Bibiana Steinhaus will become the first female to referee in the Bundesliga.

The 38-year-old police officer has been named as one of four new referees in Germany's top flight for 2017-18.
Steinhaus - the partner of English ex-Premier League and World Cup referee Howard Webb - has refereed second-tier games for six years.
"I am aware that I will be the first female referee in the Bundesliga and will be closely watched by the media and the public," Steinhaus said.
"For us all, it's a dream come true. I'm very much looking forward to the task that awaits me," she added.
Webb, who is now leading efforts to introduce video technology to Major League Soccer, said he was "absolutely thrilled to bits" and believes it could help to inspire more women to reach the top level.
He told BBC Radio 5 live he did not think it would be too long before the Premier League had female officials taking charge of games.
"We have some good female officials in England, more and more are coming through and if they have the ability it shouldn't make any difference if they are male or female," he added.
Steinhaus has faced scrutiny already in German football and admitted: "I have worked very hard for this in the last few years and suffered a few setbacks."
When fourth official at a Bayern Munich match in October 2014, then Bayern coach Pep Guardiola put his arm around her shoulders as he argued about a refereeing decision. She brushed his arm off but the Spaniard was subsequently criticised in the media.
Fortuna Dusseldorf midfielder Kerem Demirbay was banned for five games in 2015 for saying "women have no place in men's football" after Steinhaus sent him off for a second bookable offence.
He later apologised but was ordered by his club to referee a girls' football match as punishment.
DFB president Reinhard Grindel said: "Hopefully the first female referee in the Bundesliga is an incentive for many young girls in this country to try to emulate her."
Steinhaus  will referee the Women's Champions League final between Lyon and Paris St-Germain in Cardiff on 1 June.


Humza Yousaf has called on a UKIP MEP to resign after the Scottish government minister was reportedly compared to a convicted terrorist.

In a newspaper interview, David Coburn is alleged to have said: "Humza Yousaf, or as I call him, Abu Hamza".
Mr Yousaf told BBC Scotland the comment was "Islamophobic" and "among the worst racial slurs" he had ever received.
A UKIP spokesman denied the comparison had been made and said it was a "slip of the tongue" on Mr Coburn's part.
Mr Yousaf, Scotland's minister for external affairs and international development, has written to UKIP leader Nigel Farage demanding that Mr Coburn, who is Scotland's only UKIP MEP, is expelled from the party.
Mr Yousaf said he was taking legal advice on the matter.
"I'm the first to tell people to report it, so if potentially a crime has been committed - and as I say, I'm seeking legal advice on that - then of course I will report him to the police.
"If not, then, you know, at least - at the very least - the political party UKIP should certainly be taking disciplinary action against him."
Radical cleric Abu Hamza was sentenced to life in prison for a string of terrorism offences by a judge in New York in January, after being extradited from the UK.
Hamza, who previously lived in London, was jailed in the UK for seven years in 2006 for soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred.
The comments were reportedly made over the telephone to a Daily Mail reporter during a conversation about the BBC Scotland's Big Immigration Debate, which took place earlier this week.
Mr Coburn is reported to have said: "Humza Yousaf, or as I call him, Abu Hamza, didn't seem to turn up."
Speaking to BBC Scotland, Glasgow MSP Mr Yousaf said: "I have had racist and Islamophobic slurs many times over the years, but this is among the worst. For this to come from an elected representative is beyond the pale and completely unacceptable."
He added: "This is an insult to the entire Muslim community, which is fighting Islamophobia in society. It has caused hurt and deep offense. David Coburn should resign, and if he does not, Nigel Farage should remove him from UKIP."
Scotland's main political parties have united in condemning Mr Coburn's reported comments, with First Minister Nicola Sturgeon describing them as "reprehensible".
She added: "For David Coburn to effectively compare Humza to a convicted terrorist because he is Muslim is disgraceful and he must surely face consequences for that."
Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy said: "This isn't the first time that Mr Coburn has been caught out for having vile views. People across Scotland, including even those who voted for him, will now want to see the back of him."
Ruth Davidson, leader of the Scottish Conservatives tweeted: "Totally unacceptable. Our country is better than this. And he's got form. Mindless idiot."
Meanwhile, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie called Mr Coburn "an offensive fool".
Mazhar Khan, spokesman for the Muslim Council of Scotland, said: "The stereotyping of Muslims as extremists and terrorists is one the most shameful forms of Islamophobia, and constantly used by right-wing groups such as the BNP and the English/Scottish Defence League to caricature Muslims.
"The fact that UKIP is no stranger to such controversy and has regularly been accused of having racists within its ranks only exacerbates the offence."
Mr Coburn was reported in the Daily Mail as saying he offered his "sincerest apologies" for the comments.
However, UKIP's Scottish chairman, Arthur Misty Thackeray, denied a comparison with Abu Hamza had been made, and said his colleague had made a "slip of the tongue" and "got a name wrong".
He added: "He simply got a name wrong, which many people do on a daily basis.
"For example, I very often get referred to as Minty, which I believe is a character from EastEnders, but I don't take offence at that and run greeting to the papers about Mistyphobia."


The Prime Minister has signed the letter notifying the European Union that the UK is leaving and will trigger Article 50.

Theresa May has said her goal was for the UK to build a "deep and special partnership" after Brexit.
Talks on the terms of exit and future relations are expected to take two years.
There has been a lot of speculation and debate about the prospect of a so-called hard border since last June's EU Referendum vote.
But what else should Northern lreland look out for during this process? BBC News NI specialist correspondents take a look at the key issues that will impact us.
Business and economy - Julian O'Neill
Northern Ireland's biggest export market remains its nearest neighbour.
Just under one third of its total manufactured goods - £2.4bn - were sold across its land border in 2016. But increasingly the region has been broadening its horizons.
Many companies will not want cross-border trade to be damaged by Brexit and whatever border arrangements follow.
Selling beyond Ireland and outside the European Union is becoming more of a priority. To this end, Invest NI, the jobs promotion agency, is opening up to 10 new offices worldwide.
Chile and Singapore are among its latest outposts. After the Irish Republic, Northern Ireland's largest customer is the United States.
Around £1.6bn worth of goods were sent stateside in 2016, up 41% off the back of a weaker pound.
It would be wrong, however, to understate the importance of EU markets.
Of Northern Ireland's £7.7bn export total, the majority of sales (£4.2bn) were to the EU.
But growth in non-EU export markets has been accelerating at a quicker rate in recent years.
The business community probably desires the best of both worlds - a negotiated free trade arrangement involving the EU, with the UK cutting deals with other big economies like the US and China.
But that could be a huge ask - especially within a two-year time frame.
Farmers in Northern Ireland had hoped to maintain their farm subsidies post-Brexit. The EU contributes about £250m a year to farmers.
But all the indications from government are that the annual cheque is a thing of the past.
Instead it looks increasingly like support will be much more targeted through things like agri-environment schemes - in which farmers are rewarded for environmental services such as flood prevention work and biodiversity schemes.
And there's a suggestion that there'll be a greater reliance on things like insurance and futures markets to help manage volatility in prices paid for what they produce.
In November, the Assembly was told farmers and the agri-food industry need a post-Brexit strategy to stop them "falling off the edge of a cliff" once the UK leaves the EU.
The call was made during a debate on the future funding of farming.
The Assembly heard claims that funding agriculture was not a priority for the UK government.
Northern Ireland currently gets 10% of the UK's European subsidy payments.
Speakers, including the SDLP's Patsy McGlone, said it would not do as well under a domestic agricultural policy.
If the Barnett funding formula - used to calculate Northern Ireland's share of UK budgets - was applied the equivalent share would be 3%, he said.
But the DUP's Edwin Poots said farmers had voted "overwhelmingly" for Brexit, adding that it offered them opportunities.
These included displacing agricultural produce currently imported to the UK.
He said farmers did not want "handouts", but a fair return for their work.
Queen's University and Ulster University have warned that leaving the EU risks their ability to attract international staff, students and EU research funding.
Both universities have carried out their own internal studies analysing the possible implications of Brexit.
The number of EU students applying to Queen's dropped by 6% this year, while one-fifth of its staff are from the EU but not the UK.
Meanwhile, Ulster has warned that Brexit puts 20m euros (£17.5m) of EU funding and tuition fees in doubt.
Both have asked for reassurances about the immigration status of international staff and students, and continued access to European research funds.
Concerns have also been expressed that Northern Ireland students wanting to study in the Republic of Ireland would have to pay much higher tuition fees in future if they are classed as non-EU students.
While uncertainty is most acute in higher education, a number of schools here also participate in the EU funded Erasmus+ programme which sees them partner with, and send pupils to, schools in other European countries.
Like the universities, they too will hope the forthcoming negotiations provide guarantees that there will still be some access to EU money and projects in future.
One of the areas of concern will be the continued ability of EU nationals to work in Northern Ireland's health and social care system.
At the moment there are 1,000 nursing vacancies: The acute shortage of nurses led to four separate international recruitment drives in the past two years.
In 2016 around 50 job offers were made to nurses from Italy and Romania, although the bulk of the jobs - around 490 - were offered to nurses from further afield in the Philippines.
The health unions are urging the government to clarify its intentions - there is concern that some foreign nationals may feel it necessary and safer to return home.
Cross-border services are another issue where the implications of Brexit are yet to unfold.
After years of negotiation, a new cancer centre in the north-west has finally opened and is offering treatments to people on both sides of the border.
For some patients this can mean travelling a distance of 10 miles in order to cross the border. The cancer centre, radiotherapy services and paediatric cardiac surgery are all cross-border services that politicians and the public have campaigned to get for decades - services they will not want to give up easily.
Some of these services are provided by cross border workers. They may live in one area such as Donegal but work in Northern Ireland.
Those people can get a medical card in Northern Ireland and be seen as "free workers".
One of the most contentious pieces of EU law affecting the health service in NI is the working time directive: If the Westminster government decides to repeal or amend it, this could have implications for local employment contracts, as well as pay and conditions.
EU law has also provided a harmonised approach to medicines regulation.
The European Medicines Agency is currently based in London, but Health Minister Jeremy Hunt said in January this was "likely" to move outside the UK.
Could a beneficiary be the Republic of Ireland? The Republic's health minister is currently compiling what he argues is a heavyweight case for Dublin to host the medicines regulator.
Finally, Queen's University is among those that have built up reputations as centres of excellence for cancer research.
Academics have called for the Brexit negotiations to consider how these centres can continue to play a role in cross-continental projects, while attracting top international staff and funding.
The triggering of Article 50 looks likely to further exacerbate the divide between the Stormont parties, who are already unable to form a power-sharing executive.
The DUP and Sinn Fein campaigned on different sides before last June's EU referendum.
But their leaders were able to patch up their differences and sign a joint letter to Theresa May last August.
That letter set out shared concerns about the border, trading costs, the energy market, EU funding and treatment of the agri-food sector.
Since then, though, relations between Stormont's two main parties have nose dived.
Now the DUP continues to emphasise the opportunities presented by Brexit, whilst Sinn Fein, the SDLP and Alliance have all backed Northern Ireland retaining some kind of special status within the EU.
With no power-sharing executive in place, Stormont politicians currently have little, if any, influence over the Brexit negotiations.
However, London and Dublin are both committed to maintaining as open a border as possible, whilst the EU's Chief Brexit Negotiator Michel Barnier says the EU will not stand for anything that weakens dialogue and peace in Northern Ireland.


