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Six people have been shot dead and at least one other wounded in three locations near Philadelphia, officials in the US state of Pennsylvania say. Montgomery County police are seeking the suspected gunman, whom they named as Bradley William Stone, 35. They say he may be armed and dangerous and told residents to remain indoors. The suspect killed his ex-wife Nicole Stone, her mother, her grandmother, her sister, her sister's husband and 14-year old daughter.

Ashanti Regional Police Commander has condemned attempts by sections of the public who have accused the police of being bias in the handling of the case against hiplife artiste, Kwaw Kese. According to DCOP Kofi Boakye, per the laws governing the country, it is an offense to smoke cannabis and the controversial rapper did that with impunity by also smoking close to a police barrier.   Kwaw Kese, born Emmanuel Botchwey, was arrested by the police in Kumasi on Saturday, November 22, for allegedly smoking cannabis in public. Speaking on the matter in an interview with the Super Moring Show on Joy FM, DCOP Kofi Boakye said Kwaw Kese was arrested for smoking with impunity in public under the nose of the police.

The Ghana AIDS Commission has insisted that former HIV/AIDS ambassador, Joyce Dzidzor Mensah in 2007 tested positive for HIV. This according to the Commission informed their decision to recruit her as an HIV/AIDS ambassador to champion its “Heart to Heart” Campaign. Ms Mensah in a shocking revelation on Monday said she lied about her HIV status despite parading as a carrier for several years. Despite apologizing to Ghanaians for the deception, she insisted that her action “was worth it because a lot of lives were saved through my advocacy work.”

Three Nigerians believed to be members of a gang that manufactures and uses cloned Automated Teller Machine (ATM) cards to withdraw various sums of money from the accounts of a number of bank customers have been arrested. The suspects who claim to be businessmen are: Emmanuel Onye Buchi Umeononoabi, 27; Martin Sunday Akimnwunmi, 27; and Joseph Obiasogo, 32. They are believed to have withdrawn and, in some cases, transferred more than GH¢3 million from the accounts of customers of a number of banks in Accra and other parts of the country.

Members of the Ajumako Dawurampong Royal Family of James Town in the Greater Accra region, are up in arms against what they described as the dictatorial leadership being exhibited by the James Town Alata Mantse, Nii Kojo Ababio V, by inaugurating the Principal Elder's Council to steer the affairs of James Town. According to them, Nii Kojo Ababio V, has substantially abused his office as the Paramount Chief of James Town Alata resulting in detaching the allegiance of some James-Town villages from the Stool. At a press conference to lay bare the many issues that they considered an affront to the development of James Town, the Chairman of the newly inaugurated James Town Principal Elder's Council, Nii Kweikuma IV, Chief of Anumansa division of James Town and Principal elder of Ajumako Dawurampong Royal Family of James Town, noted that the people of James Town cannot continue to live with a dictator like Nii Kojo Ababio.

The known HIV/AIDS Ambassador, Joyce Dzidzor Mensah, who just confessed to the media that she has never been HIV positive, says she is ready to face the legal consequences of her action. She had always claimed antiretroviral drugs kept her healthy and strong. The 27-year-old mother recently told 'News-One' she was only a scammer and that she decided to engage in a wild public deceit so as to get a place to lay her head at a time her neighbours were wrongly accusing her of having HIV. “I was known as the HIV ambassador. The story I shared in the past years was a fusion of my story and the stories of others. The truth of the matter is, I was never infected with HIV,” she said.

An attempt by counsel of hip-life artiste, Emmanuel Botchwey aka ‘Abodam’, to get a Kumasi High Court to grant the musician bail because of medical reasons hit a snag when the lawyers could not produce a medical report to back their claim. Meanwhile a forensic report has confirmed that the substance Abodam was allegedly smoking in public at the time of his arrest was Indian Hemp also known as marijuana. The music icon, remanded to two weeks in prison by the KMA Circuit Court on Monday, had filed a motion at the High Court to be granted bail.

Have you paused for a moment to ask yourself why some music producers or sound engineers in our country have decided not to record secular music but will pay attention in recording only gospel songs?  May be that is not your duty but we at Flex newspaper think about the issues in the entertainment industry which does not prick the conscience of the wisest person among us.

A member of the communication team of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) Nana Boakye has called for the arrest and prosecution of Joyce Dzidzor, AIDS Ambassador for deceiving the public that she is HIV patient for many years. Joyce has claimed over the years that she was HIV positive but was a healthy person because she was on antiretroviral drugs. She has had support and funding from several organizations, institutions, banks and civil society in her campaign across the country on how to prevent HIV and how persons who have tested positive can live healthily and happily with the virus.

Toddlers who share a bed with their parents are at higher risk of asthma, warn researchers. New research suggests bed sharing may lead to an increased risk of asthma in later childhood although it is unclear how the practice could trigger the breathing disorder. Warnings were issued earlier this month about the dangers of parents sharing a bed or sofa with a sleeping baby. This was found to raise the risk of sudden infant death syndrome up to the age of one year. The UK has one of the highest rates of childhood asthma symptoms in the world, affecting 1.1 million children.

