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CIA rebuffs Cheney over interrogation documents

2009-05-15T04:32:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON - The CIA on Thursday rejected a request by former Vice President Dick Cheney that the public documents he said showed the effectiveness of the use of harsh interrogation methods on terror suspects.

Cheney had the agency declassify two memos that he thinks back its claim that useful knowledge was obtained by such methods. The Bush administration approved the use of water boarding, sleep and food poverty and forced nudity, as it comes to information after 11 September attacks.

The CIA says the two memos Cheney invited to be made available to the public were required for pending litigation.

"For this reason - and for that reason only - CIA Mr. Cheney does not accept the request for a binding release review," Paul Gimigliano, CIA spokesman said.

A spokeswoman for Cheney, who has become the most public defenders are much more important aspects of George W. Bush 's presidency, in January, said he was preparing a complaint.

He has been in an increasingly contentious battle with the Obama administration on the interrogation program whose disclosure prompted international anger and the United States' reputation around the world.

In one of his first acts as president, Barack Obama appoint humane treatment of terror suspects.

Obama called water boarding, a form of simulated drowning, a form of torture and has not ruled out criminal prosecution of the Bush administration, is authorized.

Cheney criticized Obama's decision last month to legal opinions, while the Bush administration, the use of the techniques employed against some caught in Bush's war against terrorism after 11 September attacks.

Obama to DEBATE

The dispute over prisoner abuse has entangled the Speaker of the House (of Representatives), Nancy Pelosi, in a dispute about how much they knew, that the program could be created in advance and Obama in a debate about whether images of the abuse to be released.

Obama on Wednesday reversed its position and refused to make public dozens of photos, which says that the images could ignite a counter-movement against the U.S. troops.

"The concern was that the release of these photos would have a negative impact on the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan," Attorney General Eric Holder said at a House Judiciary Committee hearing.

"We have to argue that in court, and we are prepared to do this," he said. Obama's decision was "consistent with the interests of our troops," said Holder.

Human rights activists want a full investigation into the interrogation program and the official who is authorized.

House (of Representatives) Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, who for a commission to investigate behavior in Bush's war against terrorism, said more than a dozen members of the Committee was the appointment of a special advisory to the treatment of prisoners.

The American Civil Liberties Union, working for the release of the photos, is also responsible for the appointment of an independent prosecutor, to the interrogation methods.

Legislators also worried about the owners about the possibility that some of the prisoners of Guantanamo Bay, the U.S. naval base in Cuba, where many terror suspects are held, could be transferred to the United States.

Representative Lamar Smith, the senior Republican on the Committee, said closing Guantanamo Bay, where 241 terror suspects are "endanger American lives."

He warned that American prisons holding terrorism suspects "could be a target for terrorist attacks sleeper cells here and around the world."

Owners said no final decisions have been taken, what to do with Guantanamo Bay prisoners.

Analysts and diplomats have said Saberi arrest should not be interpreted as a sign that Obama rejects Iran's Overture, but they say, and their release was influenced by it.

Some saw the arrest as a warning to foreign media in Iran presidential elections in June, while others say that he had an offer from hardliners to obstruct any thaw in US-Iran relations or to use it as a "trump card".

Freed reporter Saberi arrives in Austria from Iran

2009-05-15T04:14:00.000-07:00

VIENNA - US-born journalist Roxana Saberi arrive in Austria on Friday from Iran, four days after the authorities freed them from Tehran prison and lifted its eight-year sentence for espionage.

"We can confirm that they arrived in Vienna," said a spokeswoman for the U.S. Embassy in Vienna. Another U.S. official said Saberi was expected to stay in the Austrian capital for a few days. U.S. officials further comment.

Earlier, the Iranian lawyer, Abdolsamad Khorramshahi, Reuters said the 32-year-old freelance journalist in Tehran, had an overnight flight for Europe and will continue in the United States.

U.S. National Public Radio said Saberi was traveling with her parents. It also has U.S. and Iranian citizenship and worked for the BBC and NPR.

It was in January to work in Iran after their press credentials had expired. She was later accused of espionage, found guilty and for eight years in prison. She was released from prison after her sentence on Monday cut on appeal to a suspension of two years.

"She was good, but sad that they do not return to Iran soon to do the reporting," Khorramshahi added.

Saberi other lawyer, Saleh Nikbakht, said on Tuesday the change in the ruling was by a different interpretation of the relevant legislation not because of political considerations.

But her release on Monday removed a potential obstacle to the

President Barack Obama's attempts to thaw U.S. relations with the Islamic Republic after three decades of enmity.

Saberi Obama welcomed the release as a "humanitarian gesture".

The two countries are in dispute over Iran's nuclear program which the West fears is aimed at making nuclear bombs. Iran says it is for generating electricity.

The United States had said the charges were baseless and had demanded the immediate release Saberi. Tehran does not recognize dual citizenship, and told Washington not to disrupt.

Obama, Iran has a new beginning in relations if Iran says Washington really begin to change policy.

Analysts and diplomats have said Saberi arrest should not be interpreted as a sign that Obama rejects Iran's Overture, but they say, and their release was influenced by it.

Some saw the arrest as a warning to foreign media in Iran presidential elections in June, while others say that he had an offer from hardliners to obstruct any thaw in US-Iran relations or to use it as a "trump card".

WHO chief warns against false security about H1N1 flu

2009-05-15T04:11:00.000-07:00

The World Health Organization on Friday warned against a false sense of security and seemingly dwindling light outbreaks of avian flu H1N1, which says that the worst may not be longer than for the newly discovered virus.

WHO Director General Margaret Chan, the Organization of the United Nations, the pandemic alert to the second highest level, so it remained "considerable uncertainty" about the exposure, the specific threats in Southeast Asia.

"We meet at a time of crisis, the global impact," she told an intergovernmental meeting on pandemic event at the WHO headquarters in Geneva.

The meeting is to tackle the sensitive issue of virus sharing, the countries in which the biological samples to the international community for use by pharmaceutical companies and decision makers, the vaccine formulation JAB ingredients.

At the height of fears about bird flu, Indonesia had refused to H5N1 virus samples with no guarantees that any vaccines developed from them will be made available to poorer countries at an affordable price.

Leading decision-makers including the flu vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline, Sanofi-Aventis, Novartis and Baxter International expect the WHO guidelines, whether to start mass production of vaccines against H1N1, which may require less seasonal flu shots.

On Friday, Chan said countries with H1N1 infections for their "exchange of samples for risk assessment and the seed vaccine." Another top WHO officials, Keiji Fukuda, there have been "fast and wide distribution of samples to date.