An Oxford University college has taken action against a student who wore a Ku Klux Klan hood to a party.

The dean of Christ Church said the student has been banned from future events and must apologise in writing.
The event was held in December 2016 and the college emailed students about the incident on Wednesday, which it called "deeply regrettable".
Speaking to the Cherwell university newspaper the student said the costume was intended as satire.
Junior censor at the college, Brian Young, said in an email to students that "an offensive item of clothing was worn at a college bop".
He added: "We wish to affirm in the strongest possible terms that Christ Church is firmly committed to equality, diversity, and respect, and we absolutely will not accept any breaches of such toleration.
"Anyone who causes offence by disregarding these commitments is subject to strict college discipline."
The student, who has not been named, told the Cherwell he wore a sign reading "Middle America" and a pillowcase that resembled a Ku Klux Klan hood because the party's theme was 2016.
He said "I did not intend to offend anyone and removed the costume within two minutes of arriving after realising the inappropriateness of it."
Dean of Christ Church, the Very Rev Prof Martyn Percy, said the student's behaviour was "completely unacceptable".


Reading extended their unbeaten home run in the Championship to eight matches as they came from behind to beat struggling Nottingham Forest.

Ben Osborn put Forest ahead against the run of play, beating Ali Al-Habsi after being put through by Henri Lansbury.
The hosts dominated in the second half and, seven minutes after coming on, substitute Matej Vydra deflected home Oliver Norwood's long-range effort.
Reading secured victory thanks to a fierce 20-yard strike from Norwood.
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Despite claiming a first league win in four league games against Forest, the Royals remain 13th in the table.
Forest have lost eight of their past 10 games, and taken only one point from four matches since Paul Williams replaced Dougie Freedman as manager.
Beaten 3-0 by Brentford on Saturday, they are 17th in the table, nine points above the relegation zone with six games remaining.


Further cuts in government spending will be needed beyond this parliament in order to bring the national debt under control, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has warned.

In its annual report, the OBR said that without further spending cuts or tax rises, the national debt would only increase.
It said a permanent £20bn cut in annual public spending will be needed by 2020.
That would help bring the national debt down to 40% of GDP by 2064, it said.
If achieved, this means it would have taken more than half a century to bring the national debt back to the same level it was before the 2008 financial crisis.
Last year, public sector net debt was £1.48tn, or 80% of economic output, compared with around £600bn, or around 42% of GDP, in 2008.
And the OBR warned that even a cut of this size, equivalent to 1.1% of GDP, would not be sufficient to keep the national debt at 40% beyond 2064.
A Treasury spokesperson responded: "Our deficit is less than half what it was, but [today's] report from the OBR clearly shows the hard work that needs to be done to fix the public finances and deliver economic security and prosperity for working people."
The forecast spending cuts come a day after the Chancellor George Osborne announced plans to bind future governments to operating a budget surplus during times of economic growth.
But the OBR cast doubt on the government's ability to maintain a surplus, forecasting the UK public sector borrowing would still be necessary by the mid 2030s as a result of the demands of an ageing population.
OBR chairman Robert Chote said the government needed to define what it meant by normal times, and that it might not be easy to calculate.
"No-one can know with confidence how much spare capacity  there is in the economy or what the sustainable growth rate ... will be looking forward," he said. "Any rule needs to be defined in the knowledge that our estimates of these things may change."
The OBR said the government's triple-lock on the state pension - whereby the state pension rises by whichever is the greater of inflation, average earnings, or 2.5% - had resulted in an additional £2.9bn cost to the government, seven times higher than the £0.4bn increase originally forecast in 2010.
Earlier this week, ratings agency Moody's warned that the government will find it very difficult to achieve a budget surplus by 2018-19, and is still likely to be operating a deficit of between 1% and 2% of GDP by 2020.
The chancellor is due to announce spending cuts to welfare and government departments totalling £30bn over two years in his summer Budget next month.
The OBR warned if the government only made the cuts it has currently outlined, the national debt as a share of GDP would fall to 50% by the mid-2030s.
But it forecast debt to be 87% of GDP by the 2060s as a result of an ageing population, declining revenues from North Sea oil and gas, and the impact of student loans.
While admitting they were difficult to predict, the OBR forecast North Sea oil and gas revenues would fall to below 0.1% of GDP over the coming decades. It said the tax take from North Sea oil and gas had already fallen by 80% in the last three years.
That would mean a decline in revenues to £2bn in total between 2020 and 2040, down from last year's forecast of £37bn for the period.
The OBR said its latest forecast recognised the obvious collapse in oil prices in the past year but also the effect of lower production since last year.
Accumulated losses and future decommissioning costs would also impact future revenues, it said.
"Our analysis of longer-term pressures on revenue streams suggests that governments will, over time, need to find new sources of revenue to maintain the overall ratio of revenue to national income, let alone to meet the spending pressures from an ageing population," the OBR said.


A man shot by police in a so-called attempted "death by cop" incident has been jailed for six years.

Stephen Debley told passers-by to call the Sun newspaper as he was going to have "a shoot-out with the old bill".
Debley, from Dunmow in Essex, the first person shot by Essex Police for more than 30 years, admitted firearms offences involving two replica guns.
Debley, 48, who was shot in the leg and tasered, had twice previously attempted suicide, Chelmsford Crown Court heard.
He was shot by armed police in Knights Way, Great Dunmow, on 1 September last year after reports he was carrying two guns.
Read this and other stories from Essex
Judge Patricia Lynch QC said people who had seen him in the street carrying the replica weapons would almost certainly "be scared to death".
Debley, of Knights Way, was charged with two counts of possession of an imitation firearm with intent, and one of affray.
The court heard he was trying to end his life in a "death by cop" incident, a recognised form of attempted suicide in which people deliberately provoke police officers into using their weapons.
The judge said just as people who threw themselves under buses and trains did not consider the driver involved, so had Debley failed to consider the position of police officers.
She said: "This is not the United States of America and police officers in this country do not shoot to kill."
In mitigation, Gary Ryan said Debley had a 15-year history of depression and had attempted to take his own life twice, had been physically abused by his father and had cared for his mother for 25 years.
Mr Ryan said Debley had said to a member of the public: "Will you telephone the Sun, I have mental health issues, and I am about to have a shoot-out with the old bill."
Debley was jailed for six years for the gun possession offence and two years for affray, to run concurrently.


Somerset have signed Scotland and former Northamptonshire off-spinning all-rounder Michael Leask.

Leask has played in 22 limited-overs internationals for Scotland and is part of their team for the upcoming World Twenty20 in India.
The 25-year-old played his only game for Northants in a tour match against New Zealand A in 2014.
"He's a good little cricketer - feisty and quite a strong character," director of cricket Matthew Maynard said.
"It will be interesting to see if he can put pressure on the first-team bowlers this year, because I primarily see this year as a learning curve for him in the second XI, but the opportunity is there."


Geraint Thomas will venture into "uncharted territory" when he leads Team Sky in a Grand Tour for the first time at the Giro d'Italia.

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Thomas will share the leadership with Mikel Landa, having previously played a supporting role for his team-mates.
The 100th edition of the Giro, one of cycling's three Grand Tours - alongside the Tour de France and Vuelta a Espana - starts in Sardinia on Friday.
"It's one of the biggest challenges of my career," said Briton Thomas, 30.
"I've got a massive few weeks in front of me. I'm just looking forward to racing now. It feels like we've been talking about it forever.
"It's uncharted territory really. I've always been helping other guys so if I do blow up now it doesn't really matter. Hopefully it all goes well."
This year's Giro will comprise a gruelling, 21-stage route, starting in Alghero, Sardinia on Friday and ending in Milan on Sunday, 28 May.
It will be Welshman Thomas' third appearance at the Giro and his 11th Grand Tour start, though his previous outings have been as a support rider for the likes of British three-time Tour de France winner Chris Froome.
Thomas has shone in his role as 'super domestique' in cycling's showpiece events, while he has impressed as a leader in other races, winning the Tour of the Alps in April and Paris-Nice last year.
"Preparations have gone really well. I've got three wins this year which is certainly nice," the Cardiff-born rider told BBC Wales Sport.
"Being a support rider and a leader are two totally different things. I'm just relishing that opportunity and trying to make the most of it.
"It's been a long build-up and something I've been thinking about for a long time, so it will be good to get racing."
If he is to claim the winner's Maglia Rosa (pink jersey) in Italy, Thomas must overcome some formidable competition.
The favourite is Nairo Quintana, who won convincingly when he last appeared at the Giro in 2014.
A former Vuelta champion and runner-up at the Tour de France, the 27-year-old Colombian is a renowned climber who is expected to be well suited to a demanding Giro route.
However, the Movistar rider might be mindful of over-exerting himself as he keeps one eye on preparations for the Tour, which starts in July.
Other leading candidates include defending champion Vincenzo Nibali, one of only six cyclists to have won all three of the Grand Tours.
The 32-year-old Italian, nicknamed 'The Shark', won in dramatic circumstances last year as he capitalised on Dutchman Steven Kruijswijk's late crash to clinch his third Giro title.
"Nibali and Quintana have won this race before, they've got all that experience and, for sure, they're the favourites," said Thomas.
"Myself and Landa, we have a chance - but we're not at that level, I don't think."
Cycling teams tend to choose one rider to spearhead their Grand Tour campaigns, but Thomas will share his new role with Spaniard Landa.
The 27-year-old finished third at the Giro in 2015 while riding for Astana and Thomas believes their styles will be well suited to each other.
"He's obviously a great climber. He's been third in this race before, he's got the experience, he's a great athlete and he'll certainly give us another card to play," Thomas added.
"We can ride off each other. We get on well and I think it can work well. As we get into that last week there will certainly be gaps and one will be ahead of the other.
"Depending on how we're both feeling, I'd happily help him and vice versa. We'll see how it goes."
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Thomas has endured a difficult build-up to the Giro, following the death of his aunt Christine after a battle with cancer last week.
The double Olympic team pursuit champion was also shocked by the death of Italian cyclist Michele Scarponi in April, after the 37-year-old was involved in a collision with a van during a training ride.
Scarponi, a former Giro champion, had finished fourth at the Tour of the Alps, which Thomas won earlier that month.
Asked if his result at the Giro could define his career as a road cyclist, Thomas played down its significance given recent events.
"I don't think it would be a step backwards whatever happens. It's going to be a good challenge and, if it doesn't work out, then it doesn't work out," he said.
"What we've seen lately - what happened with Scarponi and I lost my auntie last week - it puts everything into perspective.
"It's a bike race, there's no point putting extra stress on it. At the end of the day, it's not the end of the world. It's just a great opportunity."


