Conservative minister resigns over sex

scandal

Brooks Newmark, the Conservative minister for civil society,

resigns after being caught sending explicit photographs of
himself to women over the internet
David Cameron was plunged into a double crisis on Saturday after one
of his ministers resigned over a sex scandal and another MP defected to
Ukip.
On the eve of the Conservative Partys final conference before next
years election, Brooks Newmark quit as Minister for Civil Society after
he was caught sending an explicit photograph of himself over the
internet.
Sources told The Telegraph that Mr Newmark had sent the pictures to
someone he believed was a woman using a social networking website,
as part of a tabloid newspaper sting operation.
In a statement, Mr Newmark said: "I have decided to resign as Minister
for Civil Society having been notified of a story to be published in a
Sunday newspaper.
I would like to appeal for the privacy of my family to be respected at this
time. I remain a loyal supporter of this Government as its long term
economic plan continues to deliver for the British people."
The married father of five, added that he was "so sorry, after the scandal
came to light.
Mr Newmark initiated a private message conversation on a social
networking website and sent a graphic picture exposing himself while
wearing a pair of paisley pyjamas, according the Mirror newspaper.
He sent a text message to an undercover reporter on Saturday, asking if
she would like to meet him at the Conservative conference this week.
Afternoons fairly full with speaking engagements but around late
evenings. Promise well meet up though. X," the MP wrote.
A Downing Street spokesman said: "The Prime Minister has accepted
Brooks Newmark's resignation from his role as Minister for Civil Society.
Mr Newmark will be replaced by Rob Wilson, a former aide to the
Chancellor George Osborne.
The ministers resignation comes just hours after Mark Reckless, the MP
for Rochester and Strood, announced on live television that he was
defecting to the UK Independence Party.
He became the second Tory MP to defect to Ukip since the 2010
election, after Douglas Carswell announced last month that he was

standing down from the Conservatives.

Mr Reckless told delegates gathered at the Ukip conference in
Doncaster that he had not taken the decision lightly but claimed the
Conservative leadership was "part of the problem that is holding our
country back".
Appearing on stage to a rapturous reception at the Ukip's conference, he
said voters felt "ripped off and lied to".
At the Newmarks' six storey townhouse, worth several million pounds, in
Belgravia in central London, dogs could be heard barking from inside but
nobody answered the door on Saturday night.

Resign = ontslag nemen

- aftreden
Plunged = kwam terecht in
- werd ondergedompeld in
election = ?
- verkiezing
sting = ?
- steek, beet ?
appeal = vragen om
- oproep, smeekbede
remain = vertrouwen in
- (over) blijven
fairly = behoorlijk
- tamelijk
former aide = ?
- voormalig assistant
delegates gathered = ?
- afgevaardigde
rapturous = chaotisch
- hartstochtelijke

Alice Gross: Parents pay tribute to 'sweet

beautiful daughter' as police confirm body
in river is that of missing teen
Rosalind Hodgkiss and Jose Gross ask why anyone would want
to hurt Alice, their 'sweet and beautiful' daughter, and appeal
for the publics help to catch her killer.

The parents of Alice Gross have described their complete devastation at

the loss of their "sweet beautiful daughter", as police confirm that the
body recovered from the River Brent is that of the missing teenager.
In a statement Alices mother, Rosalind Hodgkiss and father Jose Gross,
said they were struggling to come to terms with why anyone would want
to hurt their quirky, live spark of a girl and appealed for the publics help
to catch her killer.
Alices body was found late on Tuesday evening just yards from where
some of her belongings had been recovered almost a month earlier.
Detectives made the grim discovery as they carried out fingertip
searches of the River Brent just half a mile from where Alice vanished on
August 28.
The area in question had previously been the focus of intense police
work after Alices rucksack was found on September 4 in undergrowth by
the river bank.
It is unclear why the body had not been found during previous searches
and Scotland Yard refused to discuss whether the discovery had been
the result of specific intelligence or information received.
The Metropolitan Polices Commander Graham McNulty confirmed that
significant efforts had been made to conceal the body and it is
understood that the remains had been wrapped up before being
weighted down and placed in the river, which is several feet deep in
places.
The body was also understood to be part buried in the silt and mud
under the waterline.
Alices mother Rosalind Hodgkiss and her father Jose Gross paid tribute
to their daughter saying she had brought joy to all those who knew her.
In a statement the couple said: "We have been left completely
devastated by the recent developments and it is difficult to comprehend
that our sweet and beautiful daughter was the victim of a terrible crime.
Why anyone would want to hurt her is something that we are struggling
to come to terms with.
Alice was a loving and much loved daughter and sister, a quirky live

