European Central Bank Cuts Growth Forecast

Alex Domanski/DAPD, via Associated Press

Mario Draghi, head of the European Central Bank, at a news conference on Thursday, where he said rates would be unchanged.

FRANKFURT — Acknowledging that the economy is likely to remain weak well into next year, the European Central Bank sharply reduced its growth forecast for the euro zone Thursday, and left its main interest rate unchanged at a record low of 0.75 percent.

Meanwhile the central bank in Britain, which does not use the euro, also decided to hold its benchmark interest rate at a record low, amid indicators that the outlook for the British economy was dimming, largely because of troubles in the euro zone. The Bank of England kept the rate at 0.5 percent.

Mario Draghi, the E.C.B. president, cited economic uncertainty for the 17 euro zone countries in scaling back the bank’s prediction outlook for 2013. Compared with a previous growth forecast of 0.5 percent of growth in gross domestic product for the currency bloc, he said growth at best was unlikely to exceed 0.3 percent. And the euro zone economy could even end up shrinking 0.9 percent next year, he said.

Among the risks that could hamper future growth, Mr. Draghi listed “uncertainties about the resolution of sovereign debt and governance issues in the euro area, geopolitical issues and fiscal policy decisions in the United States.”

Yet he left room for the prospect of a return to more positive figures later next year, citing recent indicators showing increased business confidence in France, Germany and Italy.

In London on Thursday, the Bank of England not only held interest rates steady, but signaled no change in its economic stimulus program, which has called for purchasing £375 billion, or some $600 billion, in government bonds to pump more money into the economy.

The government had said Wednesday that it would take a year longer to bring Britain’s budget deficit under control because the economic recovery had slowed, mainly because of troubles in the euro zone.

The Bank of England is evaluating its options to fuel the British economy, which is again running out of steam after emerging from a double-dip recession earlier this year.

Apart from its bond-buying stimulus program, known as quantitative easing, the central bank has also been helping banks access capital more cheaply to be able to lend more. Some economists said more stimulus might be needed to bring back more stable growth and allow the government to meet its debt reduction target.

“Given that economic data has weakened if anything over the last month or so, further quantitative easing remains in the cards,” said Victoria Clarke, an economist at Investec in London.

The British economy is likely to shrink 0.1 percent this year before expanding 1.2 percent next year, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility, an independent agency. That compares with 0.8 percent growth predicted for this year in March and a 2 percent expansion for next year.

Some economists expect the Bank of England to restart its bond purchasing program early next year as a way to inject more money into the economy.

For the E.C.B., in a year where it has cut its rates to a record low, introduced a €1 trillion, or a $1.3 trillion, program of lending to banks and announced its willingness to purchase bonds from heavily indebted countries within the euro zone, the decision to leave the benchmark interest rate untouched seemed to reflect an eagerness to shift some of the burden of responsibility back to governments.

Mr. Draghi called it “essential” that countries continue restructuring their financial sectors and reduce their amount of public debt, but refrained from indicating that any further programs were in the offing to help ease the crisis, now entering its third year.

The E.C.B.’s benchmark rate has lost much of its power to influence market rates in troubled corners of the euro zone. Credit remains expensive in countries like Portugal and Italy because of lingering fear among lenders that the euro zone could splinter.

“There were no clear hints on unconventional measures of credit easing,” wrote Elga Bartsch, a researcher with Morgan Stanley, in a note to investors. “In fact, when asked about additional measures the E.C.B. could take, Mr. Draghi rattled through what the E.C.B. has done in the past and the positive impact that these measures have had.”

Julia Werdigier reported from London and Jack Ewing contributed reporting from Warsaw.

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Drug Makers Challenge Pill Disposal Law in California

Brand name drug makers and their generic counterparts rarely find themselves on the same side of an issue, but now they are making an exception. They have teamed up to fight a local law in California, the first in the nation, that makes them responsible for running — and paying for — a program that would allow consumers to turn in unused medicines for proper disposal.

Such so-called drug take-back programs are gaining in popularity because of a growing realization that those leftover pills in your medicine cabinet are a potential threat to public health and the environment.

Small children might accidentally swallow them and teenagers will experiment with them, advocates of the laws say. Prescription drug abusers can, and are, breaking into homes in search of them. Unused pills are sometimes flushed down the toilet, so pharmaceuticals are now polluting waterways and even drinking water. One study found the antidepressant Prozac in the brains of fish.

Most such take-back programs are run by local or other government agencies. But increasingly there are calls to make the pharmaceutical industry pay.