The participants in the meeting - a precursor to next week's annual World Health Assembly - try to reach an agreement on standards for transparency, trust and sovereignty in relation to virus sample sharing.

"I hope the result is something really balanced, and we can for a long time," said Fukuda.

According to the latest WHO count, more than 7,500 people in 34 countries were infected with the strain of a genetic mix of swine, bird and human viruses. The symptoms are easy for most patients, but 65 people have died from the flu, especially in Mexico.

Chan said the WHO's leadership was aware of parts of Southeast Asia saw that major outbreaks of the H5N1 bird flu virus - a virus that can kill if it's from birds to humans, but has simply not among the people until today.

A mixture of H5N1 and H1N1 viruses could have a major influence, she said, while stressing: "I am not saying that will happen."

Malaysia confirms first case of A(H1N1) flu

2009-05-15T04:07:00.000-07:00

Kuala Lumpur: Malaysia on Friday its first case of A (H1N1) flu in a 21-year-old students who return from the United States on Wednesday morning.

All the 192 passengers on a Malaysia Airlines flight MH091 from Newark on Wednesday urged to contact the Ministry of Health, using 03-88810200 or 03-88810300

Health Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said the case from the 36th Malaysia Country to be affected by the virus.

Health officers at the Sungai Buloh Hospital on high tender after the first A (H1N1) flu case in a 21-year-old students who return from the United States on Wednesday morning.

"Malaysia is now on high alert," said Liow, now in London, enroute to Geneva for a meeting of the World Health Organization. He added that he would his return earlier than planned in the next Friday.

Liow said Datuk Seri Kong Cho Ha, who is now the acting health minister would hold a press conference with Deputy Health Director-General Datuk Dr Ramlee Rahmat at Putra Jaya by 3 clock

Meanwhile, a statement by the Ministry of Health, the Director-General, Dr Ismail Merican said the young man was on Thursday in the hospital for fever, sore throat and body aches.

Tests confirmed that he was infected with the A (H1N1) virus, the statement said. He receives anti-virus treatment and was in a stable condition, he said.

Ismail said the ministry had contact with members of his family, but they were not under quarantine.

Ismail said his department was the steps to protect public health, and there is no reason to panic.

Meanwhile, Bernama reported that a man from Bukit Mertajam under observation in the isolation ward of the hospital, Penang was declared free of avian influenza A (H1N1).

"We have just confirmed a report that the blood test on the 26-year-old man was negative," state health, welfare, caring society and environment chairman Phee Boon Poh said when contacted by Bernama Friday.

A test on a sample of his blood was sent to Kuala Lumpur.

The man was held for observation Thursday after it was found that fever and symptoms similar to those of influenza A (H1N1) in his return from the United States.

Two weeks ago, a New Zealand tourist was on the isolation ward of the hospital due to influenza A (H1N1), but also a blood test showed negative.

U.N. Security Council debates Gaza violence

2009-01-01T04:34:00.000-08:00

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Arab countries called an emergency session of the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday to debate the violence in Gaza, demanding in a draft resolution an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militants.

The evening session adjourned without a vote being called and diplomats said negotiations would be held in coming days over the draft, which Western delegates described as unbalanced and focusing almost entirely on Israel's actions.

The resolution, presented by Libya, called for "an immediate ceasefire and for its full respect by both sides." It also demanded protection for Palestinian civilians, opening border crossings into Gaza and "restoration of calm in full."

It denounced "the excessive, disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force by Israel" but its only mention of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel was a vague reference to "the deterioration of the situation in southern Israel."

"It's going to need a lot of work," one Western diplomat said of the resolution.

The council has already issued a statement, which lacks the weight of a resolution, calling for a halt to the violence in Gaza, but it has been ignored. Nearly 400 Palestinians and four Israelis have been killed so far.

The United States says any ceasefire must be durable and binding on the Hamas Islamists who control Gaza, as well as on Israel. The Jewish state, which began air strikes on Gaza on Saturday to try to stamp out the Palestinian rocket fire, has rejected calls for an immediate ceasefire.

Following a meeting of Arab foreign ministers in Cairo, an Arab ministerial delegation is expected to arrive in New York early next week to press their case on Gaza at the United Nations, diplomats said.

They suggested a vote would not take place before then.

BALANCED RESOLUTION

British Ambassador John Sawers told reporters the draft "needs to reflect the responsibilities of all the parties." But he said a balanced resolution "will have a good chance of securing support across the Security Council."

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told the council Washington wanted to see "an immediate ceasefire that is sustainable and implemented by all."

But both he and Israeli Ambassador Gabriela Shalev said the best approach was to reach an agreement between Israel and the Palestinians to end the fighting, then enshrine it in a resolution rather than the council trying to impose a ceasefire.

In the council debate, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, echoed by European speakers, faulted both sides for what he called the "terrifying" conditions in Gaza. He attacked the "irresponsibility" of the rocket attacks and the "disproportionality" of Israel's response.

Arab and Muslim speakers laid the blame on Israel and made little reference to the rockets.

In a harshly worded speech, Libyan Ambassador Giadalla Ettalhi said Israel's attacks and restrictions on aid convoys into Gaza "in their own way represent a crime of genocide."

He urged fellow envoys to adopt the resolution "so that we do not add another Srebrenica (in Bosnia) or Rwanda to the history of this council" -- a reference to massacres in the 1990s that the United Nations failed to prevent.

Israeli planes strike government buildings in Gaza

2009-01-01T04:31:00.000-08:00

GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli aircraft attacked government buildings in the Gaza Strip on New Year's Day and Hamas fired more rockets at Israel after both foes spurned international calls for a ceasefire. Palestinians look at buildings damaged after an Israeli air strike in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip January 1, 2009. (REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa)

Israeli tanks and troops were massed near the border of the Hamas-run coastal territory and the Haaretz newspaper reported on Thursday the Israeli army had recommended a major but short-term ground offensive into the densely populated enclave.

In fresh raids on the sixth day of hostilities, Israeli aircraft and naval forces attacked about 20 Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian medical officials said three civilians were killed and 100 people wounded.

Hamas security officials said buildings housing the education and transportation ministries had been virtually destroyed. The Palestinian parliament building was also hit, they said. Gazans who ventured out of their homes walked along rubble-strewn streets to survey the destruction.