The number of empty shops in Scotland has increased in the first half of this year, according to a new report.

The Local Data Company (LDC) which compiled the figures said the vacancy rate during the period increased by 1.3% to 16.7% - more than 2% higher than the average across the UK.
All Scottish cities apart from Aberdeen and Stirling saw an increase in the number of empty shops.
Paisley has more empty shops than anywhere else.
The figures, released ahead of Scotland's Towns Conference in Perth, suggest vacancy rates in shopping centres, at 17.9%, are higher than in high streets, at 16.7%, and in retail parks, at 9.1%.
However, the LDC said although the number of empty shops was rising, the "negative trends of 2011 have slowed".
Matthew Hopkinson, director of the LDC, said: "Scotland's retail centres are under the same national pressures of weak consumer spend and the decline of multiple retailer shop numbers.
"As with the rest of UK, independent retailers have remained positive in their growth rates and the multiple closures have slowed but still remain negative."
In the first half of 2012, the number of independent retailers in Scotland increased by 2.3% while the multiple retailers declined by 0.48%.
Professor Leigh Sparks, from the Institute for Retail Studies at Stirling University, commented: "We need data on retail change in town centres and we need regular reporting of activity.
"We need town centres and those interested in them, to recognise this need and act on it."
The Scottish government announced earlier this month that it was reviewing town centres to "scope out" potential solutions to the issues facing them.


The annual Whiterock parade in west Belfast has passed off peacefully.

The Orange Order complied with a Parades Commission restriction on the number of people who could walk on to the mainly nationalist Springfield Road, at the junction with Workman Avenue.
About 50 residents from the Springfield Residents Action Group held a silent protest along the short stretch.
More than 100 police officers were present.
PSNI Ch Supt Nigel Grimshaw said he was "encouraged by the calm and peaceful way in which the parade and associated protests were conducted".
He added: "I want to commend those involved for their efforts in ensuring the day was a success."


Elections for police and crime commissioners will be held in the 41 police force areas of England and Wales on 5 May 2016.

Candidates standing in South Yorkshire Constabulary are listed below.
Candidates are listed alphabetically by surname. BBC News App users: tap here to see the candidates.
More information is available on the Choose my PCC website.


Jarryd Hayne is set to become the first ex-Australian rugby league player to compete in the NFL after being named in the San Francisco 49ers squad for the upcoming season.

The 27-year-old, who has 11 tries in 12 internationals for Australia, has been named in the running back rotation.
He told www.49ers.com: "I am over the moon, I've never felt so alive."
Former British discus thrower Lawrence Okoye was one of the players the 49ers cut from their roster.
The British discus record holder swapped the track for gridiron after the 2012 Olympics in London and has spent the past two seasons with the five-time Super Bowl winners.
Parramatta Eels full-back Hayne was voted Australia National Rugby League's best player last year.
He added: "I'm blessed and honoured to be a part of the 49ers franchise."
San Francisco coach Jim Tomsula said: "Making an NFL roster is an outstanding accomplishment, period. But obviously his situation is unique.
"The odds of an American who grows up in this game playing in the NFL is astronomical. Now you're talking about a guy who wasn't raised in this game and has made it.
"He's by no means a finished product but the type of person he is and the approach that he takes, he's a guy that we want here.
"It should be a celebration in Australia. I do understand the magnitude and that it's huge."
On the subject of Okoye's release, Tomsula said: "Lawrence hasn't played a lot of football.
"When you have a guy in that situation, it gives him a better opportunity [to find a team]. I will say what he's done in two-and-a-half years is remarkable."
Second-year pro Carlos Hyde is likely to start at running back for the 49ers, while Reggie Bush is expected to feature heavily on passing downs, with Hayne and fellow rookie Mike Davis competing for carries in relief.


As is almost always the case, living standards look set to be a key issue in the general election, and we are now heading into April, which is the key month for wages.

As the Bank of England has noted, around 40% of all annual pay settlements will be decided in the next four or five weeks. If 2015 is going to be the year that pay really starts to rise, then we should have some strong clues soon.
Now it's important to remember that there is a big difference between "wages" and "living standards". Wages are the biggest driver of household incomes, but the tax and benefit system (and other sources of income like bank interest or private pensions) also play a role.
But given the importance of wages in determining overall household incomes, there are good reasons to focus on them. Whilst real wages are picking up at the moment, the big driver of that has been falling inflation rather than nominal wage growth. With inflation forecast to gradually rise in the coming years back towards 2%, real wage growth will require a pickup in cash earnings.
The big squeeze in UK living standards after the 2008 crash has been driven by a historically large squeeze in real wages (wages taking into account inflation). This was all set out in a new report from the Centre for Economic Performance (CEP) yesterday, which emphasised that falling real wages have driven living standards down for working households, whilst the income of pensioner households has actually risen since 2008.
Looking at the data, there are two stories that can be told - both of which contain important elements of truth - that offer more encouragement.
The first is that the real wage squeeze has been accompanied by rising employment. That's especially important if discussing average (meaning in this case "mean") wage levels.
Imagine an economy with ten workers, nine of whom earn £25,000 a year and the last of whom is unemployed. The average wage is £25,000. Now imagine that the nine in work get a pay rise of 2% and the unemployed worker finds a job on £15,000 a year.
The average wage would now be £24,450, a fall of 2.2% from £25,000. But is that a meaningful number? All ten workers are clearly better off, and what has driven the fall in the average is not a fall for any individual, but a change in the composition of the sample. That sort of compositional change has played a role in the UK's wage data in recent years. In particular, a big fall in youth employment (young people tend to earn less) dragging down the average.  But compositional change doesn't explain the extent of the fall.
The second argument is that the fall in real wages is just a counterpart of the weakness in productivity. If productivity growth is weak then firms can't increase real wages without hitting their own profit margins. On the other hand, if workers are becoming more productive - i.e. producing more per hour worked - then hourly wages can be increased without impacting firms' bottom lines.
UK productivity is forecast to pick up in the future and it may be that if productivity growth returns then so will decent wage growth.  That said, UK productivity has been forecast to pick for quite some time without actually happening.
Whilst it is no doubt true that in the medium to long term there is a very close relationship between productivity growth and wage growth, that might not be the full picture.
An important collection of essays published today by the Resolution Foundation - a think tank focused on living standards - argues that before the wage squeeze of 2008 onwards, there was a wage 'slowdown' from 2002 until 2007.
The various authors in the collection emphasise the need for strong GDP growth, rising productivity and a supportive tax and benefit system as preconditions for stronger wage growth, but note that "recent experience here and abroad suggests that establishing a benign economic backdrop, though crucial, might not suffice".
It is against this backdrop that the Centre for Economic Performance concluded yesterday that "no party has a coherent policy on what can be done substantively to improve the real wage position of UK workers".  All of the talk of increasing the minimum wage and incentivising the (higher and non-statutory) living wage may well support the incomes of lower earners, but will have little impact on those in the middle of the earnings distribution. Given the importance of wages to living standards, and the importance of living standards to the election - that is a fairly damning indictment.
Politicians, though, are not the only policymakers who will help determine the path to real wage growth. Much of macroeconomic policy over the past two decades has been outsourced from finance ministries, like the Treasury, to central banks such as the Bank of England.
Last year, Paul McCulley, then chief economist at one the world's largest fund management firms - PIMCO - asked the crucial question: "How does a nation's productivity growth become real wage growth for ordinary citizens, in the context of low inflation and moderate long-term interest rates?"
His answer was straight forward: "A prolonged economic boom", and he argued that would require central banks to allow wages - and possibly inflation - to grow, before raising interest rates.
The idea that central banks should allow wage growth to run ahead of productivity, and build up inflationary pressure before raising rates, is far from uncontroversial in macroeconomics. But it does remind us that the course of real wage growth for middle earners in the next half decade is as much in the Bank of England's hands as anyone else's.


A Roma couple have now been formally charged in Greece with abducting a young blonde, blue-eyed girl called Maria, who was found in a Roma camp in the centre of the country last Thursday.