“We feel the industry that profits from the sales of these products should have the financial responsibility for proper management and disposal,” said Miriam Gordon, California director of Clean Water Action, an advocacy group.

In July, Alameda County, Calif., which includes Oakland and Berkeley, became the first locality to enact such a requirement. Drug companies have to submit plans for accomplishing it by July 1, 2013.

But the industry plans to file a lawsuit in United States District Court in Oakland on Friday, hoping to have the law struck down. The suit is being filed by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, or PhRMA, which represents brand-name drug companies, the Generic Pharmaceutical Association and the Biotechnology Industry Organization.

James M. Spears, general counsel of PhRMA, said the Alameda ordinance violated the Constitution in that a local government was interfering with interstate commerce, a right reserved for Congress.

“They are telling a company in New Jersey that you have to come in and design and implement and pay for a municipal service in California,” he said in an interview.

“This program is one where the cost is shifted to companies and individuals who are not located in Alameda County and who won’t be served by it.”

Mr. Spears, who is known as Mit, said that the program would cost millions of dollars a year to run and that pharmaceutical companies were “not in the waste disposal business.” He said it would be best left to sanitation departments and law enforcement agencies, which must be involved if narcotics, like pain pills, were to be transported.

Nathan A. Miley, the president of the Alameda County Board of Supervisors and the champion of the legislation, said late Thursday, “It’s just unfortunate that PhRMA would fight this because it would be pennies for them.”

“We will win legally and will win in the court of public opinion as well,” Mr. Miley said.

The battle in Alameda could set the direction for other states and localities. Legislators in seven states have introduced bills to require drug companies to pay for take-back programs in the last few years, said Scott Cassel, founder and chief executive of the Product Stewardship Institute, a nonprofit group that advocates such programs. But none of the bills have passed.

Mr. Cassel said about 70 similar “extended producer responsibility” laws have been enacted in 32 states for other products, like electronic devices, mercury-containing thermometers, fluorescent lamps, paint and batteries. He said he was not aware that any had been struck down on constitutional grounds.

The pharmaceutical industry already pays for take-back programs in some other countries. The law in Alameda is modeled partly on the system in British Columbia and two other Canadian provinces. There, the industry formed the Post-Consumer Pharmaceutical Stewardship Association, which runs the programs.

Consumers can take unused drugs back to pharmacies, from which they are periodically collected. Drug companies pay for the program in proportion to their market share, said Ginette Vanasse, executive director of the association. The program for British Columbia, with a population over four million, costs about $500,000 a year, she said.

The extent of the problem of unused pills and how best to handle them are matters of debate.

The United States Geological Survey has found various drugs, including antidepressants, antibiotics, heart medicines and hormones, in waterways it has sampled. Sewage treatment plants and drinking water treatment plants are not meant to remove pharmaceuticals.

Still, it is not known what effect the chemicals might have. “It’s a hard-to-pin-down problem,” said Sonya Lunder, a senior analyst at the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group. It is thought that trace amounts in drinking water are probably not harmful. But larger amounts found in wastewater could be having an impact on wildlife.

It is also unclear whether take-back programs will help. Experts generally agree that the bigger source of pollution is urine and feces containing the remnants of drugs that are ingested, not the unused pills flushed down the toilet.

PhRMA also argues that take-back programs will not help much with the problem of drug abuse either. Mr. Spears said that it was better to have consumers tie up unused pills in a plastic bag and throw them in the trash. That is more effective, he said, because people would not have to travel to a collection point. Such collection points could become targets for thieves and drug abusers.

Read More..

Drug Makers Challenge Pill Disposal Law in California

Brand name drug makers and their generic counterparts rarely find themselves on the same side of an issue, but now they are making an exception. They have teamed up to fight a local law in California, the first in the nation, that makes them responsible for running — and paying for — a program that would allow consumers to turn in unused medicines for proper disposal.

Such so-called drug take-back programs are gaining in popularity because of a growing realization that those leftover pills in your medicine cabinet are a potential threat to public health and the environment.

Small children might accidentally swallow them and teenagers will experiment with them, advocates of the laws say. Prescription drug abusers can, and are, breaking into homes in search of them. Unused pills are sometimes flushed down the toilet, so pharmaceuticals are now polluting waterways and even drinking water. One study found the antidepressant Prozac in the brains of fish.

Most such take-back programs are run by local or other government agencies. But increasingly there are calls to make the pharmaceutical industry pay.

