Oscar Pistorius Rebuked by Judge Masipa for Claiming "Tiredness" During Murder Trial

Oscar Pistorius was rebuked by the judge for complaining about feeling "tired" in the witness boxAFP

Oscar Pistorius was rebuked by the judge during a fifth gruelling day of evidence at his murder trial.

Pistorius struggled under questioning by prosecution counsel Gerrie Nel about whether or not he turned off the alarm system in his house on the night Steenkamp died.

The prosecutor told him: "Your mistakes are as convincing as your evidence and way you deliver it. That is a problem."

Pistorius claimed he was being inconsistent in some of his answers because he was "tired." Nel accused him of "tailoring evidence".

The runner's excuse about exhaustion at the witness stand brought an intervention from judge Maispa. She issued a rebuke to the Olympian and Paralympian, saying: "It's important that you should be all here when you're in that witness box.

"If the reason you're making all these mistakes is that you're tired, then you must say so. It doesn't help to make all these mistakes," she warned.

Nel claimed Pistorius shot Reeva Steenkamp dead while she stood on the other side of the bathroom door at his luxury home, having fled the runner during an argument.

Pistorius denied he went toward the bathroom with the gun because he was angry with Steenkamp. He insisted it was because he was convinced an intruder had climbed in through the window.

The prosecutor questioned why Pistorius went there if he was feeling "vulnerable" that an intruder was in there.

Nel said: "You went towards the danger. Why did you do that? The fact is if you had stayed in the room Reeva would be alive. You said you felt vulnerable but you approached the danger. The two don't make sense."

He said: "If she had been scared she would have hidden somewhere in the toilet. She was standing in front of the toilet door talking to you when you shot," he said. "That's the only reason she was standing [there] when you shot her in the head: she was scared of you."

Nel questioned why Pistorius would think someone would want to attack him. The runner said he regularly heard about incidents where residents were tied up in their homes or sprayed with MACE by raiders.

Nel replied: "You knew Reeva Steenkamp was behind the door and you shot at her. That's the only thing that makes sense."

Pistorius denies murder and claims he mistook Steenkamp for an intruder inside his luxury home on the outskirts of Pretoria. The prosecution alleges he killed her following an argument between the couple.

The trial continues.

Pictures of the Week: Best Photos of Past Seven Days

American golfer Scott Stallings's son Finn plays during the Par 3 Contest prior the start of the 78th Masters Golf Tournament at AugustaAFP

A swimmer balances a cup on her head during a training session in Chartres, on the eve of the first day of the French swimming championshipsAFP

Camille Muffat powers her way to win the women's 100m freestyle final during the French Swimming championships in ChartresAFP

Prince George plays with his mother's hair on his first official engagement during their royal tour of New ZealandMarty Melville/AFP

Prince William and Kate Middleton are greeted by a Maori man with a tattooed bare bottomAFP

Prince William picks up a dart during a Maori welcoming ceremony at Government House in WellingtonAFP

Prince William meets children in the crowd after laying a wreath with his wife at the war memorial in Seymour SquareReuters

Prince William holds an umbrella above his wife and then spills water on her before boarding two America's Cup yachts on Auckland HarbourReuters

A veteran awaits the arrival of Prince William and Kate Middleton at the Blenheim War Memorial in New ZealandGetty

The President of Ireland Michael D Higgins is dwarfed by troops of the Queen's Company, Grenadier Guards as he inspects the guard at honour during the first-ever state visit to Britain by an Irish head of stateReuters

The Queen laughs at Windsor Castle as she bids farewell to Irish President Michael D Higgins and his wife Sabina at the end of their official visitAFP

Ukip leader Nigel Farage arrives to speak at a meeting at Old Basing Village Hall in BasingstokeGetty

Girls look at their hands after shaking hands with US President Barack Obama at Bladensburg High School in Bladensburg, MarylandReuters

Fans record Lady Gaga as she performs onstage at Roseland Ballroom in New York CityGetty

People visit an upside-down home, a tourist attraction, in St PetersburgReuters

Aerial view of flower fields near the Keukenhof park, also known as the Garden of Europe, in Lisse, NetherlandsReuters

Newlyweds Flor Perez and Jose Ramirez kiss in front of "Cupid's Span", a sculpture by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, in San FranciscoReuters

A performer dressed as the Hindu goddess Kali participates in a procession to celebrate the Ram Navami festival in Allahabad, IndiaAFP

A boy prays during a Buddhist novice ordination ceremony in Mae Hong Son, ThailandGetty