Hamas rockets hit the Israeli cities of Beersheba, Ashdod and Ashkelon. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Diplomats said the deadliest conflict in the Gaza Strip in four decades could get even bloodier after days of Israeli air strikes that have killed at least 399 Palestinians, about a quarter of whom, U.N. figures showed, were civilians, and wounded more than 1,700.

Three Israeli civilians and a soldier have been killed by rockets from the Gaza Strip since Israel began an air offensive on Saturday with the declared aim of ending the rocket threat.

Foreign pressure grew on both sides to hold their fire but Israel brushed aside as "unrealistic" a French proposal for a 48-hour truce that would allow in more humanitarian aid for Gaza's 1.5 million residents.

In New York, the U.N. Security Council held an emergency session but adjourned without a vote after Arab countries pushed for a demand for an immediate ceasefire. Western delegates described the Arab-drafted resolution as unbalanced and said negotiations would continue to reach an agreed text.

"ONLY THE BEGINNING"

France said it would host Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni on Thursday and an Israeli official said French President Nicolas Sarkozy planned to visit Jerusalem on Monday.

Israel Radio said Israeli forces massed at the Gaza border were readying for a possible ground offensive.

"This is only the beginning," Israeli Deputy Defence Minister Matan Vilnai said on Israel's Army Radio.

"We are operating now, for exactly what we have said from the start, and nothing has changed, to deal Hamas a heavy blow. It has already been wounded." He said Israel would insist on an end to all rocket fire from Gaza.

The Gaza operation, launched after a six-month ceasefire expired on Dec. 19 and Hamas intensified rocket strikes, could affect the outcome of the national election Israel is to hold on Feb. 10.

A poll in the Haaretz daily showed a majority of Israelis, 52 percent, favoured pursuing the attacks in Gaza, with just 20 percent backing calls for a ceasefire, and 19 percent favouring the launch of a ground offensive into Gaza.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said Israeli attacks must stop before any truce proposals could be considered. Israel must also lift its economic blockade of Gaza and open border crossings.

"After that it will be possible to talk on all issues without any exception," Haniyeh said in a televised speech.

U.S. President George W. Bush spoke by phone to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the White House said. Bush put the onus on Hamas to stop firing rockets as a first step to a truce.

Olmert told his security cabinet that if a diplomatic solution could be found that ensured better security for southern Israel, the government would consider it.

"But at the moment, it's not there," an aide quoted Olmert as saying. "We didn't start this operation just to end it with rocket fire continuing as it did before it began."

Israeli ministers approved the mobilisation of 2,500 army reservists, expanding on an earlier call-up of 6,500 soldiers for the force on the Gaza border.

Rain that could impede an armoured invasion largely cleared on Thursday and forecasters predicted clear skies for the next several days.

Food supplies in Gaza were running low and there were power cuts. Hospitals struggled to cope with the high number of casualties from the offensive.

Israel said it would continue to let humanitarian supplies into Gaza and that more than 90 truckloads with food and medicine would be permitted into the territory on Thursday. A similar amount of supplies went in on Wednesday.

Israel and Hamas under pressure for Gaza aid truce

2009-01-01T04:29:00.000-08:00

GAZA (Reuters) - Foreign powers stepped up calls on Israel and Hamas on Tuesday to halt hostilities after four days of Israeli air attacks on the Gaza Strip and rocket salvoes by the Islamist militants deep inside the Jewish state.

The Quartet of Middle East peace brokers -- the United Nations, United States, Russia and European Union -- urged an immediate ceasefire, a U.N. spokeswoman said after telephone consultations by the group's foreign ministers.

Israeli warplanes destroyed Hamas targets for a fourth day, including five ministerial buildings and a structure belonging to the Islamic University in Gaza City.

Medical officials put Palestinian casualties since the aerial onslaught began on Saturday at 384 dead and more than 800 wounded. A U.N. agency said at least 62 of the dead were civilians. Four Israelis have been killed.

Israeli media quoted Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as saying the Gaza offensive, launched by his centrist government six weeks before an election that opinion polls predict the opposition right-wing Likud party will win, was in "the first of several stages".

Israel says its air bombardments are aimed at ending rocket attacks launched from Gaza, which have caused panic for months in areas where one-eighth of its population lives.

Two rockets fired from the Gaza Strip hit the city of Beersheba on Tuesday, 42 km (26 miles) inside Israel, police said -- the deepest such attack yet by militants, who have launched more than 400 rockets across the border since Saturday, according to an Israeli military assessment.

Three Israelis were killed by rockets on Monday but there were no reports of serious casualties inside Israel on Tuesday.

FOOD AND POWER LOW

In Gaza, basic food supplies were running low and power cuts were affecting much of the territory. Hospitals lacked at least 80 essential medicines as well as scores of instruments, Health Ministry official Muawiyah Hassanein said.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner proposed Israel accept a 48-hour truce to allow aid into Gaza. France said it would host Livni on Thursday and an Israeli official said French President Nicolas Sarkozy might visit Jerusalem next Monday.

EU foreign ministers called late on Tuesday for an immediate and lasting truce and for humanitarian aid to be let into Gaza.

The EU said it would work with other members of the Quartet, and send a delegation of ministers to the region shortly.

Turkey, Egypt and several other Arab governments are also pursuing their own initiative calling for a ceasefire and reopening of Gaza's crossings with Israel, diplomats said.

Olmert met Defence Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni late on Tuesday to discuss the initiatives, Israel Radio said.

Olmert's spokesman Mark Regev said Israel supported the idea of letting aid into Gaza.

"We want to see convoy after convoy of humanitarian support and we are willing to work closely with all relevant international parties to facilitate that goal," he said.

"At the same time, it is important to keep the pressure up on Hamas, not give them a respite, time to regroup and reorganise."

About 1.5 million Palestinians live in Gaza, which has one of the highest population densities and growth rates in the world. Most Gazans live on less than $2 a day and up to 80 percent are dependent on food aid, according to aid groups.

Hamas seized Gaza from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's secular Fatah faction in fighting in June 2007. The Islamists have rejected international demands to recognise Israel, renounce violence and accept existing interim peace deals.

"VICTIM AND JAILER"

Hamas was cool to the idea of a truce. It said the onus was on Israel to stop firing and lift the blockade of Gaza.

"You can't equate the victim and the jailer," Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum told reporters. "What is required at this time is an Arab and international effort to stop the (Israeli) aggression and open the (border) crossings."

The White House said President George W. Bush had spoken to Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on Tuesday to discuss how to end the violence.

According to internal Israeli assessments, the air offensive has destroyed a third of the Hamas rocket arsenal but the faction's guerrilla army remains largely intact, Israel's Channel 10 television reported.