“We feel the industry that profits from the sales of these products should have the financial responsibility for proper management and disposal,” said Miriam Gordon, California director of Clean Water Action, an advocacy group.

In July, Alameda County, Calif., which includes Oakland and Berkeley, became the first locality to enact such a requirement. Drug companies have to submit plans for accomplishing it by July 1, 2013.

But the industry plans to file a lawsuit in United States District Court in Oakland on Friday, hoping to have the law struck down. The suit is being filed by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, or PhRMA, which represents brand-name drug companies, the Generic Pharmaceutical Association and the Biotechnology Industry Organization.

James M. Spears, general counsel of PhRMA, said the Alameda ordinance violated the Constitution in that a local government was interfering with interstate commerce, a right reserved for Congress.

“They are telling a company in New Jersey that you have to come in and design and implement and pay for a municipal service in California,” he said in an interview.

“This program is one where the cost is shifted to companies and individuals who are not located in Alameda County and who won’t be served by it.”

Mr. Spears, who is known as Mit, said that the program would cost millions of dollars a year to run and that pharmaceutical companies were “not in the waste disposal business.” He said it would be best left to sanitation departments and law enforcement agencies, which must be involved if narcotics, like pain pills, were to be transported.

Nathan A. Miley, the president of the Alameda County Board of Supervisors and the champion of the legislation, said late Thursday, “It’s just unfortunate that PhRMA would fight this because it would be pennies for them.”

“We will win legally and will win in the court of public opinion as well,” Mr. Miley said.

The battle in Alameda could set the direction for other states and localities. Legislators in seven states have introduced bills to require drug companies to pay for take-back programs in the last few years, said Scott Cassel, founder and chief executive of the Product Stewardship Institute, a nonprofit group that advocates such programs. But none of the bills have passed.

Mr. Cassel said about 70 similar “extended producer responsibility” laws have been enacted in 32 states for other products, like electronic devices, mercury-containing thermometers, fluorescent lamps, paint and batteries. He said he was not aware that any had been struck down on constitutional grounds.

The pharmaceutical industry already pays for take-back programs in some other countries. The law in Alameda is modeled partly on the system in British Columbia and two other Canadian provinces. There, the industry formed the Post-Consumer Pharmaceutical Stewardship Association, which runs the programs.

Consumers can take unused drugs back to pharmacies, from which they are periodically collected. Drug companies pay for the program in proportion to their market share, said Ginette Vanasse, executive director of the association. The program for British Columbia, with a population over four million, costs about $500,000 a year, she said.

The extent of the problem of unused pills and how best to handle them are matters of debate.

The United States Geological Survey has found various drugs, including antidepressants, antibiotics, heart medicines and hormones, in waterways it has sampled. Sewage treatment plants and drinking water treatment plants are not meant to remove pharmaceuticals.

Still, it is not known what effect the chemicals might have. “It’s a hard-to-pin-down problem,” said Sonya Lunder, a senior analyst at the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group. It is thought that trace amounts in drinking water are probably not harmful. But larger amounts found in wastewater could be having an impact on wildlife.

It is also unclear whether take-back programs will help. Experts generally agree that the bigger source of pollution is urine and feces containing the remnants of drugs that are ingested, not the unused pills flushed down the toilet.

PhRMA also argues that take-back programs will not help much with the problem of drug abuse either. Mr. Spears said that it was better to have consumers tie up unused pills in a plastic bag and throw them in the trash. That is more effective, he said, because people would not have to travel to a collection point. Such collection points could become targets for thieves and drug abusers.

Read More..

Drafters of Communications Treaty Are Split on Internet Issue

PARIS — Nearly a week into a global conference to draft a treaty on the future of international telecommunications, delegates remain divided on a fundamental question: should the Internet feature in the discussions?

The United States says no, arguing that including it in an intergovernmental agreement could result in regulations that would hamper its development, which has been led by the private sector.

To try to win this point early in the proceedings, the United States delegation has pushed a proposal to restrict the application of the treaty to traditional telecommunications operators, excluding Internet companies, as well as private and government networks.

So far, however, the United States has been rebuffed.

Terry Kramer, the head of the American delegation, said the proposal, co-sponsored by Canada, had generated support from American allies in Europe, Latin America and the Asia-Pacific region. Other countries, including Russia and some African and Middle Eastern nations, have apparently resisted, favoring a broader definition of telecommunications that could include the Internet.

