, had denied helping her boyfriend recruit other beautiful young women to work for her international drug smuggling ring. The former beauty queen tried to take drugs from Argentina to Europe in late 2009 via Mexico. She was arrested in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in May 2010 after months on the run from police. Her attorney German Delgado said he would appeal the conviction. He insisted there was no proof, declaring that Sanclemente should be acquitted as she had no criminal record. Nicolas Gualco, her boyfriend, was also sentenced to six years and eight months for his role in the same plot. Sanclemente claimed during the trial in Argentina that she travelled to the country to marry Gualco and was not involved in the drug trade. She told the court: "I did not come here to commit crimes, I am not a narco-trafficker." She said all she had done for her boyfriend was "make a few calls", adding: "God knows I did it for love." Another man, Venezuelan Gustavo Paez Arneses, was sentenced to six years and two months for his role in the smuggling attempt.

“The better we understand our decision-making brain circuitry, the better we can target treatment, whether it’s pharmaceutical, behavioral, or deep brain stimulation,” says Jonathan Wallis, associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at University of California, Berkeley. Wallis says he was inspired to study the brain mechanism behind substance abuse after observing the lengths to which an addict will go to fulfill a craving, despite knowing the downside of a habit. He wanted to know what the drug did to the brain that made it so difficult to not make the right choice and what prevented the addict from making a healthier one. Straight from the Source Read the original study DOI: 10.1038/nn.2961 In the new study, published in Nature Neuroscience, Wallis targeted the orbitofrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex—two areas in the frontal brain—because previous research has shown that patients with damage to these areas of the brain are impaired in the choices they make. While these individuals may appear perfectly normal on the surface, they routinely make decisions that create chaos in their lives. A similar dynamic has been observed in chronic drug addicts, alcoholics, and people with obsessive-compulsive tendencies. “They get divorced, quit their jobs, lose their friends, and lose all their money,” Wallis says. “All the decisions they make are bad ones.” To test the hypothesis that these areas of the brain are the key players in impaired decision-making, researchers measured the neural activity of macaque monkeys as they played games in which they identified the pictures most likely to deliver juice through a spout into their mouths. The animals quickly learned which pictures would most frequently deliver the greatest amount of juice, allowing researchers to see what calculations they were making, and in which part of the brain. The brains of macaques function similarly to those of humans in basic decision making. The exercise was designed to see how the animals weigh costs, benefits, and risks. The results show that the orbitofrontal cortex regulates neural activity, depending on the value or “stakes” of a decision. This part of the brain enables you to switch easily between making important decisions, such as what school to attend or which job to take, and making trivial decisions such as coffee versus tea or burrito versus pizza. But in the case of addicts and people with damage to the orbitofrontal cortex, the neural activity does not change based on the gravity of the decision, presenting trouble when these individuals try to get their brains in gear to make sound choices, the findings suggest. As for the anterior cingulate cortex, the study found that when this part of the brain functions normally, we learn quickly whether a decision we made matched our expectations. If we eat food that makes us sick, we don’t eat it again. But in people with a malfunctioning anterior cingulate cortex, these signals are missing, and so they continue to make poor choices, Wallis says. “This is the first study to pin down the calculations made by these two specific parts of the brain that underlie healthy decision-making,”  Wallis says, who believes that a clearer understanding of how people with addictions make decisions may help remove some of the stigma of the condition. However, Wallis warned that the findings should not be used as a rationale for addicts to maintain unhealthy habits. Chronic drug and alcohol use changes the brain circuitry, and that can lead to unhealthy choices, he says. If anything, the findings offer hope that, through understanding the mechanism of addiction, treatment can be targeted at these risk-weighing, decision-making centers of the brain. “We know beyond doubt that addiction is a complex brain disease with significant behavioral characteristics,” says Susan E. Foster, vice president and director of policy research and analysis at the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University. “This research is an important contribution to understanding how the disease works. The challenge going forward is to sharpen our understanding, translate this knowledge into effective medical treatments and new prevention strategies and ultimately find a cure for this disease.” Researchers from the University of London and the University of Oxford contributed to the study that was funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.