"None of us can say how long it will take," Israeli President Shimon Peres said after being briefed at the Defence Ministry about Israel's deadliest Gaza campaign since the 1967 Middle East war, when the territory was captured from Egypt.

Barak said he would seek Israeli cabinet approval for the mobilisation of 2,500 army reservists, compounding an earlier call-up of 6,500 reservists for the garrison on the Gaza border.

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was due in Syria and Jordan on Tuesday. Al Arabiya television said he would meet Khaled Meshaal, the exiled Hamas leader living in Damascus, although Erdogan's office said no such meeting was scheduled.

Palestinian officials said Abbas would meet Erdogan in Jordan in the evening.

In northern Gaza, two Palestinian sisters were killed in an air raid near their home, medical workers said. The area has been a launching ground for cross-border rocket attacks.

"We are living in horror, we and our children. The situation is not just bad, it is tragic," said Gazan Abu Fares, standing outside his home near the rubble of a building bombed overnight.

Obama, Clinton face new tests in White House duel

2008-05-06T12:10:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton faced crucial tests in their grueling White House fight on Tuesday, as voters in Indiana and North Carolina began casting ballots in the latest Democratic showdowns.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama (D-IL) (L) greets Andrea Raes after she voted along with her daughters Lilia (in pink), 3, and Sophia, 2, outside the polling location at Hinkle Fieldhouse on the campus of Butler University in Indianapolis May 6, 2008. (REUTERS/Brent Smith)

The two states, with a combined 187 delegates to the August nominating convention at stake, are the biggest prizes remaining in the tight race to see who will be the party's candidate in the November presidential election. After Tuesday, only six of the state-by-state contests will be left.

"The stakes are high and the consequences are huge," Clinton told supporters at a New Albany, Indiana, fire station on Monday night.

Polls in both states opened by 7 a.m. EDT (1200 GMT) and were scheduled to close in Indiana at 7 p.m. EDT (2300 GMT) and in North Carolina at 7:30 p.m. EDT (2330 GMT), with results expected soon afterward.

Clinton has cut Obama's advantage in North Carolina to single digits in most polls over the past few weeks. The two run closer in Indiana, where Clinton has a slight edge.

"Obviously we hope to do as well as we can, but, you know, we started out pretty far behind," she said late on Monday. "I never feel confident; I just try to do the best I can."

Obama, an Illinois senator, has an almost unassailable lead in pledged delegates who will help select the Democratic nominee to face Republican John McCain in November.

If Obama wins in both Indiana and North Carolina on Tuesday, it would end Clinton's slender hopes of overtaking him in either delegates or popular votes won in the battle for the nomination and spark a fresh flood of calls for the New York senator and former first lady to step aside.

Clinton victories in both states could fuel doubts about Obama's electability and persuade some superdelegates -- party insiders free to back any candidate at the nominating convention -- to move toward her.

Neither can win enough delegates to clinch the race before voting ends on June 3, leaving the decision to the nearly 800 superdelegates.

A split decision would leave the race largely unchanged heading to the last six contests, in which 217 delegates are at stake. "Today is likely to be 'Groundhog Day': six more weeks of this campaign," said George Stephanopoulos of ABC News.

OBAMA'S ROUGH STRETCH

Obama has struggled through a rough campaign stretch after last month's loss to Clinton in Pennsylvania, dogged by a furor over his comments on "bitter" small-town residents and a controversy over his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, has won the votes of nine out of 10 black voters in other states, and is expected to benefit from a strong turnout in North Carolina, where African-Americans could make up more than one-third of voters in the Democratic primary.

The two Democrats, courting the working- and middle-classes suffering from an ailing economy and high gas prices, spent much of the past few days focusing on Clinton's proposal to lift the federal gasoline tax for the summer.

Obama and many economists called the plan a political gimmick that would save little money for most families, but Clinton launched an advertisement in both states questioning her rival's stance.

"What has happened to Barack Obama?" an announcer asks. "He is attacking Hillary's plan to give you a break on gas prices because he doesn't have one."

Clinton says a suspension of the tax during June, July and August, when many Americans take vacations, would help people deal with record gas prices in a faltering economy. Congressional leaders say there is little chance Congress will take up any gas tax proposal this year.

"Do I think we can get it done, past a veto by President (George W.) Bush as the ultimate blocker?" Clinton said. "It's obviously a very difficult challenge. But that doesn't mean you don't try."

Obama released his own advertisement that said Clinton offered "more of the same old negative politics." He told supporters the gas tax holiday was a dishonest approach to a real problem.

"The majority of people do find me trustworthy, more than they do the other candidate," he said. "We can't solve problems if people don't think their leaders are telling them the truth."

U.S. slams Russia over rising tensions with Georgia

2008-05-06T12:09:00.000-07:00

The United States on Tuesday condemned the Russian government for taking "provocative actions" against neighboring Georgia and urged both sides to take steps to avoid armed confrontation.

The White House accused Moscow of escalating tensions over the Georgian breakaway province of Abkhazia by sending in more troops, shooting down an unarmed, unmanned aerial vehicle over Georgia and boosting ties with the separatist regions.

"In recent days and weeks, the Russian government has taken what we would call provocative actions which have increased tensions with Georgia," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters.

"These steps have significantly and unnecessarily heightened tensions in the region," she said.

Georgia has tried to reassert control over Abkhazia and South Ossetia since they broke away in the early 1990s. Russia has said its troop increases were aimed at countering an attack planned by Georgia on Abkhazia and it denied the drone shootdown.

Perino urged the Russian government to reiterate its commitment to Georgia's territorial borders and sovereignty, reverse the troop movements and "cease from further provocation.

"In contacts with both the Russian and Georgian governments at the highest levels, the United States has firmly reiterated our support for Georgia's territorial integrity and strongly urged Russia to de-escalate and reverse its measures," she said.

The United States and Western allies have suspected Russia of trying to punish Georgia -- a small Caucasus country on Russia's southern border -- for its attempt to join the NATO alliance which Washington supports.

Greed behind food price rises - development bank head

2008-05-06T12:08:00.000-07:00

The food price crisis is caused largely by greed and speculation rather than food shortages, the head of Southern Africa's development bank said on Tuesday.

People climb a truck loaded with vegetables in Kenskoff to sell them at the streets markets of Port-au-Prince May 2, 2008. (REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz)

Spiralling food costs -- called a "silent tsunami" by the World Food Programme -- have ignited fury and a rash of protests from Haiti to Somalia to Bangladesh. Exporting countries have curbed shipments to ensure domestic supplies and tame inflation.