“Fundamentally, to us, this conference should not be about the Internet sector,” Mr. Kramer said by telephone from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, where the meeting is taking place under the auspices of the International Telecommunication Union. “There are some pretty big differences of opinion on this.”

Russia, as expected, has introduced a proposal to shift oversight over the Internet, including the address system, to an international body, contending that the United States wields too much influence over this. The address function is now handled by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, a private body that operates under a United States government contract.

“We fundamentally disagree with that,” Mr. Kramer said, referring to the Russian proposal. “Once governments are in that role, they are in position to decide how the Internet operates, what kind of information flows there, et cetera.”

Campaigners against restrictions on the Internet have also expressed concerns about proposals to bolster security and to crack down on spam — fearing that this could be used as a pretext for censorship — as well as about a proposed technical standard for “deep packet inspection.” This refers to technology that can be used to examine the content of traffic that passes through telecommunications networks.

It is unclear which, if any, of these initiatives might make it into the final treaty. The talks are set to continue through next week, and Mr. Kramer has pledged to block any proposals that would threaten the integrity of the Internet. The telecommunication union says proposals will be adopted only if they meet with widespread support at the conference, whose goal is to update regulations that date to 1988.

Groups that favor an open Internet have criticized the process as lacking transparency. While some meetings are going on behind closed doors, the union moved to provide webcasts of the plenary sessions, in which delegates from more than 190 countries are debating the proposals.

On Wednesday, however, access to the webcasts and other material on the union’s Web site was briefly blocked; the group said hackers appeared to have been responsible.

“Some delegates were frustrated at being unable to access some of the online working documents that were being considered by the meeting,” the union said in a statement. “However, a spirit of camaraderie prevailed, with those who had access to up-to-date online versions of the texts willingly sharing with other delegates in order to keep discussions moving forward.”

So far, fears that the conference could turn raucous have not come to pass.

“The world is having a conversation,” said Sally Shipman Wentworth, senior manager of public policy at the Internet Society, whose members include Internet companies, governance groups and others. “The meeting rooms are full, and everyone wants to have a chance to be heard. It’s been pretty collegial so far.”

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Mona Ackerman, Psychologist Who Wrote Advice Column, Dies at 66

The cause was ovarian cancer, said Richard Cohen, her longtime companion and a columnist for The Washington Post.

Dr. Ackerman ran a private practice on the Upper East Side of Manhattan before a meeting with Arianna Huffington led to “Dr. Mona Knows,” a question-and-answer column. The format was more narrative device than “Dear Abby”; Ms. Ackerman at times wrote the questions along with the answers.

Topics included coping with the death of a child; psychological profiles of public figures like Bernard L. Madoff; and appraising Dr. Phil’s therapeutic credentials.

Her treatment for cancer forced her to end the column in 2009, but Dr. Ackerman continued to write occasionally online for The Daily Beast.

Mona Riklis was born in Tel Aviv on May 22, 1946, to Judith and Meshulam Riklis. They emigrated to America, where Mr. Riklis became a billionaire by pioneering leveraged buyouts and junk bond deals.

Her marriage to Irwin Ackerman, in 1966, ended in divorce. She graduated from New York University and earned her Ph.D. from the Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University.

In addition to Mr. Cohen, Dr. Ackerman is survived by her father; a sister, Marcia Riklis; a brother, Ira Riklis; a son, Ari Ackerman; a daughter, Gila Steinbock; and two grandchildren.

Answering a question in her column about how to communicate with a dying friend, Dr. Ackerman advised: “Don’t be afraid, be honest and ask questions.

“Don’t assume you understand or can make the pain go away,” she added. “What you can do is listen, respond and give back what is needed, even if that is silence.”

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Well: Running in Reverse

This column appears in the Dec. 9 issue of The New York Times Magazine.

Backward running, also known as reverse or retro running, is not as celebrated as barefoot running and will never be mistaken for the natural way to run. But a small body of science suggests that backward running enables people to avoid or recover from common injuries, burn extra calories, sharpen balance and, not least, mix up their daily routine.

The technique is simple enough. Most of us have done it, at least in a modified, abbreviated form, and probably recently, perhaps hopping back from a curb as a bus went by or pushing away from the oven with a roasting pan in both hands. But training with backward running is different. Biomechanically, it is forward motion’s doppelgänger. In a study published last year, biomechanics researchers at the University of Milan in Italy had a group of runners stride forward and backward at a steady pace along a track equipped with force sensors and cameras.