Although the couple insist the girl was informally adopted and not abducted, the case has thrown the spotlight on the wider issue of child trafficking in Greece.
Criminal organisations bring hundreds of children from the Balkans to Greece, where they are subjected to forced labour, sex-trafficking or sold to couples, in Greece or abroad, in illegal adoption schemes.
"There are currently 3,000 children transited through Greece by child-trafficking rings. The children originate mainly from Bulgaria, Romania and other Balkan countries," says Lambros Kanellopoulos, the president of the UN children's agency Unicef in Greece.
Mr Kanellopoulos says Greece's status as a trafficking hub can be attributed to two factors: its geographical location, and its ineffective prevention and prosecution procedures.
"The system is full of holes," he says.
According to the latest US state department report on human trafficking, in 2012 Greek authorities identified only 94 victims.
Mr Kanellopoulos says traffickers often use Roma communities because they live "largely under the radar of society".
A senior police officer involved in fighting human trafficking described to the BBC a recent case solved by the police, which he said was typical of how the system worked.
"A Roma woman from Bulgaria came to Thessaloniki and gave birth in a public hospital," the officer said.
"She was accompanied by a member of the criminal ring, who posed as her relative. He paid her 3,000 euros (Â£2,500), took her baby, and then sold the child to a Greek couple."
Childless parents pay as much as 30,000 euros for a baby.
Police sources say that in most cases the children are not abducted, but bought and sold "like commodities" for a few thousand euros.
Those children who are not sold often end up on the streets, begging, stealing and working. They are a common sight in Greek streets, known as "the traffic-light children".
The luckier children are taken care of by charities like Smile of the Child, the organisation that has received temporary custody of Maria.
"We are currently taking care of many children who came to Greece as unaccompanied minors or who where victims of child-trafficking," says the charity's Panayiotis Pardalis.
The Roma community in Greece, which according to various estimates numbers 150,000-300,000 members, feels wronged.
"All this talk about our communities being incubators of child trafficking is nonsense," says Antonis Tsakiris of the Panhellenic Association of Greek Roma Associations.
"The Roma are victims of prejudice and media hype. We are the first to condemn cases of illegal adoptions and trafficking, but these are single events."
The case of Maria also brought to light the broken-down system of child registrations in Greece.
The Greek authorities say the Roma couple were in possession of false papers which suggested the woman had given birth to six children within a 10-month period.
The Greek birth-registration system is easily exploited. Parents can register the birth of a child by simply submitting solemn statements of two individuals confirming the birth to local authorities.
There is also no way to cross-check registrations, as municipal archives are not connected, allowing the same person to keep multiple registrations with different municipalities.
Now the government says it is determined to close the loopholes.
Deputy Interior Minister Leonidas Grigorakos told the BBC that he had prepared an amendment to be submitted to parliament that makes DNA paternity testing mandatory for children born outside hospitals.
"Undoubtedly the system and the child registration law were problematic. We are now changing that," says Mr Grigorakos.
He added that he had ordered an administrative inquiry that would investigate whether public servants were guilt of any wrongdoing in Maria's case.
Mr Grigorakos added that the Greek government would raise the issue of the Roma communities as a top priority in January 2014, when Greece assumed the rotating presidency of the EU.


A prostate cancer patient has been hailed a "total hero" after a photo of him in his underwear showing his catheter bag went viral.

Kurt Jewson's Facebook post, which also shows his colostomy bag, scars and hormone implants, was shared by more than 185,000 people within four days.
The 44-year-old said he had exposed himself in his "tubby, pale & middle aged glory" in the hope "just one other man" might then get symptoms checked.
He also wants to alert GPs.
The married father, from west Cornwall, wrote: "Why am I posting this? Well, in the summer of 2014 I had blood in my urine. Went to the GP and he said that it was probably just an infection and would clear up. It did.
"However, it wasn't an infection. It was a symptom of prostate cancer."
Latest updates on this story and more from Cornwall and Devon
Mr Jewson said if his GP had done a blood test then, his cancer would have been caught early, but he was not diagnosed until going back more than a year later with repeat symptoms.
1 in 8
men will get prostate cancer at some point in their lives.
1 in 4 black men will get the disease at some point in their lives.
70 - 74 is the average age for men to be diagnosed.
10,000 men die from it every year in the UK.
He said he was concerned that more and more younger men are getting the disease, and urged men to visit the Prostate Cancer UK website to learn how to spot the signs.
Heather Blake from the charity said: "Kurt's decision to wise men up by this bold action is hugely inspiring.
"One in eight men will get the disease at some time and by sharing such a candid image in this generous way he's reached tens of thousands with a message that may well save lives."
"More than 200,000 people have already visited our website as a result of his story. Kurt's a total hero," she said.
Mr Jewson said of the impact his post had: "I should have tidied the room and put my number one pants on, I should have made a bit more effort... but I just thought 'let's do it' and if we get one person to check themselves and get diagnosed early... then it would have been worth it".
He added that his GP had admitted it had been a "missed opportunity" and that he did not wish to name him or the surgery.
He has undergone surgery which caused complications, but said his prognosis looked positive.


Japan's economy expanded an annual rate of 1.9% rate in the first quarter of this year, revised from a preliminary figure of 1.7%, according to official figures on Wednesday.

The revised figure was in line with analysts' estimates.
Markets in Tokyo fell at first as the higher figure was seen as reducing the chance of further economic stimulus measures by the Japanese government.
But shares then rebounded, and the Nikkei 225 closed up 0.9% at 16,830.92.
The broader Topix index rose 0.8% to 1,350.97.
Shuji Tonouchi, senior fixed income strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities, said: "The upward revision is very slight, and when you exclude the impact of leap year growth is not that strong.
"We expect growth to slow in the current quarter. The government should focus on steps to help low-income earners, but consumption may not rise much if consumer sentiment worsens."
Other stock markets in Asia were mixed after Chinese trade data showed continued weakness in the world's second-biggest economy.
Chinese exports fell 4.1% in May from a year earlier while imports dropped 0.4%.
In China, the Shanghai Composite fell 0.3% to 2,927.16, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng index dipped 30.26 points, or 0.1%, to 21,297.88.
In South Korea, the Kospi index closed up 15.45 points, or 0.8%, at 2,027.08.
Australia's ASX 200 index ended the day flat at 5,369.98.


Arsenal Ladies have signed Bayern Munich and Scotland winger Lisa Evans.

Evans, 25, signed for German side Bayern in July 2015 from Bundesliga rivals Turbine Potsdam, who she joined from Glasgow City in 2012.
The former St Johnstone trainee has won 48 caps for Scotland, scoring 12 goals, and is part of their Euro 2017 squad.
"She has played at the top level for many years now and she joins us from a strong side," manager Pedro Martinez Losa told the club website.
Evans won the women's Bundesliga with Bayern in her first season at the club, in 2015-16.  They finished runners-up to Wolfsburg last season.
Details of the length of her Arsenal contract have not been disclosed.


Refugees from Syria have fled to nearby countries like Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon, but some are now searching for a new life in Europe.

Media playback is unsupported on your device
3 February 2014 Last updated at 10:47 GMT
Since the beginning of last year 6,000 Syrians have walked across the border from Turkey to Bulgaria - the EU's poorest country.
Watch this report from the BBC's Chris Morris from a former school where refugees are now living in classrooms.


Detectives searching for a toddler who went missing 24 years ago say a TV appeal has generated possible leads.

Ben Needham, from Sheffield, vanished when he was 21 months old during a 1991 family holiday on the island of Kos.
Kerry Needham, Ben's mother, appeared on Greek television on Friday to make a fresh appeal for her son.
She later said a man who contacted the show saying he resembled Ben was "old information" and "stronger information should take priority".
In a post on the Help Find Ben Facebook page, a member of the support team wrote: "Just to make things clear as Kerry previously stated the man who called the show is an old lead.
"However we do have seven new very strong possible leads."
South Yorkshire Police said about 30 calls and emails were received following the broadcast.
Officers also confirmed the appeal generated some seven new lines of inquiry which would be explored further in partnership with the Greek authorities.
Det Supt Matt Fenwick said: "We have received lots of information over the last 24 hours - some new information and some which correlates to information we already have in our possession.
"We will now work with the Greek police to review that information to move the inquiry forward."
The television programme, the English translation of which is Light at the End of the Tunnel, broadcasts to about 50% of the Greek TV audience.
Earlier this year, South Yorkshire Police was granted Home Office funding to support the Greek authorities in continuing inquiries to find Ben.
Kerry Needham has always maintained her son, who would now be 25, is still alive.
"It is just a feeling I have inside myself," she said.
"It feels like he is saying 'come on I am here, come and get me'. I believe he's out there, I don't think its going to be long, we are going to get somewhere. I am hopeful anyway.
"I want him to know, as his mum, I love him as much today as the day he was born. I will never never stop looking for him."
She said the amount of public support the family had received after the programme was "overwhelming".
Ben's grandmother Christine and his sister Leighanna also participated in the programme.
Ben vanished on 24 July, 1991, having travelled to Kos with his mother and grandparents who were renovating a farmhouse in the village of Iraklise.


Ex-Harlequins CEO and Saracens director of rugby Mark Evans has been appointed as Stadium for Cornwall project leader.

He will lead first-phase construction of the ground, which is to be shared by rugby side Cornish Pirates and National League South football club Truro City.
The £10m stadium, to be built on the outskirts of Truro, will hold 6,000, with work set to start in spring 2018.
"You just can't be an elite rugby club in England now without having a decent stadium," said Welshman Evans.
"For the guys running the day to day needs of the club this can be rather overwhelming, so my considerable experience in this area, which of course takes a lot of time, is aimed to help."
Evans, who has more recently been CEO at Australian side Melbourne Storm, was at Harlequins when they rebuilt their Twickenham Stoop ground more than 15 years ago.


Police are looking for two men who launched a racist attack as part of a "crime spree" in Stirling city centre.