"These increases in food prices are not the consequence of food shortages, it's the consequence of human greed that is putting at risk the lives of millions of men, women and children," Jay Naidoo told Reuters.

"There are companies that are making super profits on this issue."

The root causes of the more than 40 percent rise in food prices in the last year are disputed. Experts point to strong demand from Asian emerging markets, adverse weather in some producer countries and increased use of biofuels.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said it would give up to $500 million in emergency loans to regional economies hardest hit by the crisis and double investment in the farm sector to $2 billion in 2009.

After four days of talks in Madrid, governments remained split on whether they should use export bans and market intervention to ensure 1 billion poor Asians living on less than $2 a day do not slip back into hunger and malnutrition.

"Trade measures or price controls are not efficient ways to combat the food crisis or food price inflation. It distorts the market and could exacerbate the situation in the international grain market," ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda told Reuters.

"... the best way to address the immediate difficulty is to strengthen social safety nets through targeted support for the poor rather than generalised food subsidies or trade measures or price controls."

Naidoo, of the Development Bank of Southern Africa, said on the sidelines of a conference on malnutrition in Brussels that governments and world bodies should take concerted action to control surging food prices.

RICE DOWN

Thai rice prices fell around 10 percent on Tuesday after importers taking their cue from Manila's decision to scrap a large tender held back on purchases.

Five Thai exporters quoted prices for 100 percent B trade white rice , the world's benchmark, at between $900 and $920 a tonne, free on board. That is down from last week's $990-$998 a tonne.

Calming nerves further, Thailand, the world's biggest rice exporter, backed off its proposal for an "OPEC-style" rice cartel. "If Thailand was going to set up a rice cartel to fix the price, that would worsen food security," Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama told reporters.

On Monday, the Philippines, the world's top rice importer, scrapped its largest rice tender of the year.

Vietnam, the world's second-largest rice exporter, said it was considering imposing a duty on rice exports because it wants to save more of the grain for domestic consumption.

In Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo cut import taxes on staples including "rice, maize, wheat flour, sugar, vegetable oil, powdered milk, cement, mackerel, chicken, beef ... and equipment necessary for production," according to a government statement published on Tuesday.

Traders said the fall in prices could be limited if Myanmar, which has committed rice exports to neighbouring countries, decides to halt overseas sales and instead starts to import the grain after being hit by a devastating cyclone.

Some of Myanmar's rice customers are expected to turn to Thailand for supplies after the military-ruled country was lashed by Cyclone Nagris. The storm killed up to 22,500 people and ripped through Myanmar's Irrawaddy delta, its main rice growing area once dubbed the "rice bowl of Asia".

Interpol launches paedophile photo campaign

2008-05-06T12:07:00.000-07:00

The global police body Interpol launched a worldwide photo appeal on Tuesday to find a suspected paedophile after its first such campaign led to the arrest and trial of a Canadian in Thailand.

Interpol posted pictures of a white-haired, balding man on its website, saying they were part of a series that showed him sexually abusing boys aged between 6 and 10 in southeast Asia.

The identity, nationality and whereabouts of the man were not known. The first pictures of him were found by police in Norway in March 2006 and so far about 800 images have been discovered, all featuring the same victims and locations.

Interpol, based in the French city of Lyon, said it believed the photographs were taken between April 2000 and May 2001 and the man would look older today than he appeared in the pictures."

"The law enforcement community around the world has done all it can to find this man who clearly presents a danger to young children, and we are now asking the public to help identify this predator and protect other potential victims from abuse," said Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble.

The campaign is a repetition of the first such appeal last October, when Interpol unscrambled images of a suspect's "swirly face" on the Internet.

This led to the arrest of 32-year-old Canadian Christopher Neil, who has since gone on trial in Thailand charged with molesting and distributing pornographic images of two Thai boys.

If found guilty he faces up to 20 years in prison.

website: http://www.interpol.com/

Georgia says "very close" to war with Russia

2008-05-06T12:06:00.000-07:00

Russia's deployment of extra troops in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia has brought the prospect of war "very close", a minister of ex-Soviet Georgia said on Tuesday.

A member of the Georgian Interior Ministry's troops keeps watch at a checkpoint in Upper Abkhazia May 1, 2008. (REUTERS/David Mdzinarishvili)

Separately, in comments certain to fan rising tension between Moscow and Tbilisi, the "foreign minister" of the breakaway Black Sea region was quoted as saying it was ready to hand over military control to Russia.

"We literally have to avert war," Temur Iakobashvili, a Georgian State Minister, told reporters in Brussels.

Asked how close to such a war the situation was, he replied: "Very close, because we know Russians very well."

"We know what the signals are when you see propaganda waged against Georgia. We see Russian troops entering our territories on the basis of false information," he said.

Georgia, a vital energy transit route in the Caucasus region, has angered Russia, its former Soviet master with which it shares a land border, by seeking NATO membership.

An April summit of the U.S.-led Western alliance stopped short of giving it a definite track towards membership but confirmed it would enter one day.

Russia has said its troop build-up is needed to counter what it says are Georgian plans to attack Abkhazia, a sliver of land by the Black Sea, and has accused Tbilisi of trying to suck the West into a war -- allegations Georgia rejects.

Tensions have been steadily mounting and escalated after Georgia accused Russia of shooting down one of its drones over Abkhazia in April, a claim Russia denied.

An extra Russian contingent began arriving in Abkhazia last week. Moscow has not said how many troops would be added but said the total would remain within the 3,000 limit allowed under a United Nations-brokered ceasefire agreement signed in 1994. Diplomats expect the reinforcement to be of the order of 1,200.

SECURITY GUARANTEES

Russian soldiers acting as peacekeepers patrol areas between Georgian and Abkhazian forces but handing full military control of the breakaway province to the Kremlin would alarm both the Georgian government and its allies in the West.

"Those 200 km (120 miles), the distance between the Psou and the Inguri rivers, are all Abkhazia. We agree to Russia taking this territory under its military control," Sergei Shamba, "foreign minister" of Abkhazia, told the Russian newspaper Izvestia.

"In exchange, we will demand guarantees of our security."

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow had not received an official request from Abkhazia for its military to take control of the region.

After the NATO summit, Moscow announced plans to establish legal links with Abkhazia and South Ossetia, another "frozen conflict" region inside Georgia.

NATO has urged Russia to reverse the steps and complained that the deployment of extra troops would add to tensions. The European Union has also expressed concerns.