They found that, as expected, the runners struck the ground near the back of their feet when going forward and rolled onto the front of their feet for takeoff. When they went backward though, they landed near the front of their feet and took off from the heels. They tended to lean slightly forward even when running backward. As a result, their muscles fired differently. In forward running, the muscles and tendons were pulled taut during landing and responded by coiling, a process that creates elastic energy (think rubber bands) that is then released during toe-off. When running backward, muscles and tendons were coiled during landing and stretched at takeoff. The backward runners’ legs didn’t benefit from stored elastic energy. In fact, the researchers found, running backward required nearly 30 percent more energy than running forward at the same speed. But backward running also produced far less hard pounding.

What all of this means, says Giovanni Cavagna, a professor at the University of Milan who led the study, is that reverse running can potentially “improve forward running by allowing greater and safer training.”

It is a particularly attractive option for runners with bad knees. A 2012 study found that backward running causes far less impact to the front of the knees. It also burns more calories at a given pace. In a recent study, active female college students who replaced their exercise with jogging backward for 15 to 45 minutes three times a week for six weeks lost almost 2.5 percent of their body fat.

And it aids in balance training — backward slow walking is sometimes used as a therapy for people with Parkinson’s and is potentially useful for older people, whose balance has grown shaky.

But it has drawbacks, Cavagna says — chiefly that you can’t see where you’re going. “It should be done on a track,” he says, “or by a couple of runners, side by side,” one facing forward.

It should be implemented slowly too, because its unfamiliar motion can cause muscle fatigue. Intersperse a few minutes periodically during your regular routine, Cavagna says. Increase the time you spend backward as it feels comfortable.

The good news for serious runners is that backward does not necessarily mean slow. The best recorded backward five-kilometer race time is 19:31, faster than most of us can hit the finish line with our best foot forward.

Read More..

Well: Running in Reverse

This column appears in the Dec. 9 issue of The New York Times Magazine.

Backward running, also known as reverse or retro running, is not as celebrated as barefoot running and will never be mistaken for the natural way to run. But a small body of science suggests that backward running enables people to avoid or recover from common injuries, burn extra calories, sharpen balance and, not least, mix up their daily routine.

The technique is simple enough. Most of us have done it, at least in a modified, abbreviated form, and probably recently, perhaps hopping back from a curb as a bus went by or pushing away from the oven with a roasting pan in both hands. But training with backward running is different. Biomechanically, it is forward motion’s doppelgänger. In a study published last year, biomechanics researchers at the University of Milan in Italy had a group of runners stride forward and backward at a steady pace along a track equipped with force sensors and cameras.

They found that, as expected, the runners struck the ground near the back of their feet when going forward and rolled onto the front of their feet for takeoff. When they went backward though, they landed near the front of their feet and took off from the heels. They tended to lean slightly forward even when running backward. As a result, their muscles fired differently. In forward running, the muscles and tendons were pulled taut during landing and responded by coiling, a process that creates elastic energy (think rubber bands) that is then released during toe-off. When running backward, muscles and tendons were coiled during landing and stretched at takeoff. The backward runners’ legs didn’t benefit from stored elastic energy. In fact, the researchers found, running backward required nearly 30 percent more energy than running forward at the same speed. But backward running also produced far less hard pounding.

What all of this means, says Giovanni Cavagna, a professor at the University of Milan who led the study, is that reverse running can potentially “improve forward running by allowing greater and safer training.”

It is a particularly attractive option for runners with bad knees. A 2012 study found that backward running causes far less impact to the front of the knees. It also burns more calories at a given pace. In a recent study, active female college students who replaced their exercise with jogging backward for 15 to 45 minutes three times a week for six weeks lost almost 2.5 percent of their body fat.

And it aids in balance training — backward slow walking is sometimes used as a therapy for people with Parkinson’s and is potentially useful for older people, whose balance has grown shaky.

But it has drawbacks, Cavagna says — chiefly that you can’t see where you’re going. “It should be done on a track,” he says, “or by a couple of runners, side by side,” one facing forward.

It should be implemented slowly too, because its unfamiliar motion can cause muscle fatigue. Intersperse a few minutes periodically during your regular routine, Cavagna says. Increase the time you spend backward as it feels comfortable.

The good news for serious runners is that backward does not necessarily mean slow. The best recorded backward five-kilometer race time is 19:31, faster than most of us can hit the finish line with our best foot forward.

Read More..

Memo From Afghanistan: YouTube Ban Is Shrugged Off in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan — When it comes to YouTube, the government of Afghanistan intends to keep its hand on the switch for now.

