A special programme is being written into a new government computer system to prevent thousands of non-existent criminal court cases being called for trial all over the country on the last day of the 20th century. Her family have no idea where she had been staying.Police believe her friends could hold vital clues to her death, and her closest friend has been asked to draw up a list of people who may be able to shed light on her life away from school.Detective Superintendent Tony Whittle, leading the inquiry, said: “It may be that she was living some kind of double life. “The first is ensuring that CBDE [Porton Down] is not unduly selective in what it chooses to tell the national authority – that it does not hold back information about, for example, some attractive new chemical-weapons possibility.” In 1975, he said, the US Senate discovered that the CIA’s Technical Services Division had retained stocks of a toxic weapon in breach of the Biological Weapons Convention.The second problem was “whether Porton actually has the requisite reach into the industrial, academic and other worlds where there is leading- edge research”.. Murder squad detectives were yesterday questioning friends and relatives of a 15-year-old girl after her body was found at a secluded beauty spot. Police say Nobantu Zani, whose decomposed body was found covered with branches on moors near Bingley, West Yorkshire, may have led a double life.
Nobantu, who liked to be known as Mandy, had not been reported missing because her South African mother thought she was staying with a friend.The teenager had not been seen since 11 September and police believe she was strangled soon after that date – with her own chiffon scarf.Mandy regularly played truant from Buttershaw Upper School in Bradford, and had not been seen at home since 9 September. The civil servants will constitute the “national authority” required by the CWC, which is supposed to keep track of the movements of all these chemicals and to investigate any discrepancies.Porton Down’s military experts will advise and assist the “national authority” in monitoring scientific developments that might lead to new types of chemical weapons.According to Professor Julian Perry Robinson of the University of Sussex, this raises two problems.

absent from the draft Bill.”Just 10 civil servants within the Department of Trade and Industry are to be responsible for monitoring more than 500 companies and 2,000 sites which employ lethally toxic chemicals that have a dual military-civilian use. But the Government plans to exempt the Wiltshire centre from legislation making chemical weapons illegal. The only public scrutiny of government departments will be through ministerial accountability to Parliament.
The Government has taken the unusual step of publishing draft legislation before introducing the Bill to Parliament. The deadline for comments on the draft expires this weekend.However experts say the legislation is not tough enough to measure up to the international Convention on Chemical Weapons and may lead to difficulties. Nicholas Sims, of the London School of Economics, said “most of the elements of national implementation of the CWC are …

Porton Down, the Ministry of Defence’s chemical and biological research centre, is to play a leading role in verifying that British companies are not illegally making or exporting chemical weapons. “We would much prefer it to get back on track with some persuasion from the Government.”. Industry analysts predict that the first non-British Gas suppliers will be existing utilities such as privatised water and electricity suppliers.Mr Powe said, however, that he would not want to see British Gas lose the Charter Mark because it would have an adverse effect on the company’s morale. This itself is a serious breach of British Gas’s operating licence.The first domestic competitors to British Gas will be phased in next April with some 50,000 customers in Somerset, Devon and Cornwall.

Frequent complaints prompting this apology included meters being read wrongly, inaccurate bills sent out and only four per cent of customers who phoned in to complain getting through in the time laid down by regulators. They’re taking on temporaries who are not of the same level of training – and there’s confusion in British Gas about who is dealing with what.”The company said that when service levels fell, it brought in extra staff and freephone helplines and that “99.9 per cent” of its customers had not complained.”We are proud of our Charter Mark which reflects our previous high level of customer service and we believe we should retail the award,” it said in a statement.British Gas’s monopoly of supply to Britain’s 18 million domestic gas users is to be phased out over the next few years.The company has been repeatedly criticised in recent months over various controversies including the pounds 475,000 salary of the chief executive, Cedric Brown, and the decision earlier this month to raise the cost of service contracts.Three million gas users have contracts and the Gas Consumers’ Council has said the rise could have serious safety implications if many people decide to go without a regular service or rely on “cowboys”.Earlier this year Mr Brown apologised to British Gas customers for poor service. But he stressed the main reason for his visit had been to officiate at the ordination in Letterkenny of the new Bishop of Raphoe, Philip Boyce.Meanwhile, the Bishop of Ferns, Brendan Comiskey, who last month left his post on a three-month sabbatical, confirmed he was receiving treatment in the United States for alcoholism. Rebutting press speculation that he had been forced out, he stressed the decision to go had been his.Bishop Comiskey has been at the centre of controversy since June after challenging the Vatican to allow a debate on its rule of priestly celibacy.Leading article, page 14Holy disorder, Section Two. Complaints against British Gas are at an all-time high, according to a report by the Gas Consumers’ Council published last night. The report reveals that 30,000 people have complained about poor service and falling standards so far this year – more than double the figure for the same period last year.