Iakobashvili said Georgia was urging the European Union to take a more active role in reducing tensions, with options including participating in border control or policing.

"We should have more Europe in these conflict zones," he said, while adding that no decisions on a bigger EU role had been taken during his talks in Brussels.

China's Hu urges close Japan ties, offers two pandas

2008-05-06T12:05:00.000-07:00

Chinese President Hu Jintao lauded closer cooperation with Japan -- and offered a pair of pandas as a friendly gesture -- after arriving on Tuesday for a state visit intended to nurture trust between the wary Asian powers.

Chinese President Hu Jintao (R) and Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda head to a dinner hosted by Fukuda, at Hibiya Matsumotoro restaurant in Tokyo May 6, 2008. (REUTERS/Japan Pool)

The state visit, the second ever by a top Chinese leader, comes as China seeks to soothe international concern over Tibetan unrest, which has threatened to mar Beijing's Olympic Games in August.

Hu was greeted at the airport by senior Japanese officials and flag-waving well-wishers, mostly Chinese, but in the centre of the capital, more than 1,000 protesters marched peacefully chanting "Human rights for Tibet".

Trucks carrying right-wing activists roamed the city blaring anti-China slogans and Japan's national anthem. Some 7,000 police were deployed amid concern over protests by the activists, who see China as a threat, but there were no reports of scuffles.

China wants to promote an image as a friendly neighbour after years of feuding over Japan's handling of its wartime aggression.

Hu, who has stressed forward-looking goals for his five days of summitry and ceremony, said stable and friendly ties were good for both countries, whose economies are increasingly intertwined.

"Relations between the two countries now have new opportunities for further development," he said in a written statement upon arrival in Tokyo. "I hope through this visit to increase mutual trust and strengthen friendship."

In a gesture that might help woo a sceptical Japanese public, Hu offered to give Japan two pandas for research purposes, Japan's foreign ministry said in a statement, following the recent death of popular Ling Ling panda at a Tokyo zoo.

He made the offer during an informal dinner with Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda at a Tokyo restaurant with historical links to Sun Yat-sen, considered the "father" of modern China.

OPPORTUNITIES, ANXIETIES

China replaced the United States as Japan's top trade partner last year, with two-way trade worth $236.6 billion, up 12 percent from 2006.

"As two important powers, if China and Japan can coordinate and cooperate more, and together promote regional economic integration and respond together to international financial, energy, environmental and a series of other challenges, that would be an excellent supplement to our two countries overall trade and economic relations," Chinese ambassador to Japan Cui Tiankai said in a recent interview on Chinese state TV.

But Beijing's expanding diplomatic and military reach has also stirred anxieties in Japan over disputed energy resources, military power and the safety standards of Chinese exports.

"Although the iceberg between China and Japan has melted, fully warming relations require further efforts from both sides," a commentator wrote in China's People's Daily.

The political climax of Hu's visit is set to be a summit on Wednesday with Fukuda, when they hope to unveil a blueprint for managing future ties.

Beijing and Tokyo are keen to avoid a rerun of former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin's visit to Japan a decade ago, which left a chill after he delivered pointed lectures on Japan's 1931-1945 invasion and occupation of China.

Sino-Japanese ties chilled during Junichiro Koizumi's 2001-2006 term as prime minister over his visits to Tokyo's Yasukuni war shrine, but tensions have eased since then.

Japanese media reports said that touchy references in the joint document to Taiwan, human rights, and Japan's hopes for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council were still under negotiation.

The two countries are also quarrelling over the rights to gas beds beneath the East China Sea, while a row over Chinese-made dumplings laced with pesticide that made several people sick has become for some a symbol of Japanese alarm at China's rise.

GOODWILL, NOT BREAKTHROUGHS?

Japan wants greater transparency about China's surging defence spending, set at 418 billion yuan ($60 billion) for 2008, up 17.6 percent on 2007 and outstripping Japan's defence budget. Foreign critics say China's real military budget is much higher.

Tokyo wants Chinese backing for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, an issue that in 2005 fuelled anti-Japanese protests in China, where there is deep rancour over Japan's harsh wartime occupation of much of the country.

China has pressed Japan to spell out again its stance on Taiwan, the self-ruled island that Beijing says must accept reunification. Tokyo has said it supports "one China" that includes Taiwan, which was a Japanese colony for fifty years until 1945 and keeps close ties to Japan.

Few expect big breakthroughs on specific disputes, but the two sides are keen to stress forward-looking goodwill and are to issue a joint document on fighting climate change, a key topic for Japan as host of the July G8 summit.

Hu will speak to Japanese students at Tokyo's Waseda University and may unwind a bit by playing ping-pong with Fukuda.

Bone marrow treatments restore nerves, expert says

2008-05-06T12:03:00.000-07:00

An experiment that went wrong may provide a new way to treat multiple sclerosis, a Canadian researcher said on Tuesday.

Patients who got bone marrow stem-cell transplants -- similar to those given to leukemia patients -- have enjoyed a mysterious remission of their disease.

And Dr. Mark Freedman of the University of Ottawa is not sure why.

"Not a single patient, and it's almost seven years, has ever had a relapse," Freedman said.

Multiple sclerosis or MS affects an estimated 1 million people globally. There is no cure.

It can cause mild illness in some people while causing permanent disability in others. Symptoms may include numbness or weakness in one or more limbs, partial or complete loss of vision, and an unsteady gait.

Freedman, who specializes in treating MS, wanted to study how the disease unfolds. He set up an experiment in which doctors destroyed the bone marrow and thus the immune systems of MS patients.

Then stem cells known as hematopoeitic stem cells, blood-forming cells taken from the bone marrow, were transplanted back into the patients.

"We weren't looking for improvement," Freedman told a stem cell seminar at the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

"The actual study was to reboot the immune system."

Once MS is diagnosed, Freedman said, "you've already missed the boat. We figured we would reboot the immune system and watch the disease evolve. It failed."

STEM CELL REPAIR

They had thought that destroying the bone marrow would improve symptoms within a year. After all, MS is believed to be an autoimmune disease, in which immune system cells mistakenly attack the fatty myelin sheath that protects nerve strands.

Patients lose the ability to move as the thin strands that connect one nerve cell to another wither.

Instead, improvements began two years after treatment.

Freedman reported to the seminar about 17 of the patients he has given the transplants to.

"We have yet to get the disease to restart," he said. Patients are not developing some of the characteristic brain lesions seen in MS. "But we are seeing this repair."

MS patients often have hard-to-predict changes in their symptoms and disease course, so Freedman says his team must study the patients longer before they can say precisely what is going on.