More than two months after the Afghan government banned YouTube to prevent the spread of an anti-Islamic video, it has yet to restore access to the popular video Web site. While officials say they hope to lift the block “as soon as possible,” they have offered only a vague sense of what must happen before that can be done.

It is a measure of some of Afghanistan’s complexities, however, that even as Afghan rights advocates have worried about censorship, a common reaction on the street to the YouTube ban has been praise, or at worst ambivalence, even among some of the younger, Internet-savvy set in Kabul.

“That video dishonored our prophet,” said Syed Hamid, 19, a recent high school graduate, in comfortable English. “If YouTube isn’t going to remove the video, then our government is right to block access to it.”

He added: “I don’t need YouTube. I can watch videos on other Web sites.”

When a trailer for the video “Innocence of Muslims,” which portrays the Prophet Muhammad as a crass thug and a womanizer, began to circulate in September, the Afghan government reacted quickly to stem potential violence as riots broke out in other countries. In a move that senior Western officials in Afghanistan praised, the Afghan authorities reached out to religious leaders across the country, urging them to preach restraint and tolerance.

More controversially, officials also decided to impose the ban on YouTube after the company refused to remove the video from its site.

The country remained mostly peaceful, to the relief of the government and Western officials here. Past demonstrations related to religious insensitivity had quickly become deadly: In February, when NATO personnel were seen burning Korans near the Bagram Air Base, Afghans took to the streets in a violent outpouring of rage that led to dozens of deaths.

While Western countries, including most of the ones involved here, recoil at the idea of restricting free speech, the lesson is less clear in Afghanistan. In this case, censorship worked, and in conjunction with the government’s broader strategy almost certainly saved lives.

Still, some are asking the question: Where does the government draw the line on filtering information to its citizens? The answer has consistently been: Anywhere Islam is insulted.

“In the Islamic world, there are certain things that are untouchable,” said Jalal Noorani, senior adviser to the minister of culture and information, who initiated the ban. “We won’t be patient with anything disrespectful to our religion.”

Mr. Noorani said the government had no plans to ban other Web sites, so long as they did not disrespect Islam or incite ethnic violence.

The government had shown a willingness to censor offensive broadcasts before. In 2010, for instance, it shut down Emrooz TV after the local station showed a segment on Shiite Muslims that some Afghans found offensive. And a sustained war of words with Pakistan prompted Afghan officials to ban Pakistani newspapers from eastern Afghanistan in September, claiming they were little more than “propaganda tools for the Taliban.”

While Web sites that focus on vices like gambling and pornography have been banned for years, the government had never before blocked an entire media Web site for hosting an offensive video, officials said. Civil rights groups have argued that the censorship undermines President Hamid Karzai’s promises of transparency and openness.

But for all the controversy over the ban, it hardly seemed to register with many youths here in Kabul.

On a recent afternoon, hundreds of young men gathered in a plaza off the Pul-e-Khesti market, where a de facto cellphone emporium has taken root. Men waved phones as they barked out prices across the crowd. Merchants at makeshift tables charged nominal fees to download music and videos on mobile devices.

The market is just the sort of place the government feared could be a magnet for violence if the video — or even just news of its contents — spread from phone to phone. Although most Afghans do not have computers, cellphones have become ubiquitous over the past decade, and an estimated three-quarters of Afghans have access to mobile devices that allow them to watch videos.

“As long as this anti-prophet video is on YouTube, our government should keep their Web site blocked,” said Javeed Khawrin, 21, who was shopping at the market. “If I had power, I would have destroyed the whole area where this video was taped.”

Subhanullah, 24, an Afghan Army soldier who came to the market to get his phone fixed and who, like many Afghans, uses a single name, said the video “creates more haters among our national army soldiers toward the foreign troops here.”

Attitudes were similar at the city’s Women’s Garden, a sanctuary of roses, leafy trees and swing sets financed by Western aid.

Nilab Khursihid, 18, said she welcomed the government’s decision to keep the ban in place, and suggested even extending it to all material that is hurtful or disrespectful, including cartoons that lampoon Mr. Karzai.

“This is how our community is,” she said, sitting with friends in the garden. “The Internet has misled many of the youth.”

The garden, in the Shahrara neighborhood, boasts a library, a computer lab and a gymnasium for women. Small shops selling toys, lingerie and dresses line the inner wall of the compound. Nearby, a young woman sat uneasily behind the steering wheel of a Toyota, taking a driving lesson, a freedom unknown in the rest of the city.