She once stood on international platforms as an AIDS Ambassador and encouraged us about not to fear if we ever contracted the deadly disease. Even in Gods’ house, Joyce Dzidzor pretended she had the disease but it now turns out her entire campaign was a hoax.  She never had the disease and despite shooting to fame on deceit, she claims she did it with intent to help people living with the disease.  “I realized that I couldn’t continue deceiving people I was living with AIDS that is why I had to render an unqualified apology. I am sorry for what I have taken people through,” she apologized. 

BEIJING (AP) — A court in northern China has cleared a teenager of the rape and murder of a woman in a public toilet 18 years after he was executed for the crime. The Inner Mongolia Higher People's Court announced Monday that it had overturned the conviction of Huugjilt, who was 18 when he was sentenced to death and executed. The court's online statement said the defendant had been found "not guilty." In an article carried by the official Xinhua News Agency, the deputy head of the court, Zhao Jianping, offered his "sincere apologies" to Huugjilt's parents. State media carried photos of a court official handing over the verdict to Huugjilt's weeping parents at their home. The retrial was held last month, nine years after another man confessed to the 1996 crime.

PARIS (AP) — The Malian government says it exchanged four prisoners to secure the release of a French hostage held for three years by al-Qaida's North African branch. The liberation of Serge Lazarevic last week revived debate among Western governments over whether to negotiate with hostage-takers. Mali government spokesman Mahamane Baby said Sunday that al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb demanded the release of six prisoners "but the government freed only four, including two Malians." The French government has not publicly confirmed a prisoner exchange or explained the circumstances of Lazarevic's release. France insists it pays no ransoms and does not exchange prisoners, although President Francois Hollande has acknowledged that other countries have done so, "to help us."

SYDNEY (AP) — Five people have fled from a Sydney cafe where a gunman took an unknown number of hostages at the height of Monday morning rush hour. Two people inside the cafe were earlier seen holding up a flag containing an Islamic declaration of faith. The first development came six hours after the hostage crisis began, when three men were seen running from a fire exit of the Lindt Chocolat Cafe in downtown Sydney. Shortly afterward, two women, one after another, sprinted from the cafe and into the arms of heavily armed police. Both were wearing aprons with the Lindt chocolate logo, indicating they were cafe employees.

"Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.’ Mature love says ‘I need you because I love you’.” ~Erich Fromm  How often have you thought you were truly in love, only to lose those in-love feelings after a few months? Have you believed you were in love but discovered that you were ‘in need’ instead?

Former President John Agyekum Kufuor Saturday night counselled Ghanaian youths not to look down on their chosen vocations but to persevere for success. He told 115 graduating students of EKGS Culinary Institute in Accra who had completed courses in Cake Making and Decorating, Pastry Making Art, Cookery and Balloon as well as Ribbon and Floral Arts that the vocations they had chosen for themselves compared favourably with any other, such as those in the health and education sectors. What the graduates needed to succeed, the former president noted, was for them to persevere.

Several people have been taken hostage by at least one armed man at a Lindt cafe in Sydney, Australia. Hundreds of armed police have sealed off the normally busy Martin Place in the central business district. At least three people have been seen inside the cafe with their hands up against a window, and holding up a black flag with Arabic writing. Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has described the incident as "deeply concerning". Tony Abbott: "This is a very disturbing incident" He said it was not yet clear who was behind the incident but that it could be politically motivated, and that the National Security Committee had been briefed.

The 2016 flagbearer of the main opposition New Patriotic Party, Nana Akufo Addo has said he won’t allow his appointees to embezzle state funds, if he is elected as President. “I have told members of the NPP, anybody who wants to be in government with the intention of coming to steal money; it will be impossible.

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) has virtually taken over Kumasi, the Ashanti Regional Capital, where it is billed to hold its national delegate’s congress. The NDC congress, which is to elect new national executives to manage the affairs of the party for the next four years, will take place at the Baba Yara Sports Stadium on Saturday, December 20. With about one-week away from the important congress, Kumasi seems to have been taken over by the ruling political party and its numerous followers.

 Pastor Mensa Otabil, Founder and General Overseer of the International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), has chided authorities of the Kotoka International Airport (KIA) for what he considers a display of low level of wisdom. He said the Kotoka International Airport, which is a major transit point in West Africa, lacks among other things, a jet way (tunnel that connects the plane to the terminal) for passengers coming off the plane. “So anybody who arrives at Kotoka International Airport gets down in this day and age from the plane and descends; there is not a jet way. Almost every country has a jet way to protect you from the elements but in Ghana No! No! No!” he bemoaned.

Ghana and Togo have renewed their commit-ment to implement a project to harvest water from the Volta River and export it from Sogakope to Lome. Known as the Sogakope–Lome Trans-boundary Water Supply Project, the initiative has been on the drawing board since 1970 but lack of funds and technical challenges stalled its implementation.