spark of a girl, beautiful inside and out. She was a funny companion, a
loyal friend, both passionate and compassionate, and so talented with a
bright future ahead of her. She brought so much joy to our family and
those who knew her."
The statement went on: "We still don't know who is responsible for this
crime and we ask that people continue to help the police by giving them
information that could help bring the perpetrator to justice.
We would like to thank all those that have supported us in our efforts to
find Alice, especially the local community; it is comforting to know that so
many people care.
This is a personal and private tragedy and one which we want to be
allowed to deal with in that manner, rather than fearing any individual or
group will use it to further any political agenda. This is a time for grieving
and not a time for anger or recriminations.
A statement from Brentside High, the school that Alice attended, also
paid tribute to her, describing her as an "outstanding and talented
student".
The statement said: "Our thoughts and sympathy are with Alices family
at this time.
"Alice was an outstanding and talented student who will be sorely missed
from our school community. This is a very sad day for our school and we
are devastated by this tragic loss. We are doing everything we can to
support each other and will continue to do so in the days and weeks
ahead.
"We would like to thank the MPS for their efforts in finding Alice and hope
that the perpetrator of this awful crime is brought to justice very soon.
"If anyone has any information that may be of use to the polices murder
inquiry please do come forward.
A post-mortem which began on Wednesday was due to continue on
Thursday as police attempt to establish the cause and time of death and
obtain any forensic evidence that could help catch the person
responsible.
The prime suspect in the case remains Latvian builder Arnis Zalkalns,
who vanished without trace from his home in west London, just days
after Alice went missing.
The 41-year-old served seven years in prison in his native Latvia after
butchering his wife and was also arrested in 2009 on suspicion of
drugging and molesting a 14-year-old girl in a London street.
Scotland Yard detectives have travelled to Latvia as part of their
investigation, but have admitted that they have been unable to apply for
a European Arrest Warrant because of a lack of evidence.
Despite the discovery of the body, sources last night said there had still
been no application for a warrant to detain Zalkalns, should he turn up

overseas.
Detectives cordoned off a shed on a building site where Zalkalns had
worked and were understood to be carrying out forensic tests.
The wooden shed, set within a gated community of newbuild houses
near the River Thames in Isleworth, was first searched two weeks ago,
but yesterday police returned and sealed it off, posting a single officer on
guard outside.
The discovery of Alices body caused shock and distress among the local
community which had supported her family and had appealed for her
safe return.
Locals laid floral tributes at the scene as missing posters in shop
windows and pinned to lampposts were taken down.
One tribute was left by ambulance staff at Ealing Hospital, which the river
runs past, read: "For beautiful Alice, you will be loved and remembered
always.

Confirm = bevestigen
- bevestigen
appeal for = vragen om
- verzoeken om
recovered = ?
- terugvonden
belonging = spullen
- eigendommen
grim = verschrikkelijk
- akelig
conceal = ?
- verbergen
comprehend = beseffen
- begrijpen
perpetrator = dader
- dader
post-mortem = ?
- lijkbeschouwing
butchering = slaan
- verminken
warrant = ?
- machtiging
overseas = overzees
- overzees
cordoned = vonden
- ?

Womb transplant: first picture of baby

born after pioneering operation

Doctors have welcomed the birth of the first baby from a

transplanted womb as bringing hope to thousands of infertile
women around the world
Opta Widget start Opta Widget end

The parents of the first baby to be born from a transplanted womb have
told of their delight at his arrival.
The baby boys birth took place in Sweden after surgeons at the
University of Gothenburg performed the pioneering transplant procedure.
He was delivered by caesarean section in the 31st week of pregnancy
and weighed 3.9 pounds normal for that stage of pregnancy.
Both mother and child are now at home and said to be doing well.
The identity of the parents, a Swedish couple, has not been released, but
the babys father said: It was a pretty tough journey over the years, but
we now have the most amazing baby.
He is very, very cute, and he doesnt even scream, he just murmurs."
He added: "Hes no different from any other child, but he will have a good
story to tell. One day he can look at the newspaper articles about how he
was born and know that he was the first in the world to be born this way."
He spoke as the first picture of the baby was published, amid widespread
excitement over a procedure which offers renewed hope to thousands of
infertile women around the world.
British experts said that they were preparing to carry out a similar
procedure next year. If successful it could help 15,000 British women
who suffer from the same type of infertility to carry their own child.
Mats Brannstrom and his team performing a womb transplant.
The birth of the Swedish baby is understood to have taken place within
the last month, after doctors transplanted wombs into several women
who had a rare genetic condition that meant they were born without their
own womb.
In January, one of the patients underwent IVF treatment that resulted in
an embryo being transferred to her new womb. The donated womb came
from a 61-year-old woman, a close family friend who had gone through
menopause after giving birth to two children.
The 35-year-old mother is a patient of Dr Mats Brannstrom, professor of
obstetrics and gynaecology at the Sahlgrenska Academy in Gothenburg.
The mother had to take three medicines to prevent her body from
rejecting the new organ. About six weeks after the transplant, she got her
menstrual period - a sign the womb was healthy.