"We are trying to find out what is happening and what could possibly be the source of repair," Freedman said.

But he has found some hints that may help doctors who treat MS by using drugs to suppress the immune system.

"Those with a lot of inflammation going on were the most likely to benefit (from the treatment)," he said.

"We need some degree of inflammation." While inflammation may be the process that destroys myelin, it could be that the body needs some inflammation to make repairs, Freedman said.

Immune cells secrete compounds known as cytokines. While these are linked with inflammation, they may also direct cells, perhaps even the stem cells, to regenerate.

The treatment itself is dangerous -- one patient died when the chemicals used to destroy his bone marrow also badly damaged his liver.

Russia, U.S. sign civilian nuclear pact

2008-05-06T12:02:00.000-07:00

Russia and the United States signed a pact on Tuesday allowing the world's two biggest atomic powers to boost their nuclear trade and work on new ways to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

File photo of U.S. President George W. Bush (L) and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Sochi April 5, 2008. Russia and the U.S. signed on Tuesday a long awaited civilian nuclear cooperation pact that will allow firms from the world's two biggest atomic powers to expand bilateral nuclear trade. (REUTERS/RIA Novosti/Kremlin/Files)

The civilian deal will open up the booming U.S. nuclear market and Russia's vast uranium fields to firms from both countries by removing Cold War restrictions that prevented bilateral trade potentially worth billions of dollars.

U.S. ambassador to Russia, William Burns, signed the deal with the head of Russia's state nuclear corporation, Sergei Kiriyenko, on the last full day of Vladimir Putin's presidency.

"The United States and Russia were once nuclear rivals -- we are today nuclear partners," said Burns.

At the 2006 Group of Eight summit in St Petersburg, President George W. Bush and Putin ordered ministers to reach a deal but it has faced opposition from some U.S. congressmen because of Russia's nuclear cooperation with Iran.

A 123 agreement, so-called because it falls under section 123 of the U.S. Atomic Energy Act, is required before countries can cooperate on nuclear materials.

It is critical to the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, or GNEP, which the United States and Russia have discussed for more than a year as a way to expand peaceful nuclear energy development and mitigate proliferation risks.

"What this agreement allows us to do is to implement some very creative ideas that both Russia and the United States have put forward to deal with the growing challenge of proliferation of nuclear weapons," Burns said.

He said the deal would allow Washington and Moscow to move forward on proposals for international nuclear fuel centres, which would sell developing countries access to nuclear energy but remove the need for their own enrichment programmes.

NUCLEAR GIANTS

Russia and the United States control the largest arsenals of nuclear weapons in the world and both have ambitious plans to build hundreds of new reactors for power production.

Some U.S. politicians have said nuclear cooperation with Russia should be shunned because Moscow is helping Iran build an atomic power station, but the Bush administration is keen to have the pact approved this year.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said in Washington that now that the deal has been signed, it would be sent to Congress for lawmakers to review "in due course".

When asked about speculation that Bush may not submit the deal to Congress -- possibly leaving it for the next president to do -- McCormack said: "Usually we don't sign agreements we don't intend to send to Congress for ratification."

Once the agreement is sent to lawmakers, it would go into force if Congress did not pass a disapproval resolution within 90 legislative days. Russia's parliament, controlled by Putin's party, must also ratify the treaty.

Russia, one of the world's biggest sellers of enrichment services, has been trying to break into the nuclear markets of the United States and European Union.

"The signing of this agreement opens a gigantic field of opportunities for the economic cooperation in the large and growing businesses linked to the civilian use of nuclear energy," Kiriyenko said after the signing.

Tuesday's agreement simplifies life for companies in both countries and allows them to strike deals on trade in nuclear materials directly among themselves.

Putin has reformed Russia's nuclear sector to boost competition and open it up to atomic firms such as Japan's Toshiba Corp, which owns U.S.-based Westinghouse Electric.

Russia has crafted a nuclear behemoth called Atomenergoprom -- which officials say is an atomic version of Russian gas giant Gazprom -- to compete with the biggest nuclear companies on the world market.

Austrian incest victim may sue for compensation

2008-05-06T12:01:00.000-07:00

Austrian Elisabeth Fritzl, who was imprisoned by her father for 24 years and gave birth to seven of his children, may sue her father for compensation, her lawyer said on Tuesday.

An Austrian police officer looks on as forensic experts walk into the backyard of a house in Amstetten, where Josef Fritzl imprisoned his daughter for 24 years and fathered her seven children, in eastern Austria May 5, 2008. (REUTERS/Herbert Neubauer)

Fritzl, 73, kept Elisabeth and three of her six surviving children in a windowless basement prison for nearly a quarter of a century, while raising three of their children as his own upstairs.

Lawyer Christoph Herbst said he was looking into claiming compensation from Fritzl, who had four or five real estate assets in his name, for those who had been locked in the basement.

"There is the possibility of claiming compensation for imprisonment and the damage that has been incurred by it," Herbst told Reuters in an interview.

Fritzl's assets also have debt attached to them and it is unclear how much money will be left in the end, he said.

"Now it is all about evaluating his financial circumstances. Does he actually have any wealth so that it pays off to start proceedings?"

Herbst said he had the impression that the victimised family had a loving relationship when he met them.

"My experience of the family was a very positive one. Looking at the way they treat each other, it is really very loving, they are open towards each other and they play together," he said.

United for the first time just over a week ago, Elisabeth Fritzl, five of her children and her mother Rosemarie are now in the care of a hospital in Amstetten, some 130 km (80 miles) west of the capital Vienna.

"If you see the family with your own eyes, it makes you feel much better than looking at the whole case in theory and from afar," he said.

The case came to light when the eldest child of the incestuous relationship, a 19-year-old daughter, became seriously ill and was taken to hospital more than two weeks ago.

She remains in an artificial coma and needs artificial respiration, according to her doctor.

One baby died shortly after being born and Fritzl, who also has seven children with his wife Rosemarie, burnt its remains in a furnace.

Prosecutors are investigating Fritzl for rape, incest, coercion and the death of the baby.

Clinton, Obama go on attack ahead of crucial vote

2008-04-20T22:32:00.000-07:00

With two days to go before a crucial U.S. presidential vote, Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton sharpened their attacks on Sunday, with Clinton pouncing on Obama for saying Republican John McCain would be better for the country than George W. Bush.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton smiles during a rally at Liberty High School in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, April 20, 2008. With two days to go before a crucial U.S. presidential vote, Democrats Barack Obama and Clinton sharpened their attacks on Sunday. (REUTERS/Tim Shaffer)

Obama told a rally in Reading, Pennsylvania McCain would be an improvement over Bush, a comment that seemed to undercut the message he often pushes that electing McCain would amount to giving the current Republican president a third term.