Assistants use incense and cigarettes to drive bees away from She Ping's face. He covered himself in more than 460,000 drones, weighing over 45 kg (99 lbs)Reuters

Competitors attend the 2nd Russian Beard and Moustache Championships in MoscowReuters

Twin polar bear cubs play in their enclosure at Hellabrunn zoo in Munich. The two cubs have now been named – Nela and NobbyReuters

King and Zoe, twin brown bear cubs, play in their enclosure at Juraparc animal park near Vallorbe, SwitzerlandReuters

Seven-month-old giant panda Xing Bao explores its new enclosure at the zoo in MadridAFP

Jimmel, an owl-faced monkey, protects her one-month old baby at the zoo in AntwerpReuters

A tourist reacts as an elephant sprays her with water in celebration of the Songkran water festival in Thailand's Ayutthaya province. Songkran marks the start of Thailand's New YearReuters

Hungarian women cast their ballots inside a polling station during parliamentary elections in Veresegyhaza near BudapestReuters

Afghan women look for brooms at a roadside shop in HeratAFP

Jyoti Amge, 20, the shortest woman in the world and a first-time voter, shows her voting card and ink-marked finger after casting her vote in Nagpur, IndiaReuters

Politicians come to blows during a session of the parliament in Kiev, UkraineReuters

A pro-Russia protester stands at a barricade outside a regional government building in Donetsk, eastern UkraineReuters

Street cleaners sweep away bullet cases as they remove rubbish and a barricade erected by pro-Russian protesters near a building of the state security service in Donetsk, eastern UkraineReuters

Kenyan men try to put out a fire caused by an electrical fault at the Deep Sea slum in NairobiAFP

Men rescue a boy from under the rubble of a building after what activists said was a barrel bomb attack by forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar Al-Assad in Al-Shaar neighbourhood of AleppoReuters

India's Gold and Silver Imports Plunge 40% in Fiscal 2013-14

India's central bank allows five private banks to import gold.Reuters

Gold and silver imports to India, the world's second-largest consumer of the yellow metal, plunged 40% to $33.46bn in the fiscal year 2013-14 in the wake of tough government restrictions.

However, the drop in gold and silver imports narrowed in March, recording a year-on-year drop of 17.27% to $2.76bn (£1.64bn, €1.99bn), an unnamed Indian trade ministry source told Reuters.

Last month, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) decided to allow five private sector banks to import gold, in a move that marked a major step towards easing India's tough bullion import restrictions, imposed in 2013 in order to cut the nation's trade deficit.

Government Raids

Earlier in March, Indian authorities made physical checks of gold stocks held by wholesalers, to ensure inventories tally with the amount imported through legal channels, an industry association said.

The checks were part of efforts aimed at curbing gold smuggling.

Pakistan Bans Imports

Earlier this year, Pakistan temporarily prohibited gold imports in a bid to check smuggling to neighbouring India.

Islamabad said, on 21 January, the ban would last for 30 days and that exports, mostly jewellery, would not be restricted.

Pakistan last banned gold imports for a month in August 2013 after the country purchased gold worth $514m (£313m, €380m) in the preceding month.

Indian Import Curbs

Three upward revisions to the import duties on gold in 2013, to a record 10%, and restrictions tying purchases to exports, have discouraged gold buying in Asia's third-largest economy.

While official imports in 2013 reached 750 tonnes, an additional 200 tonnes was believed to have been smuggled to india, according to estimates from the World Gold Council.

New Delhi imposed the so-called 80/20 rule in July 2013, making it mandatory to export a fifth of all gold imports.

According to that rule, only six banks and three state-run trading agencies that had facilitated export of jewellery or gold over the past three years were allowed to import. These six banks were mainly state-run lenders.

Have Scientists Found First Exomoon by Chance?

Artist impression of two possible scenarios of the discovery - left hand image shows the exomoon.NASA/JPL-Caltech

Scientists believe they have accidentally discovered their first exomoon - a natural satellite outside the solar system.

The lunar candidate, which was spotted near a cosmic system dubbed MOA-2011-BLG-262, was seen by chance using a telescopes in New Zealand and Tasmania.

Using a technique known as gravitational microlensing, the researchers were able to take advantage of chance alignments between stars.

"When a foreground star passes between us and a more distant star, the closer star can act like a magnifying glass to focus and brighten the light of the more distant one. These brightening events usually last about a month," Nasa explained.

If a foreground star has a planet circling it, the planet acts as a lens to brighten the light. This means researchers are able to measure the mass of a planet in comparison to its orbiting companion – which in this case appears to be a moon.