After one year, when doctors were confident the womb was working well,
they transferred a single embryo created in a lab dish using the woman's
eggs and her husband's sperm.
The woman, who has only one kidney, had three mild rejection episodes,
including one during pregnancy, but all were successfully treated with
medicines.
The baby's growth and blood flow to the womb and umbilical cord were
normal until the 31st week of pregnancy, when the mother developed
preeclampsia, a dangerous high-blood-pressure condition.
After an abnormal fetal heart rate was detected, the baby was delivered
by cesarean section.
Prof Brannstrom, who led the research and delivered the baby with the
help of his wife, a midwife, said: The baby is fantastic. But it is even
better to see the joy in the parents and how happy he made them.
That was a fantastic happiness for me and the whole team, but it was an
unreal sensation also because we really could not believe we had
reached this moment. Our success is based on more than 10 years of
intensive animal research and surgical training by our team and opens
up the possibility of treating many young females worldwide that suffer
from uterine infertility.
Liza Johannesson, a gynaecological surgeon on the team, said: It gives
hope to those women and men that thought they would never have a
child, that thought they were out of hope.
Richard Smith, a consultant gynaecological surgeon at Queen
Charlottes Hospital in London, said he was preparing to do similar
operations here next year, funded by the charity Womb Transplant UK.
He said on Saturday: This is unbelievably exciting, its brilliant. It looks
like everything has gone very well and its really wonderful news. Whats
happened here is so exciting because the great unknown has been
answered.
Mr Smith said his own teams research in this area was going well and
should be able to begin work on womb transplants in Britain next
summer.
He said: Weve finished all the lab research and pre-transplant human
research and were almost ready to go. The only big issue is were short
of funds, which weve been all the way along.
We are submitting applications for ethics approval in the next few weeks
with a view to doing human live transplants in the UK next year.
We have moved from an atmosphere where people were really quite
against this procedure to where people are quite supportive. We have 60
patients on the waiting list for this procedure.
The Swedish couple, both competitive athletes, will have to decide
shortly if they want a second baby.

The drugs used to prevent the womb being rejected would be damaging
in the long term - so the couple will either try again or have the womb
removed.
The father said: We will definitely think about that. But right now, were
very happy with just one baby.
After the caesarean section, the womb would be left in place until the
mother has completed her family and then removed so that drugs to stop
the body rejecting the organ could be halted. The drugs carry an
increased risk of cancer.
The operation, follow-up and immunosuppressant drugs cost 100,000,
with the research paid for by the Jane and Dan Olsson Foundation for
Science, a Swedish charity.
The only other options for women born without a womb were adoption or
surrogacy if she wanted to have a child genetically related to her, but this
is legally complicated.
Doctors around the world have welcomed the first successful birth from a
transplant.
Prof Sheena Lewis, Professor of Reproductive Medicine at Queens
University Belfast and Chair of British Andrology Society said: This is
another step forward in the treatment of infertile women.
The questions we have asked in the past about such a study have been:
are the donors fully informed of the risks of such an operation. If so, and
they agree, that seems acceptable.
The other question is whether the transplanted womb is adequate in
providing the optimal environment for the growing foetus. We will watch
the progress of this baby with Interest and hope.
Dr Allan Pacey, the chairman of the British Fertility Society, told BBC
News: "I think it is brilliant and revolutionary and opens the door to many
infertile women.
"The scale of it feels a bit like IVF. It feels like a step change. The
question is can it be done repeatedly, reliably and safely."
The first womb transplant was done in Saudi Arabia in 2000 but failed
shortly afterwards.
In 2011 Derya Sert, 21, received a womb from a dead donor in Turkey.
She conceived a child but no heartbeat was detected and it was later
terminated.
In 2012 it was announced by Dr Brannstrom that nine womb transplants
had been carried out and all were successful.
Eight of the recipients suffer from MRKH syndrome, a congenital
disorder which affects one in 5,000 women and prevents the womb from
developing.
The ninth had her womb removed after suffering cervical cancer.

The only other options for women born without a womb is adoption or
surrogacy if she wants to have a child genetically related to her but this is
legally complicated in the UK.

Womb = ?
- baarmoeder
infertile = onvruchtbaar
- onvruchtbaar
murmurs = mompelen
- mompelen
renewed = vernieuwde
- vernieuwen
obstetrics = ?
- verloskunde
umbilical cord = ?
- navelstreng
halted = beschadigen
- stopzetten
adequate = ?
- voldoende, geschikt