The duo approached three Nigerian students in Cowane Street on Saturday and shouted racial abuse at them, goaded them to fight, threw a pint glass and assaulted one of them.
Both men were between 20 and 22. One was 6ft tall and was wearing a red top, while the other was 5ft 8in tall and was wearing a white shirt and hoodie.
Officers have appealed for information.
The attack, which occurred at about 21:10, ended when a member of the public stopped his vehicle to check on the victims on nearby Wallace Street, and police are also keen to trace this person.
The two attackers then moved on to Bruce Street, where they assaulted two students, one of whom was a 19-year-old woman, in another unprovoked attack.
Insp Jim Young said: "The behaviour of these two males is very concerning. They were first noticed in Viewfield Street and they then entered Cowane Street where they started their crime spree.
"Due to one having a pint glass in his hand, it is likely they have been in a local pub before this and we are currently checking licensed premises and CCTV to identify them.
"They have targeted everyone they have come across which includes a female.
"Due to the time of night and city centre location, someone will have seen them and know who they are. I am appealing for witnesses to come forward and help identify them."
In a separate inquiry, Forth Valley police are investigating another racial incident where two Zimbabwean men were abused outside the Masterchef Takeaway on Strathmore Drive in Cornton.
The man involved in the incident at 21:45 on Sunday was white, about 30 years old, of stocky build and had short hair. He was wearing a tracksuit, appeared to be drunk, and walked into a nearby block of flats after the incident.


Division Two leaders Nottinghamshire had to settle for a draw after resilience from the Kent tail and bad weather denied them victory.

After a two-and-a-half-hour delay, Adam Milne scored 51 on his Kent debut and put on 79 with Adam Rouse (35).
Rouse was last man to go when he hooked Steven Mullaney (2-44) to Samit Patel as the visitors were all out for 265.
Notts, needing 75 to win, were about to begin their reply as rain returned and the game was called off at 20:30 BST.
Kent, who were at one stage 167-7 in their second innings on day three still needing 24 to avoid an innings defeat, dug in and took eight points from the game with a little help from the weather.
The hosts claimed 12 points and now lead second-placed Worcestershire by 26, with Kent a further 13 points back in third.
Nottinghamshire head coach Peter Moores told BBC Radio Nottingham:
"You can't control the weather, so it's frustrating when you get that close and everybody has put the effort in. Anybody that has been in the game for a while will accept that this was just part of it.
"We got in this position because we bowled them out for under 200 and we got a 200 lead, so the only reason it got twitchy was because we dominated the game."
On the pink ball: "I think there are some issues with seeing the ball at different times, but you can see why the experiment is there - to try and find out whether we can put cricket on at different times of the day when people might find it easier to watch."
Kent head coach Matt Walker:
"I think there has been a fairly mixed reaction to the pink ball. Individually, everyone has had their own little battles with it, I think it's just different, that's the biggest issue.
"It's not done excessive amounts in the air, but it is just a slightly different feel in the hands for the bowlers and sometimes it reacted differently off the surface for the bowlers.
"I think in terms of the batting the biggest issue for the lads is that they weren't able to pick up the seam and weren't quite seeing the shape of the delivery, so they were just seeing a pink blur coming down.
"If they are going to stick with it then I hope they have more than one game a year, so people can used to it, rather than just a token one-off."


Thirteen South African mine workers have been injured during fierce clashes between two rival unions in Rustenburg, police say.

A large mob attacked union stewards with machetes and sharp objects at the Anglo American Platinum mine.
Security guards fired rubber bullets at the mob, injuring nine miners. Four guards were also wounded in the fight.
Last August, Rustenburg was the scene of violent wildcat strikes, during which police shot dead 34 miners.
The bloodshed at the Marikana mine was the most deadly police action since South Africa became a democracy in 1994 and sparked national outrage.
No officers were involved in Monday's incident, police spokesman Thulani Ngubane confirmed to the BBC.
The stand-off is thought to have taken place between the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) - allied to the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party - and the militant Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu).
They may have been fighting over the occupancy of union offices at the Anglo American Platinum's Siphumelele mine shaft in Rustenburg, 100km (60 miles) north-west of Johannesburg, Mr Ngubane said.
"Mine security intervened and fired rubber bullets, and in the process a total of 13 mine workers, including four security guards [were injured]," Mr Ngubane said.
Some of the people injured were hacked with machetes and sharp objects, he added.
Three of the wounded miners are believed to be in a critical condition.
Last year, wildcat strikes and violent unrest over wages spread to a number of mines across South Africa, the world's largest platinum producer.


The Duke of Cambridge has launched a new award programme in his name to help children gain confidence, during a visit to a Monmouthshire school.

Prince William visited Llanfoist Fawr Primary School in Abergavenny on St David's Day and joined pupils in making a tower out of marshmallows and straws.
About 80 children took part in team building exercises during the visit.
Headteacher Jon Murphy said the pupils could "barely contain their excitement" at meeting the prince.
Aimed at six to 14-year-olds, the SkillForce Prince William Award draws on the skills of ex-service personnel and aims to help schoolchildren build character, confidence and resilience.
The launch follows a year-long pilot at 37 schools across England, Scotland and Wales.
Abigail Squirrell, 10, from Llanfoist Fawr, said the challenges helped her feel more confident.
Pupils from Caldicot School, Monmouthshire and Bishopstone Primary School in Swindon, Wiltshire also joined the prince in a series of team building exercises.
This included making a free-standing tower from marshmallows and straws, pretending a ball is a 'radioactive cell' and carrying it to safety and putting up a tent wearing blindfolds.


Rights group Amnesty International has criticised a tough Indian law which it says has been used to detain up to 20,000 people without trial in Indian-administered Kashmir.

Amnesty urged India to scrap the Public Safety Act (PSA) which allows detention for up to two years without charge.
The group also criticised the judiciary for its failure to protect human rights of the detainees.
Kashmir has been gripped by a violent separatist insurgency since 1989.
Corrrespondents say the Indian government does not comment on reports by international rights groups.
The detentions have been made since the beginning of the insurgency, Amnesty says in a new report released in Srinagar on Monday.
Detentions under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act documents how the law is used to secure long-term detention of individuals against whom there is insufficient evidence for a trial.
"The Jammu and Kashmir authorities are using PSA detentions as a revolving door to keep people they can't or won't convict through proper legal channels locked up and out of the way," said Amnesty campaigner Bikramjeet Batra.
"Hundreds of people are being held each year on spurious grounds, with many exposed to higher risk of torture and other forms of ill-treatment," he added.
The report says the detainees include political leaders and activists, suspected members or supporters of armed opposition groups, lawyers, journalists and protesters, including children.
Often, they are initially picked up for "unofficial" interrogation during which time they have no access to a lawyer or their families.
Even minors are being held under the law, the report says.
Amnesty International called upon the government of Jammu and Kashmir to repeal the law and end the system of detentions.
It also urged the government to release all detainees or charge those suspected of committing criminal acts with recognised offences and try them fairly in a court of law.
The Himalayan region of Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan and is claimed in full by both.
The region is also one of most militarised in the world, with hundreds of thousands of troops present on both sides of the Line of Control - the de facto border dividing the territory.


Kashgar and Hotan, historic centres of Uighur and Islamic culture in the south of China's Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, have been the scene of recent bloodshed.

The reasons behind the violence in these two cities, which lie 520km (323 miles) apart on the southern fringes of the Taklamakan Desert, are confused and disputed but some of the essential facts are clear.
On 18 July a group of Uighurs armed with knives and explosive devices attacked a police station in Hotan and took hostages. During a rescue operation, at least one police officer, two of the hostages and some of the attackers were killed.
Among the grievances of these Uighurs were: the detention of many young male family members without trial after the anniversary of the July 2009 Urumqi riots; attempts to ban women from wearing black headscarves and robes; and the confiscation of their farmland for redevelopment. Some sources have reported that 20 people died in this incident.
In Kashgar the violence broke out on 30 July, just before the Ramadan fast. There were two explosions and a hijacked car was driven into pedestrians on a crowded street where Han Chinese workers regularly gather at food stalls: six or seven people died and almost 30 were injured.
On the afternoon of 31 July a restaurant in Kashgar was set on fire and the owner and a waiter were killed. Although no specific grievances have been mentioned in connection with these attacks, the citizens of Kashgar have been outraged at the demolition of the traditional Uighur houses in the centre of the old city.
The official reason for the demolitions was that the houses were unhygienic and potentially dangerous in an earthquakes, but Uighurs believe that it is simply a stratagem to break up their communities and reduce their influence in the city.
People continue to live and work among the ruins: heavily armed police patrol regularly, and very visibly, on foot and in armoured vehicles. The atmosphere is tense.
Behind the current conflict lies a long struggle for self-determination by the Uighur people. Although Xinjiang is in the far north-west of China, it is also culturally part of Central Asia and the Uighurs, who are the largest single ethnic group in Xinjiang, are Turkic-speaking Muslims.
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 and the Muslim Central Asian states gained their independence, the dormant Eastern Turkestan independence movement in Xinjiang was stirred into a revival.
During China's economic boom, Xinjiang has received considerable state investment in industrial and energy projects that have in theory benefited the whole region. However, there has also been large-scale migration of mainly Han Chinese workers from the east: many Uighurs complain that the Han are taking their jobs.
The shocking but not unexpected outbreak of violence in July was not the first in Xinjiang, and it is unlikely to be the last.
In July 2009, riots in Urumqi, the administrative capital of Xinjiang, cost the lives of at least 200 people and drew the attention of the world's media to an ethnic and political conflict that has been neglected for decades.
In 1995 there were serious disturbances in the north-western city of Ghulja, which had been the headquarters of an independent Eastern Turkestan Republic in the 1940s. A rigorous crackdown by the local government and military developed into a permanent "Strike Hard" campaign, and this provoked a further outbreak of demonstrations in February 1997 which were vigorously suppressed.
Thousands of Uighurs were detained; some were convicted and imprisoned; others charged with separatist activity were executed. Religious activities, which have become less restricted in the rest of China, were curtailed in Xinjiang; children under the age of 18 and Communist Party and government officials were forbidden even to enter a mosque for prayers.
The official response has been to characterise these outbreaks of violence simply as "terrorist" acts and to blame outside forces, including Uighur groups based in the United States and in Europe. Overseas groups actively promote the idea of an independent Eastern Turkestan, but there is no evidence linking them directly with violence inside Xinjiang.
More recently Beijing has pointed to international terrorist organisations, including al-Qaeda, as possible culprits: but again no concrete evidence has been produced. In 2003 the death was announced of Hasan Mesum, who had been shot in South Waziristan on Pakistan's border with Afghanistan and he was identified as the leader of the Eastern Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM).
In the wake of the recent attacks in Hotan and Kashgar, the Chinese authorities have revived concerns about terrorists trained by ETIM in Pakistan although most specialists do not even believe that ETIM exists as a real organisation.
The dire situation of the Uighurs in Xinjiang is at the root of the conflict. Only when the real culprits - poverty, marginalisation and discrimination - are defeated can the conflict be satisfactorily resolved.
Michael Dillon is the author of Xinjiang: China's Muslim Far Northwest and the forthcoming Xinjiang and the Expansion of Chinese Communist Power: Kashghar in the Twentieth Century