Researchers will not have the opportunity to observe the potential exomoon again because of the method used to first spot it.

The study was led by the joint Japan-New Zealand-American Microlensing Observations in Astrophysics (MOA) and the Probing Lensing Anomalies NETwork (Planet) programmes.

Lead author David Bennett, of the University of Notre Dame, said: "We won't have a chance to observe the exomoon candidate again. But we can expect more unexpected finds like this."

In their study, the researchers said the ratio of the larger body to its smaller companion is 2,000 to one, meaning it could either be a small faint star circled by a planet, or a planet bigger than Jupiter coupled with a moon.

However, there is no way of working out which one of these scenarios is true: "One possibility is for the lensing system to be a planet and its moon, which if true, would be a spectacular discovery of a totally new type of system," said Wes Traub, the chief scientist for Nasa's Exoplanet Exploration Programme office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

"The researchers' models point to the moon solution, but if you simply look at what scenario is more likely in nature, the star solution wins."

To work out if the first exomoon has been discovered, researchers will have to work out the distance of the circling objects. The true identity of the mystery object, will, for now, remain unknown.

India Equities Rally: Investor Optimism Over Elections May be Misplaced

Investor optimism over India elections may be misplaced.Reuters

Optimistic investors are returning to India's $1.2tn equity market, amid forecasts that the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will win elections and deliver a government that can revive economic growth from a decade low, but analysts advise caution.

Analysts want investors to tread with caution given that the current level of optimism does not correspond with the fundamentals of Asia's third-largest economy.

Investors are betting on the BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, who supervised annual economic growth of 10% as the head of the Gujarat state since 2001.

India's benchmark share average – the S&P BSE Sensex – has risen 7.04% this year.

However, any new government, "will have to do something dramatic to replicate the current [market] run-rate" post elections, Shubhada M Rao, senior president and chief economist, Yes Bank, told IBTimes UK.

The market rally is not "commensurate with the fundamentals of the [Indian] economy as yet," Rao said in a telephone interview.

"Investors [eyeing the Indian equity markets] should be more cautious than the current optimism suggests," said Miguel Chanco, India economist at Capital Economics.

"The most optimistic polls still see the BJP requiring coalition partners to form a government. Governing within a coalition is likely to mean that a BJP administration at the centre may face difficulties implementing far reaching reforms.

"In addition, we caution that the BJP is not entirely the free market stalwart it is often perceived and portrayed as. For example, it has opposed the entry of foreign investment in the multi-brand retail sector, which is a position it reiterated specifically in its manifesto for this election cycle," Chanco said in an e-mail to IBTimes UK.

"With these in mind, we think the current optimism is going too far, in our view, especially considering the recent heights the market has hit over the past few weeks.

"Apart from the uncertainty regarding the elections, it is worth remembering that India still has a lot of macro economic and business environment problems that are unlikely to be solved over night, such as high inflation, a high fiscal deficit, rigid labour laws, infrastructure deficits, etc," Chanco added.

"A strong coalition is a pre-requisite for investor confidence to build. That's a necessary condition. A performing government is a sufficient condition," said Rao.

"[India] needs result-oriented decision making. Performance and policy are essential for [investor] confidence to stay alive," she added.

"I still see 2014 as a year in which emerging market economies with large foreign borrowings like India's are vulnerable," said Bill Adams, senior international economist for the PNC Financial Services Group.

"From an international perspective, some of the change in sentiment toward Indian assets is probably related to the stabilisation, and now today, decline of US benchmark interest rates. Lower US interest rates increase the premium earned on Indian financial assets relative to assets seen by investors in industrial economies as risk free.

"I expect US interest rates to turn a corner and rise again in the coming months, which would bring back the driver of Indian capital markets' 'awful August' of 2013," Adams said in an e-mail to IBTimes UK.

Modi has promised to boost investment if he takes power from South Asia's longest serving prime minister, Manmohan Singh.

Growth in India has dropped from a high of about 9.6% in the fiscal year 2006-07 to a decade low 4.5%.

Reeva Steenkamp's Mother Helps Pistorius in Court During Gerrie Nel Mauling

June Steenkamp (in white) watches Oscar Pistorius in court during his murder trialReuters

Reeva Steenkamp's grieving family intervened on behalf of her killer in court today as Oscar Pistorius prepared for another grilling in his murder trial.

A message from Reeva's mother June Steenkamp was read out by prosecutor Gerrie Nel before he went on tom make the fallen star cry again during relentless cross-examination.

But June's intervention struck a blow against Nel by undermining his portrayal of Pistorius as callous and self-centred.