One shopkeeper, Mariama Ahmadi, 23, who runs a dress store, offered a counterperspective. While she, too, thinks the video should have been taken down, she said, she thinks banning the Web site was a mistake. She said she preferred self-censorship, and the freedom to decide for oneself.

“We can all have our own choices and decide what to watch,” she said, her face framed by a black hijab. “The government shouldn’t be telling people what to do.”

Sharifullah Sahak contributed reporting.

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3 Walmart Suppliers Made Goods in Bangladesh Factory

Khurshed Rinku/Associated Press

Burials on Nov. 27 for some of the 112 victims of the garment factory fire in Bangladesh.

Documents found at the Tazreen apparel factory in Bangladesh, where 112 workers died in a fire nearly two weeks ago, indicate that three American garment companies were using the factory during the past year to supply goods to Walmart and its Sam’s Club subsidiary.

The documents — photographed by a Bangladeshi labor organizer after the fire and made available to The New York Times — include an internal production report from mid-September showing that 5 of the factory’s 14 production lines were devoted to making apparel for Walmart.

In a related matter, two officials who attended a meeting held in Bangladesh in 2011 to discuss factory safety in the garment industry said on Wednesday that the Walmart official there played the lead role in blocking an effort to have global retailers pay more for apparel to help Bangladesh factories improve their electrical and fire safety.

Ineke Zeldenrust, international coordinator for the Clean Clothes Campaign, an anti-sweatshop group based in Amsterdam, said Walmart was the company that “most strongly advocated this position.”

The meeting was held in April 2011 in Dhaka, the country’s capital, and brought together global retailers, Bangladeshi factory owners, government officials and nongovernment organizations after several apparel factory fires in Bangladesh had killed dozens of workers the previous winter.

According to the minutes of the meeting, which were made available to The Times, Sridevi Kalavakolanu, a Walmart director of ethical sourcing, along with an official from another major apparel retailer, noted that the proposed improvements in electrical and fire safety would involve as many as 4,500 factories and would be “in most cases” a “very extensive and costly modification.”

“It is not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments,” the minutes said.

Kevin Gardner, a Walmart spokesman, said the company official’s remarks in Bangladesh were “out of context.”

“Walmart has been advocating for improved fire safety with the Bangladeshi government, with industry groups and with suppliers,” he said, adding that the company has helped develop and establish programs to increase fire prevention.

Ms. Zeldenrust said, “Everyone recognized that fire safety was a serious problem and it was a high time to act on it, and Walmart’s position had a very negative impact.” She added, “It gives manufacturers the excuse they’re looking for to say, ‘We’re not to blame.’ ”

Scott Nova, the executive director of the Worker Rights Consortium, a factory monitoring group based in Washington, was also at the meeting. He said that upgrading the factories’ safety would cost a small fraction of what Walmart and other retailers pay for the clothing they import from Bangladesh each year.

Bloomberg News first reported details of the Dhaka meeting on Wednesday.

Walmart has indirectly acknowledged that the factory, Tazreen Fashions, outside Dhaka, was producing some of its apparel, saying in a statement that a supplier had “subcontracted work to this factory without authorization and in direct violation of our policies.” In that statement, issued two days after the Nov. 24 fire, Walmart said, “We have terminated the relationship with that supplier.” Walmart has declined to name the supplier.

After Walmart was shown some of the documents from the factory on Wednesday, Mr. Gardner replied in an e-mail. “As we’ve said, the Tazreen factory was de-authorized months ago,” he wrote. “We don’t comment on specific supplier relationships.”

The photographed documents from the factory indicate that three suppliers — the International Direct Group, Success Apparel and Topson Downs — used the factory to make shirts, shorts and pajamas for Walmart. One document, written in July, provides product descriptions from Success Apparel for Walmart’s Faded Glory house-brand shorts. A photo taken inside the factory after the fire showed a pair of Faded Glory shorts.

The documents indicate that Success Apparel often worked through Simco, a Bangladeshi garment maker.

Mr. Nova of the Worker Rights Consortium said the documents raised questions about Walmart’s statements after the fire.

“It was not a single rogue supplier as Walmart has claimed — there were several different U.S. suppliers working for Walmart in that factory,” Mr. Nova said. “It stretches credulity to think that Walmart, famous for its tight control over its global supply chain, didn’t know about this.”

Mr. Nova works closely with the Bangladesh Center for Worker Solidarity and made the factory documents available.