Pressure is building on Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders to give up his fight for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Hillary Clinton has been declared the presumptive Democratic nominee after winning four out of six primaries on Tuesday.
Mr Sanders has virtually no path to the nomination but has vowed to fight on. He meets President Obama on Thursday.
Democrats have urged Mr Sanders to join Mrs Clinton as she tries to defeat Donald Trump.
The billionaire businessman, seen as an outsider early in the campaign, is the Republicans' presumptive nominee.
The White House meeting on Thursday came at Mr Sanders' request. He will hold a rally in Washington the same day ahead of the District of Columbia's primary on 14 June.
He has won 22 state primaries and caucuses but failed to make a significant dent in Mrs Clinton's delegate lead, despite mounting what has been seen as an impressive campaign, influencing the Democratic debate and engaging with thousands of young voters.
How last major primary night unfolded
Live results from all six states
Great leap for womankind?
Why this election will make history
What an Obama endorsement will mean for Hillary
"The struggle continues. We are going to fight for every vote in Tuesday's primary in Washington DC, and then we will bring our political revolution to the Democratic convention in Philadelphia," his campaign said in a statement on Wednesday.
As the votes were being counted in California, Mr Sanders said: "I am pretty good at arithmetic, and I know that the fight in front of us is a very, very steep fight, but we will continue to fight for every vote and every delegate we can get."
Bernie Sanders isn't giving up the fight for the nomination just yet - despite the near overwhelming odds stacked against him. But now, it seems, some of his most prominent supporters are edging away.
Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Arizona Representative Raul Grijalva, who was a fixture alongside Mr Sanders in California, have essentially told the Vermont senator that it's time to rally behind Hillary Clinton.
But will he listen? In his late-night non-concession speech in Santa Monica, Mr Sanders said that he would continue to contest the nomination, despite it being "very, very steep fight". While the thousands in attendance went wild at the announcement, Mr Sanders may find his struggle an increasingly lonely one.
Vice-President Joe Biden, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and, most importantly, President Barack Obama have all begun quietly, respectfully making motions to usher Mr Sanders from the stage.
After Mr Obama meets Mr Sanders on Thursday, the next step is likely a presidential endorsement of Mrs Clinton. Trailing in the popular vote and delegates, both the pledged and super variety, Mr Sanders may then have no choice but to acknowledge political reality.
Going into the California primary, Mr Sanders said he hoped to flip superdelegates, who do not have to say who they are supporting until the party convention in July, to come to his side.
But many political commentators have cast doubt on that aspiration.
Vice President Joe Biden has said it is up to Mr Sanders to decide when to drop out.
"Oh, let him make that decision," he said. "Give him time."
Senator Bill Nelson from Florida said Mr Sanders should "stand down" and Senator Bob Casey said Democrats must come together and unify.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen from New Hampshire said Mr Sanders should end his campaign soon.
The Sanders campaign is downsizing its staff by about half ahead of next week's DC primary.


Ivory Coast's economy is growing and the business environment has dramatically improved since the political crisis that hit the country following elections in 2010.

23 October 2015 Last updated at 18:33 BST
But for Ivorian entrepreneurs, access to funds and training is sometimes complicated.
Ahead of elections this coming Sunday, 24-year-old designer Anine Mariam Ouattara tells the BBC about difficulties young people face and her aspirations for her country.


Katie Cooke has a lifestyle clash few others can rival.

9 March 2017 Last updated at 17:03 GMT
The 19-year-old from Dublin is a competitive runner - but her chronic epilepsy means she has around 16 seizures a day, often during races.
When other competitors see her fall to the ground, they naturally believe she needs to go to hospital - even though she normally recovers immediately and in her case, there's no need for medical intervention.
Even though she's grateful for the public response, all Katie wants to do is carry on running.
When she told the neurologist who's treating her condition, he offered to become her running partner - and together they've become a marathon-running team.
Video by Andy Brownstone and Daniel Gordon


The UK is already a target for Islamic State extremists and the threat has "intensified", Defence Secretary Michael Fallon has told MPs.

He told the Defence Select Committee "air strikes alone" would not destroy IS but could reduce its ability to attack the UK.
The Cabinet has endorsed the PM's plan to debate and vote extending air strikes into Syria on Wednesday.
Labour wanted a two-day debate and has called the plans a "rush to war".
David Cameron urged MPs of all parties to back his case for intervention.
The government has published the motion to be voted on, which says military action is "only one component of a broader strategy" to tackle IS.
It says the UK government will not deploy troops in "ground combat operations". The motion would specifically authorise air strikes "exclusively" against IS in Syria.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is against military intervention but offered his party a free vote on the question after opposition from within his shadow cabinet, many of whom are thought to back Mr Cameron's case for bombing in Syria.
Speaking on BBC Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show, he appealed to his frontbenchers to "think again" and "think about the consequences and implications".
Ministers had said they would only call a vote when certain they would win.
BBC assistant political editor Norman Smith said it looked as though Mr Cameron would secure a "fairly commanding majority" with a potential single-figure Conservative rebellion offset by the DUP and at least 50 Labour MPs who support air strikes.
In his appearance before MPs, Mr Fallon defended claims that 70,000 moderate opposition ground forces were on the ground in Syria.
In a country of 20 million people, it would be surprising if there were not this many he said, saying the 70,000 figure was the estimate of the Joint Intelligence Committee.
This figure "deliberately excludes those who are on the extreme side of this fight", he added.
Sitting alongside Mr Fallon, Lieutenant General Gordon Messenger, the deputy chief of the defence staff (Operations), was asked about the ground forces available, saying: "I don't think we should dismiss them, but nor should we try and invent some coherence where it doesn't exist."
He also cited an estimate of the fighting force of IS as between 20,000 and 30,000, adding that this "comes with considerable conditionality".
MPs rejected air strikes against Syrian government targets in 2013, but have since backed strikes against IS in Iraq.
Ministers say it is "illogical" to carry out strikes in Iraq but not Syria as IS does not recognise the border between the countries.
Wednesday's entire parliamentary schedule - including Prime Minister's Questions - will be cleared to make way for the debate.
But Labour has accused the government of a "rush to war" by rejecting calls for a two-day debate.
A spokesman for Mr Corbyn said: "By refusing a full two-day debate, David Cameron is demonstrating he knows the debate is running away from him, and that the case he made last week is falling apart."
"The prime minister should stop the rush to war to allow for a full discussion of the issues in Parliament.
"Matters of national security are far too important to be bulldozed through the House of Commons for political convenience."
Mr Cameron has said there would be "the equivalent number of questions we would often have across a two-day debate in one day."
He added: "I want MPs to be able to have full consideration, to make speeches, to make points, to ask me questions, to examine the government's case."
The prime minister said the vote would be held to "answer the call" from the UK's allies, because IS "is a threat to our country and this is the right thing to do".
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Mr Benn agreed, saying he had reached the decision to support air strikes "because of the threat to our citizens and others".
He defended Labour's approach to the question, saying "people of conscience have reached different views about what the right thing to do is", and insisted he had not been planning to resign if he had been instructed to vote with Mr Corbyn.
Mr Benn said he would "argue my case from the despatch box tomorrow in a serious way".
Labour MPs are reported to have criticised Mr Corbyn's tactics during a lively meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) on Monday night, with former Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett said to have accused him of trying to divide the party.
Speaking afterwards, shadow energy minister Clive Lewis, an ally of the leader, said: "If there are members of the PLP that want to bomb Syria and join with the Tories then on their heads be it. I respect that decision in the sense that they've come to the decision they have."
He warned that if the war "extends with no ends" the party would be looking at who voted in favour of action and "when the blame is apportioned, step forward".
One Tory rebel, senior backbencher David Davis, said moderate ground forces referred to by Mr Cameron were "disparate people, not an army".
He said US air forces were only carrying out seven strikes each day "because they've not got the targets - they've not got the troops on the ground to find the targets".
Labour's deputy leader Tom Watson questioned the 70,000 figure in a letter to Mr Cameron, calling for a detailed explanation of how the figure was compiled.
Mr Watson also requested a "timeline for peace", saying many MPs were "yet to be convinced" that a "meaningful political process" is in place to pull together different groups to secure peace.
The UK Parliament's third largest party, the SNP, had also called for a debate over two days. It opposes bombing IS in Syria, while the Liberal Democrats, with eight MPs, have yet to say how they will vote.


Newcomer Alan Davidson hit nine points as Down battled to a hard-fought 0-15 to 0-14 Dr McKenna Cup Section A win over Derry at Pairc Esler on Sunday.