June Steenkamp told North Gauteng High Court in her message that Pistorius had made efforts to meet with her following Reeva's violent killing.

She said they rejected the Bladerunner's request because they were not ready to meet the 27-year-old who gunned down the model.

Opening proceedings at North Gauteng High Court, Nel said: "After the adjournment yesterday Mrs Steenkamp said that Oscar Pistorius requested a meeting prior to the trial, but they were not ready for the meeting. Mrs Steenkamp felt it was important we put it on the record."

Earlier this week, the dogged prosecutor reduced the fallen track star to tears by claiming his apology to the Steenkamps in court was stage-managed and designed for his own benefit.

In dramatic scenes on Monday, Pistorius wept as he apologised to Reeva's relations present in court for gunning her down in a hail of bullets at his home on Valentine's Day last year.

Addressing them, he said: "There's not a month and there hasn't been a moment since this tragedy happened that I have not thought about your family.

"I wake up in the morning and you are the first people I pray for. I can't imagine the pain and sorrow you feel. I was trying to protect Reeva. I promise when Reeva went to bed that night she was loved.

"I've tried to put my thoughts on paper to write to you, but no words would ever suffice."

Recalling the episode on Thursday, Nel laid into Pistorius over the incident, saying: "That was more than a year after the event. Why would you create a spectacle in the public eye and not in private? You never thought about how they would feel sitting in the public gallery."

The Olympian and Paralympian denies murder and claims he mistook Steenkamp for an intruder inside his luxury home on the outskirts of Pretoria. The prosecution alleges he killed her following an argument between the couple.

The trial continues

India's Infosys Begins Search for Head as Last Founder-CEO Offers to Leave Amid Falling Stock

Infosys founder and chairman N R Narayana Murthy.Reuters

India-based IT services provider Infosys has hired executive search firm Egon Zehnder to help find a successor to CEO SD Shibulal, who announced early retirement.

The hunt for a new CEO comes as the company's performance lags behind its peers in Indian IT services sector. Bangalore-based Infosys was the third-worst performer this year on the S&P BSE Information Technology Index.

Egon Zehnder will help identify external candidates for the top job at Infosys while the company will also look for internal candidates.

This would be the first time the company looks to hire as CEO someone who is not its founder. Like Shibulal, former CEOs -- NR Narayana Murthy, Nandan Nilekani and Kris Gopalakrishnan – were also co-founders of the company.

"The Nominations Committee will short list and evaluate an internal slate of candidates with the assistance of Development Dimensions International (DDI), a company specializing in corporate executive evaluations," Infosys said in a statement.

Potential internal candidates for the job include BG Srinivas, the company's president.

Shibulal, one of the seven Infosys founders, has expressed his desire to retire on or before his superannuation on 9 January 2015, the company said.

Infosys shares underperformed the market during his tenure as CEO, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The shares have risen 42% since August 2011, when Shibulal was appointed as CEO, compared with an 82% rise in the 10-member BSE IT index in the same period.

The idea of external CEO candidates is part of founder chairman NR Narayana Murthy's plan to restructure Infosys.

Murthy, who returned as the company's chairman in June, earlier said that he was not 'very happy' with Infosys' performance over the last two years.

"We could have done a better job in executing Infosys 3.0 strategy," Murthy said.

Infosys shares declined 8.7% this year, as India's second-largest IT services exporter forecast annual sales at the lower end of its earlier guidance and well below the domestic industry forecast.

The stock has plummeted 17% since the end of February, compared with a 7% gain in the benchmark BSE Sensex.

Infosys shares closed up 0.9% at 3,235 rupees on the Bombay Stock Exchange.

Sony Confirms Battery Fire Risk with Vaio Fit 11A Laptop

Sony has urged customers to stop using the new Vaio Fit 11A following three reports of the battery catching fire.Sony

Sony has warned customers that using its new Vaio laptops could potentially result in the computers overheating and catching fire.

The Sony Vaio Fit 11A laptops were launched in February and have since been shipped to 52 countries around the world.

Sony hasn't confirmed if it has stopped selling the Vaio Fit 11A or if it will be issuing a recall of all units sold so far. IBTimes UK has contacted Sony to try and confirm these details.

Of the 25,905 laptops sold, 7,158 were in Europe; 497 were in the US and 3,619 were in Sony's home market of Japan.

According to the electronics giant, there have been three reported incidents of Vaio laptops setting fire.

"There is a risk that battery overheating could damage part of the computer," Sony said in a statement on its website. "We're asking customers to stop using their PC immediately, unplug the cable and stop using it."