Investigators also found apparel made for Sears and Disney inside the factory after the fire. Both companies said suppliers had given orders to the factory without their knowledge and authorization.

Mr. Gardner said accredited outside auditors had periodically inspected the factory on Walmart’s behalf. A May 2011 audit gave the factory an “orange” rating, meaning that there were “higher-risk violations” and that it would be re-audited within six months. If a factory gets three orange ratings over two years, it loses Walmart’s approval.

A follow-up audit in August 2011 for Walmart gave Tazreen an improved “yellow” rating, meaning “medium-risk violations.”

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Rhode Island Judge Has Stake in Pension Case Outcome

Can a judge rule impartially on pension cuts when her mother, her son, her uncle and even she herself all have a stake in preserving the status quo?

Rhode Island, the site of a sweeping pension overhaul last year, has brought in a prominent New York lawyer to litigate the question: David Boies, perhaps best known for representing Al Gore in the fight over the 2000 presidential election and for waging an antitrust battle against Microsoft on behalf of the government in the 1990s.

Rhode Island’s dispute may not reach quite those dramatic heights, but it is being closely watched as a first major test of whether, and how, financially strained states and cities can cut the benefits of their workers and retirees.

Several public employee unions have sued Gov. Lincoln Chafee and other Rhode Island officials, accusing them of acting illegally when they pushed through a package of money-saving pension cuts last year, including suspending annual cost-of-living increases for most retirees. The unions want the richer benefits restored.

Their five pension lawsuits were assigned to Judge Sarah Taft-Carter of the state Superior Court, who has handled public pension cases before and handed a big victory to the unions in one recent case. Mr. Boies, who at $50 an hour is working for a small fraction of his ordinary fee, is seeking a less conflicted judge, and could even ask to move the case into federal court.

The case has raised questions and strong feelings about the overhaul in Rhode Island, a state so small that it seems as if nearly everybody has friends or family in the pension system. Could the judge see beyond the harsh effects on her own family?

When the subject came up in a hearing in October, Judge Taft-Carter acknowledged that her son, a state trooper, was earning a pension, and her mother, the widow of a mayor, was already receiving one. (The uncle’s pension came to light only later.)

She said she had researched the matter, sought advice from a judicial ethics board and concluded that her relatives’ interests “will not reasonably impact my ability to be impartial.”

Her son joined the state patrol just three years ago, she said, so calculating his pension “requires a large degree of speculation and assumption.” Her mother’s pension was too small to be a factor, she said. (Court papers put it at about $22,000 a year.)

And while the overhaul means the judge’s pension will be smaller despite having to contribute more, she said that was true of all judges in the state: “If my financial interest should require disqualification, then all other state judges would be similarly required to recuse themselves.”

Mr. Boies is expected to appear in court on Friday and cite the state’s judicial code of conduct, which requires judges to recuse themselves when their spouses, parents or children have an economic stake in the litigation before them.

The state’s Supreme Court justices, who have been asked for a review, are also members of the state pension system.

In an interview, Mr. Boies said that challenging Judge Taft-Carter’s impartiality was just “the first step,” and the bigger issue was whether any judges in Rhode Island could handle the case, given their personal stakes. Companies routinely have their pension disputes decided by federal courts, which grant more leeway in changing pension plans.

“The plaintiffs brought this case the way they did to try to avoid federal jurisdiction,” Mr. Boies said.

Whatever the outcome of the hearing, Mr. Boies said he would continue to represent Rhode Island until all of the lawsuits and appeals were decided.

Mr. Boies, whose standard fee is $1,250 an hour, said $50 an hour was “the same fee that I charged the United States when I represented the Department of Justice in the Microsoft case.”

Mr. Boies became involved, he said, because he was convinced that Rhode Island’s pension troubles were just the tip of a $5 trillion iceberg of unsecured retirement promises to the nation’s millions of public workers. “This is something that can cripple state and municipal governments at a time when the federal government is, more and more, cutting back on the services it provides,” he said.

Public employee unions, in Rhode Island and elsewhere, argue that people like Mr. Boies are exaggerating the size of America’s total public pension shortfall.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: December 4, 2012

An earlier version of this article wrongly attributed the following quotation: Rhode Island’s effort is “the clearest example of fundamental pension reform that we have right now,” Ms. Monahan said. “Even though whatever Rhode Island decides doesn’t serve as actual precedent for other states, other states and cities still want to know if it can work.” The quote was from Amy Monahan, not Gina Raimondo.

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