The Mourne County, without an inter-county victory since April 2015, led 0-6 to 0-1 after just 12 minutes.
They only trailed once briefly in the second half and the win sets up a winner-takes-all clash with Armagh on Wednesday night for a semi-final place.
Ethan Rafferty and Anto Duffy goals helped Armagh beat Queen's 2-19 to 0-9.
Having beaten Queen's in their opening fixture, Down got off to a flying start as full-forward Barry O'Hagan scored points from play off both feet in the opening minute.
The impressive Davidson tagged on a free before Benny Heron's free put Derry on the scoresheet in the sixth minute.
O'Hagan and Davidson continued to lead the way for Down who romped into a five-point lead before Derry fought back.
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Ryan Bell, Niall Loughlin, a Heron free and another monster point from Bell helped the Oak Leafers hit four points in a row in a seven-minute spell to reduce the gap to 0-6 to 0-5 after 19 minutes.
Derry could not get level as Down kept their noses in front until half time, leading 0-9 to 0-8 at the interval.
Davidson hit 0-6 in the opening half, five from frees, while Emmett McGuckin's point from the wing reduced Derry's deficit to a single point at the break.
Derry levelled for the first time through sub Enda Lynn 20 seconds after the restart and led briefly through a Carlus McWilliams point after 40 minutes.
Once Joe Murphy brought Down level at 0-10 apiece, the home side never looked back.
Man-of-the-match Davidson, Johnny Flynn and sub Caolan Mooney kicked points for Eamon Burns' side.
Derry battled hard with subs Mark Lynch and James Kielt tagging on scores.
Although the sides were level three times in the second half, Down kept their noses in front for a confidence-boosting win.
Queen's took an early 0-2 to 0-1 lead over Armagh thanks to two Marty Clarke points but the Orchard county recovered to lead 0-8 to 0-4 at the interval.
After the break, Rafferty collected a high ball and finished into the net to give his side a 1-8 to 0-5 advantage and then Jamie Clarke went on to score a point on his introduction after missing last year's entire inter-county season.
Armagh remained in control and Duffy's late goal ensured a comfortable 16-point winning margin for the hosts.
Goalscorers Rafferty and Duffy both scored 1-2 apiece, with Oisin Mac Iomhair (0-4), Conor White (0-1), Stephen Sheridan (0-1) Rory Grugan (0-2), man-of-the-match Aidan Forker (0-2), Ben Crealey (0-1), Jemar Hall (0-2) and Niall Grimley (0-1) the other Armagh scorers.
Martin Clarke was top scorer for Quen's with four points, with Aaron Morgan, Barry McCann and Aaron McClements also getting their names on the scoresheet.
Down: M Cunningham; R McAleenan, G McGovern, D O'Hagan; D McKibbon, C McGovern, B McArdle; P Turley, J Flynn (0-1); S Millar, C Maginn, J Murphy (0-1); A Davidson (0-9, 7f), B O'Hagan (0-3), P Havern
Subs: A Carr for Turley (44), C Mooney for McKibbon (47), D Savage for Haveron (57), R Mallon for Millar (61), G Collins for D O'Hagan (65)
Derry: T Mallon; R Murphy, O Duffin, C McGrogan; N Forrester, C Nevin, P Hagan; P Kearney, A McLaughlin; G O'Neill, R Bell (0-3), C McWilliams (0-1); N Loughlin (0-1), E McGuckin (0-1), B Heron (0-4, 4f)
Subs: J Kielt (0-1, f) for Kearney (HT), E Lynn (0-1) for O'Neill (HT), M Warnock for Hagan (47), C Mullan for Duffin (47), M Lynch (0-2, 1f) for McLaughlin (52), C McAtamney for McGuckin (62)
Referee: Sean Laverty (Antrim)
2017 Dr McKenna Cup - Results and fixtures
Round 2: Sunday, 15 January
Section A
Down 0-15 0-14 Derry
Armagh 2-19 0-09 QUB
Section B
Antrim 0-09  2-20 Monaghan
Fermanagh 2-13 0-13 St Mary's
Section C
Donegal 1-06  2-14 Cavan
Tyrone 2-17  1-07 UUJ
Round 3: Wednesday, 18 January
Section A
Derry v QUB (Owenbeg)
Armagh v Down (Athletic Grounds)
Section B
Fermanagh v Antrim (Brewster Park)
Monaghan v St Mary's (Inniskeen)
Section C
Cavan v Ulster University (Kingspan Breffni Park)
Tyrone v Donegal (Healy Park)
Semi-finals: Sunday, 22 January
Section C Winner V Best Runner Up
Section B Winner V Section A Winner
Final: Saturday, 28 January


Supporters of Iran's moderate President Hasan Rouhani are in jubilant mood following his re-election, but have urged him to stick to his promises.

Dr Rouhani's face has been used in numerous celebratory images, memes and even emojis.
Users also shared how they would run things if they were in Mr Rouhani's place.
Messages flooded most social media platforms, including Twitter, which remains banned within the country.
Iranian celebrities and popular figures congratulated the president, but urged him to recognise the support of key political figures who had backed him.
On Instagram, Iranian actress Parastoo Salehi reminded Mr Rouhani of the "great responsibility" he was shouldering".
Iranian scholar Sadeq Zibakalam called on the president to pay tribute to former reformist president, Mohammad Khatami and visit the tomb of his late mentor Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani.
He also reminded Mr Rouhani of the support he'd received from opposition figures Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karrubi, who remain under house arrest following their role in protests against the results of the 2009 presidential election.
Some Instagram and Twitter users offered guidance to President Rouhani under a Persian hashtag which translates as "If I were in Rouhani's shoes".
"I would have gone to Akhtar street [Mir Hossein Mousavi address] for breakfast," @1momas tweeted.
Twitter user @mmoeeni suggested that Rouhani should punish hardline media outlets for providing what he considered to be unfair coverage of the campaign and siding with the ultra-conservative candidate, Ebrahim Raisi.
An image of an emotional Rouhani supporter named as "Mirza Aqa" was widely circulated on social networks.
"#If I were in Rouhani's shoes, I would go to Mirza Aqa tomorrow and give him a hug," Twitter user @elahehsalari said. bit.ly/2roNfVu
Rouhani's victory is a severe blow to Iran's conservative establishment, and the majority of conservative users seem to have accepted defeat.
Supporters of Ebrahim Raisi emphasised how "peacefully" they had accepted the election results, comparing themselves favourably to the reaction of reformists after the 2009 presidential election.
Twitter user @mosbatboy sarcastically wrote: "16m warmongers and fanatics [referring to conservatives] lost in the election but the city is at peace... Eight years ago, 13m peace-seekers and civilised people lost the election and there was a civil war in the country for eight months".
Facebook user Mohammed Petgar suggested that the conservative groups "could only dream of winning an election", adding: "These delusional people will become a minority in Iran's political arena in no time."
BBC Monitoring reports and analyses news from TV, radio, web and print media around the world.


You will have little trouble finding a luxury Swiss watch in London's West End, where shops selling brands such as Rolex, Omega and Patek Philippe are commonplace.

But British-made timepieces are much harder to come by.
One of the few purveyors is Bremont, which has a boutique in the upmarket central London area of Mayfair.
Its mechanical watches sell for between £2,695 and £30,950, and are all designed and painstakingly assembled by hand in England.
It employs around 30 watchmakers at a workshop in the Oxfordshire town of Henley-on-Thames, and makes many of its own parts at a factory in Silverstone, Northamptonshire.
"The goal is to produce watches that you could put on in 20 to 30 years' time and that will still look great," says Nick English, Bremont's co-founder.
"We are also tapping into the incredible history of British watchmaking. The world sets its time by Greenwich, not by Geneva, and that is for a good reason."
Bremont, which was launched in 2007, today makes 8,000 to 10,000 watches a year.
While this is a fraction of the more than 800,000 watches made per annum at Swiss giant Rolex, Bremont has outlets in New York, London and Hong Kong, and is an official sponsor of the America's Cup yachting competition.
Yet it is among but a handful of British watchmakers to be so successful.
According to the most recent World Watch Report by research body Digital Luxury Group, of the top 62 luxury brands that were searched for online worldwide in 2015, only one was British - Bremont.
For many watch enthusiasts this is disappointing, given that the UK led the way in watchmaking in the 17th and 18th Centuries.
In 1800, Britain made around half of the world's timepieces - about 200,000 a year. However, the US and Switzerland gradually overtook the UK thanks to mass production.
Today the Swiss have a near monopoly on the luxury market, while low cost battery-powered quartz watches are made in Asia.
However, a small but growing crop of British brands - currently around a dozen - hope to stage a comeback.
"We've definitely seen more British watch companies opening over the last five to 10 years," says Dudley Giles, chief executive of the British Horological Institute.
"People are attracted because if you can design and market a mechanical watch the margins are good. And the British brand attracts people because it has always been associated with quality and innovation."
In addition the luxury watch market is growing, thanks to rising demand from countries such as India and China.
However, new UK brands face considerable hurdles. For example, watchmaking machinery can cost hundreds of thousands of pounds and Britain's engineering capacity in the sector is all but non-existent - meaning the equipment has to be imported.
This can make it hard for firms to claim that their watches are truly "made in Britain". Bremont, for instance, uses Swiss-manufactured movements.
James Buttery, editor of WatchPro magazine, says: "In the UK what you have are British brands, where the majority of the components are supplied from elsewhere and then in some cases assembled in the UK.
"So there is a grey area over what constitutes 'British made', a problem elite Swiss brands don't face."
Only a few firms claim to manufacture every component of their watches in the British Isles - one of the best known being Roger W Smith, which makes limited numbers of watches on the Isle of Man. They sell for more than £100,000.
However, an increasing number aspire to make everything in the UK, such as Garrick which opened in Norfolk in 2015. The company's movements - the beating heart of a mechanical watch - are currently made in Switzerland and modified in house.
But in November it will launch its own movement, designed in collaboration with the Swiss watchmaker UhrTeil, and assembled in the UK.
"It means that we are one step closer to realising our dream of a totally in-house movement," says Garrick founder David Brailsford. "We do almost everything else ourselves, from making the plates and dials to the cases and crowns."
Garrick watches retail for between £2,500 and £50,000, and around 70 were sold last year to customers around the globe.
But getting to this point was not easy, Mr Brailsford says. The firm spent about 18 months just getting its processes right, "such as building watchcases which nobody had done in the UK for years".
"We wasted a lot of time and money because there was nobody to go to in the UK to get advice from. So we had to learn everything from scratch."
Mr Buttery says that a growing number of British watchmakers are bringing some or all of their manufacturing back to the UK. Yet for most it is too expensive, leaving them little choice but to produce abroad - although this can make it easier to produce more affordable watches in higher volumes.
Take Marloe, a start-up launched in February of this year following a £180,000 crowd-funding campaign. Its British-designed watches are manufactured in China and retail for around £250.
"They are all hand wound, there are no automatic features, they are not quartz," says founder Oliver Goffe. "To be honest we are trying to bring hand-wound watches back to the masses."
The company, which only retails online, has sold 1,500 watches to date and expects to sell 5,000 next year.
Mr Goffe attributes the resurgence of British watches to the rise of craft culture more generally.
"It's about people moving away from Sainsbury's and Tesco and actually buying meat from their local butchers and cheese from the local deli," he says.
"It spreads to other things that are made locally, in the country you are from, where people are making that product you are about to put on your wrist."
Perhaps surprisingly, Mr Goffe would also like to manufacture all of his watch components in the UK one day, and believes it could be done for a reasonable price.
"Yes you've got the cost of labour and machinery, but if we used to do it in Britain then why can't again? It could be a real opportunity if we work out how."
British watchmaking remains a cottage industry, but is picking up pace. As for whether the UK could one day regain its market-leading position - watch this space.