The batteries in question were in fact manufactured by Sony rival Panasonic. The lithium-ion battery pack powers the laptop, as well as the tablet computer that it is capable of transforming into.

Shift of focus

The news comes just a few months before a deal is expected to be completed for the sale of Sony's Vaio computer division.

Sony announced in February that it would be quitting the PC business in order to focus on mobile for a variety of reasons, including "drastic changes in the global PC industry".

The investment fund Japanese Industrial Partners (JIP) will be taking control of the business for an as yet undisclosed sum.

When the deal was first announced, Sony stated: "The optimal solution is to concentrate its mobile product lineup on smartphones and tablets and to transfer its PC business to a new company."

Reuters Plans Tie-Up With Iran's Tehran Stock Exchange

A trader speaks with a stock market official beneath the electronic board at the Tehran stock exchangeReuters

News agency Thomson Reuters is exploring business opportunities in Iran in the event of international sanctions against the Islamic republic being lifted.

Earlier, the Wall Street Journal reported that Iran's Tehran Stock Exchange was in talks to share its trading data with the news provider once the main sanctions against the country were lifted.

Hassan Qalibaf, chief executive of the Tehran Stock Exchange, told WSJ that a meeting between representatives of Thomson Reuters and officials of the exchange was held on 9 April during the officials' recent visit to London.

"They are interested in disseminating the trading data of the Tehran capital market," he told WSJ.

Qalibaf added that Tehran's bourse is an "untouched market" in terms of foreign investment, with overseas investors holding just 1% of the shares listed on the exchange, compared to about 60% on average at other exchanges across the Middle East.

Reuters later confirmed the meeting between the companies in London.

"Thomson Reuters complies with all sanction rules and regulations," a Thomson Reuters spokeswoman said.

"Consistent with these rules, the meeting was used to express mutual interest in exploring potential business opportunities should sanctions permit and the opportunity be aligned with our business objectives."

The spokeswoman added that the parties had reached no agreement of any type on the matter during the meeting.

Thomson Reuters supplies news to media clients in Iran, as is permitted under the sanctions imposed on the country by global powers.

The exchange's visit to London was seen as the latest attempt by Iran to attract investments to its embattled economy after reaching an interim agreement to partially lift sanctions with six world powers.

In November 2013, a group of global powers including the US, Russia and Great Britain agreed to limited sanctions relief in exchange for Iran's six-month suspension of some nuclear activities.

The deal between Iran and six world powers was reached in Geneva on 24 November and is dubbed the Geneva Joint Plan of Action.

Following the deal, Iranian investors flocked to the Tehran Stock Exchange, resulting in a 130% rise in its benchmark index in 2013. The exchange is one of the largest financial centres in the Middle East.

Due to the current sanctions targeting the financial sector of the economy, it is virtually impossible for Western banks to invest in the country.

Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370: Australia Sending Mixed Signals over Black Box Pings

A crew member aboard a Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) P3 Orion maritime search aircraft watches a smoke flare after it was deployed to mark an unidentified object while flying over the southern Indian Ocean to look for the missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370Reuters

Australian authorities are sending mixed signals over the latest developments in the hunt for the black box of the Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 even as unconfirmed reports suggesting the flight data recorder has been found are doing the rounds.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has said the searchers are "very confident" that the acoustic pings from the southern Indian Ocean are from the black box of the missing airliner and the crew is closing in on the exact location.

"It's been very much narrowed down because we've now had a series of detections, some for quite a long period of time. Nevertheless, we're getting to the stage where the signal from what we are very confident is the black box is starting to fade," Abbott told reporters in Beijing.

"We are hoping to get as much information as we can before the signal finally expires."

The Australian premier, who will be meeting Chinese president Xi Jinping shortly, said he was not divulging more information because of respect for the relatives of the Chinese passengers.

Meanwhile, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), which is leading the search operations, has said in its latest press statement that no major breakthrough has been achieved.

Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston (Retd), the chief of the search activities, said: "The Australian Joint Acoustic Analysis Centre has analysed the acoustic data and confirmed that the signal reported in the vicinity of the Australian Defence Vessel Ocean Shield is unlikely to be related to the aircraft black boxes."

In all, the Australian vessel had detected five acoustic pulses, but experts have said the last one is unrelated.

The Boeing 777 passenger aircraft, with 239 people on board, went missing on 8 March while it was flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Neither the jetliner nor its debris has been found so far although authorities now believe the airliner crashed in the southern Indian Ocean.

Authorities are racing against time as the battery life of the flight data recorder runs out in 30 days.