A former youth politician who posed as a teenage girl on Skype to groom boys as young as 12 has been jailed.

Connor Allen-Howe had an archive of material showing underage victims performing sex acts.
Some were asked to drink their own urine while others were made to take part in sexual activity with siblings and dogs, Chelmsford Crown Court heard.
Sentencing him to eight years, judge Emma Peters said the 21-year-old had "deeply troubling perversions".
The former youth councillor from Halstead, Essex, was also put on the sex offenders register for an indefinite period.
He admitted 21 counts of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, eight of coursing or inciting child pornography and two of having indecent images, at an earlier hearing.
Allen-Howe's actions came to light when a boy from Colorado, in the US, alerted his parents.
A child exploitation team in the States contacted Essex Police and the defendant was arrested.
It emerged he had begun contacting schoolchildren when he was 16 and a member of Halstead Youth Council.
He told victims, targeted between November 2012 and June 2015, his webcam was broken so he could not be identified.
At sentencing, Judge Peters said: "You have deeply troubling perversions. You were calm and controlling.
"There were a significant number of victims, with 15 of them being under the age of 16.
"Had you committed all of the crimes when you were over 18 years of age, you would be looking at a much higher sentence."
Michelle Brown, from the Crown Prosecution Service, said: "This case is a shocking warning of the dangers that exist online, not only of how easy it is for a stranger to make contact with young boys, but also to persuade them to carry out sexual acts on camera.
"In some instances, these acts were committed on children younger than themselves or involved pet dogs."


The two brides wore white and the 12 grooms wore suits, two in lime green with matching moustache-adorned bow ties.

The bridesmaid was a known transgendered activist in a Chinese-style gown of red and gold - "for good luck" - and the mayor of West Hollywood performed the ceremony.
But even by the "anything goes" West Hollywood standard, the wedding was unusual.
The seven couples married in the mass wedding were all from China - the winners of a contest meant to promote the rights of gay people to marry in China and around the world.
More than 2,000 couples applied to the "We Do" contest hosted by Chinese ecommerce giant Alibaba, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Gay marriage is not legal in China, but there is a growing gay rights movement.
"The progress that's been made in terms of gay rights, for want of a better word, in China has been astronomical," said Geng Le, the CEO of Chinese gay dating app Blued, which has 15 million members.
"In fact, when Ireland recently voted on the same sex referendum, it was reported on the national media in China. So the progress has been pretty quick."
Charlie Gu, of China Luxury Advisors, organised the wedding in West Hollywood. Mr Gu's job is to help luxury brands market to the growing number of Chinese travellers and consumers.
"For a company like Alibaba there is also a strong business interest in this," Mr Gu said of the mass wedding.
"When you look at companies like Google and Apple all stepping up their game to embrace marriage equality and support this cause, Alibaba as a publicly traded company in the United States certainly wanted to elevate their status and their participating in the global business community and be part of it - do the right thing."
The wedding was held Tuesday morning at the West Hollywood public library. It was a solemn and emotional event, with the couples walking the short aisle through the library auditorium to sit in seats until it was their turn on stage.
They walked the aisle to the tune of Somewhere Over the Rainbow and each wedding took just a few moments.
The sponsors sprung for platinum Tiffany rings for the couples. But Rongfeng Duan, 38, of Shanghai had other plans. Coco Lachine - the bridesmaid - brought the Tiffany ring to him and West Hollywood Mayor Lindsey Horvath asked him to place the ring on Tao Li's finger.
But Mr Duan solicited gasps and then applause from the small crowd when he said: "No thanks, I have another."
He had another Tiffany ring. A gold one with diamonds. Mr Li broke down in tears and afterward couldn't stop admiring his sparkly new ring as the other couples were getting married.
"It cannot be complete without a diamond," Mr Duan said after the wedding. "We already got the support from family and friends including the red envelopes [full of money] which is a tradition in China."
Mr Duan and Mr Li, the couple who wore the lime green and moustache ties, say they have matching red suits to wear for a reception their mothers are hosting for them in Shanghai to celebrate the marriage once they get home. Gay marriage may not be legal in China, but it's becoming easier to be gay, they said.
"Unfortunately, it is still the case today that for the LGBT community in China, they are unable to walk down the aisle with the person they love," Mr Le of Blued said to the wedding party.
"These seven couples are also represented of the entire Chinese LGBT community. Another reason we brought them to LA - we want to showcase to the community back in China what it can really be like."
To win the contest, couples had to submit a video sharing their love stories to Taobao, an online marketplace owned by Alibaba, which is similar to Amazon or eBay (and sells more than them both combined).
The public then voted on winners and 10 couples were selected. Only seven made the trip to California because the other three couples had visa problems.
Aside from the wedding, the couples were treated to tours of Los Angeles, shopping trips and various dinners out on the town.
After the ceremony, the couples wiped away their tears as they posed for group photos with the mayor and the bridesmaid. Mayor Horvath, who is just 32 and has been mayor for just two months, said she considers it her job to fight for gay marriage around the world.
"I do believe that today's occasion not only helps to demonstrates the love and commitment all couples share but to let those people who want to shut us down and take away the rights and privileges of these couples that we will not stop," she said, "until all love can be celebrated equally under the law".


Celtic winger Scott Sinclair says the most important lesson he has learned in football is to always have belief in your ability.

The PFA Scotland player of the year has experienced spells on the sidelines at previous clubs and was part of the Aston Villa squad relegated from England's top flight last season.
"If I can give advice to young players it is to never give up," he said.
"People will always pull you down and say you are never good enough."
And Sinclair, who has scored 25 goals so far this term, added: "The main thing, on a personal level, is that I never gave up and I'm getting the rewards for it now.
"When you've gone through so many tough times in your career, of not playing and getting relegated, I was the one who stayed behind at training and did things at home. Looking back, it was all worth it."
Sinclair, now 28, joined Chelsea at 15 from Bristol Rovers and made a handful of appearances for the first team. In his five years contracted to the Stamford Bridge club he was loaned to Plymouth, Queens Park Rangers, Charlton, Crystal Palace, Birmingham and Wigan before signing for Swansea in August 2010.
The English winger made more than 90 appearances for the Swans ahead of a switch to Manchester City, but was on the fringes there and was again loaned out, with spells at West Brom and Aston Villa.
The pain of relegation with Villa, in his first season there after a transfer from City ahead of season 2015-16, has made the success of his debut season under Brendan Rodgers at Celtic all the more joyful.
He said: "The main thing was to come up here and enjoy my football again and get that happiness back into my life of playing week in, week out and having a manager who believes in me.
"I could have stayed down in England and enjoyed my life and had it all nice and cosy. But I didn't want that, I wanted much more. I've always wanted to be giving more."
Sinclair, who described his player of the year award as "a great honour", came off the bench on Saturday as Celtic swept St Johnstone aside.
In the second half he replaced the impressive 18-year-old Michael Johnston, who has since signed a three-year deal with the treble-chasers.
"Mikey stepped up," said Sinclair of his young team-mate.
"He was fantastic, you could see his confidence. I spoke to him before the game just to say, 'play your own game', because sometimes when you play under-21 level and you come in to the first team you just want to keep it simple.
"But any young player coming into the first team wants to go out there and express himself, and that's what the gaffer brings to any young player who steps up."


The Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service (NIFRS) is attending a gorse fire in Alderwood Road near Clogher and Fivemiletown in County Tyrone.

The fire, which is being treated as deliberate, was first reported at about 11:00 BST on Sunday.
Eight fire appliances and 45 fire fighters are at the scene, including crew members from the Irish Fire Service.
The blaze has spread across a 5 kilometre area, crossing the border.
It is the latest of 435 reported wildfires since the beginning of May.
Group Commander Brian Stanfield said: "We believe this fire has been started deliberately and we believe there are still people in the area qho are starting fires.
"We'd like to appeal to members of the public. This is reckless behaviour, this is not just endangering the countryside, but it is putting people's lives and property at risk."


The children of a 101-year-old man have legally challenged his marriage to his ex-maid, who is just over half his age.

Francisco Marcolino married his maid of decades, Rita Monteiro, 52, in northern Portugal on 4 May.
But three children from his previous marriage claim she is eyeing his €2m (£1.7m; $2.2m) estate and that he is not of sound mind.
"If he had wanted to marry, he would have done it when he was capable," his son told Portuguese media.
The children are trying to annul the marriage on grounds of incapacity - though a fourth is refusing to join the action and has not commented.
Ms Monteiro was hired by Mr Marcolino's wife 30 years ago, two years before she died.
According to Manuel Marcolino de Jesus, one of three children who have filed the lawsuit, his father's health has sharply deteriorated over the past few years.
His father has made several emergency trips to the local hospital, where his files say he suffers dementia and is totally dependent, Manuel Marcolino said.
"They have lived in [Ms Monteiro's] house since he became incapable five years ago, and that is when she started to take over everything," he told Portugal's CM Jornal.
"Since then, more than €319,000 has gone missing from one [bank] account and more than €200,000 from another," he alleged.
Last December, the three lodged two criminal cases of abuse of trust against Ms Monteiro and listed Mr Marcolino's assets. A psychological assessment was under way to see whether Mr Marcolino should be appointed a representative to manage his affairs.
But they say they were caught by surprise when they found out their father had married.
They say officials at a register office 80km (50 miles) away refused to marry the pair, forcing them to travel to another one 150km away.
Portuguese news agency Lusa has repeatedly contacted Ms Monteiro's lawyer, but her lawyer says she has "no questions to answer".
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