"You have a real choice in this election -- you know, either Democrat would be better than John McCain, and all three of us would be better than George Bush," Obama said.

Clinton, vying with Obama for the Democratic nomination and the right to run against presumptive Republican nominee McCain in the November election, criticized Obama's comments.

"We need a nominee who will take on John McCain, not cheer on John McCain," she said at a rally in Johnstown.

The two candidates sparred ahead of Tuesday's Pennsylvania primary, which has become a major test in the race for the party's nomination.

Clinton, a New York senator who needs a win in the state to keep her presidential ambitions alive, leads in polls but Obama, an Illinois senator and the national front-runner, has cut into her one-time double-digit lead in recent weeks.

At a later event in Scranton, Obama appeared to backtrack on his suggestion that McCain would be better than Bush, once again reiterating his view that the Arizona senator was "running for George Bush's third term."

"We can't afford four more years of George Bush policies under the guise of John McCain," Obama said.

He also said Clinton's campaign tactics amounted to "game-playing" and said she would not represent enough of a change from the Bush administration.

'CHEAP POLITICAL POINTS'

"Trying to score cheap political points may make good headlines and good television but it doesn't make for good government," Obama said.

"If we're really going to solve big problems then we can't just settle for a little bit better. We need something fundamentally different," he added.

Clinton said it was Obama who had gone negative since their Philadelphia debate last week.

"It's no wonder that my opponent has been so negative these last few days of the campaign because I think you saw ... a big difference between us," she said at a rally in Bethlehem.

"While my opponent says one thing, his campaign, he does another. You can count on me to tell you what I will do," she said in Johnstown.

Clinton, who with her husband former President Bill Clinton has been the subject of many conservative investigations since the couple first entered the White House in 1993, was endorsed on Sunday by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review whose publisher, Richard Mellon Scaife, funded many of those probes.

"Clinton's decision to sit down with the Trib (editorial board) was courageous, given our long-standing criticism of her," the paper said. "Political courage is essential in a president. Clinton has demonstrated it. Obama has not."

Obama picked up an endorsement, too, from the Financial Times. "After Tuesday's vote, the Democrats should move quickly to affirm Mr. Obama's nomination," it said. "He is, in fact, the better candidate."

Ahead of Tuesday's Pennsylvania vote, most analysts believed Clinton would win but the size of the victory has become the focus of both campaigns.

McCain this week was heading off on a multistate tour of areas hard hit by poverty. Before leaving, he addressed the issue of his temper, which was the subject of a front-page Washington Post story on Sunday.

He said on ABC's "This Week" examples given in the story were decades old, "totally untrue or grossly exaggerated."

"I am very happy to be a passionate man," he said. "I love this country. I love what we stand for and believe in, and many times I deal passionately when I find things that are not in the best interests of the American people."

U.S. Democrat Obama hauls in $42.8 million in March

2008-04-20T22:31:00.000-07:00

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama raised more than $42 million in campaign donations in March, his campaign reported on Sunday.

The Illinois senator hauled in $42.8 million in the scramble for cash ahead of a showdown with rival Sen. Hillary Clinton in Tuesday's Pennsylvania primary, the campaign said in a monthly fund-raising report.

U.S. Senator Barack Obama addresses supporters at a town meeting in Reading, Pennsylvania April 20, 2008. Obama raised more than $42 million in campaign donations in March, his campaign reported on Sunday. (REUTERS/Bradley Bower)

The $42.8 million Obama raised in March was less than the $55 million his campaign brought in during February.

The February total for the Illinois senator was an all-time high for any presidential candidate during a primary and the March number, while lower, was the second highest.

The candidates had until midnight EDT Sunday to file monthly campaign fund-raising reports with the U.S. Federal Election Commission.

Sen. Hillary Clinton's March report was not out yet. A campaign source said earlier this month the New York senator expected to raise about $20 million.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain began April with $11.6 cash on hand, his campaign said in its fundraising disclosure report.

The Arizona senator, who has clinched the Republican presidential nomination to contest the November election, raised $15.4 in March and spent $11.8 during the month, the campaign reported.

Hillary, Obama hit each other in attack ads

2008-04-20T22:30:00.000-07:00

Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton were bashing one another with the most negative attacks of the primary season, bidding for undecided voters in Tuesday's critical Pennsylvania primary.

The former first lady gained the endorsement of a Pittsburgh newspaper whose owner funded probes that led to her husband's impeachment a decade ago.

With just 10 pre-convention contests remaining after Pennsylvania, it appeared mathematically impossible for either candidate to gather the 2,025 delegates needed for nomination going into the party convention in August. That leaves the nomination in the hands of so-called superdelegates, the nearly 800 party officials who can vote for either candidate regardless of state primary or caucus results.

The battle for Pennsylvania has turned particularly nasty as Clinton, who initially was expected to win easily and by a large margin, has seen her lead shrink in state polls. Obama _ who is the clear front-runner for the nomination _ is fighting equally hard to keep his expected loss as narrow as possible, hoping to diminish Clinton's argument to the superdelegates that she has unstoppable momentum.

She goes into the Pennsylvania primary having most recently won the delegate-heavy states of Texas and Ohio, but Obama leads nationwide in delegates selected in primary elections and state caucuses, in the popular vote and the number of pre-convention state contests won.

Overall, including the nearly 500 superdelegates who have committed to one of the Democrats, Obama leads 1,646 to 1,508. On Sunday, Clinton's campaign was bristling over new Obama TV ads that claimed the New York senator's health care plan would force Americans to buy into the program even if they couldn't afford it. Obama also was striking out at Clinton, charging her with having cozy links to lobbyists _ that in response to her campaign claims that he was taking money from special interest groups.

In a development that would have seemed impossible as the campaign opened, Clinton won the backing of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and its owner and publisher, billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife.

In the 1990s, he spent $2.3 million (euro1.46 million) to fund a series of articles by The American Spectator magazine that dug into Bill Clinton's behavior as governor of Arkansas. The magazine reported that Clinton had asked state troopers to help procure women for him and that he had sexually harassed a state worker named Paula Jones. Jones's legal case against Clinton helped launch an independent counsel investigation that eventually exposed his relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Hillary Clinton famously defended her husband at the time, saying the allegations were part of a "vast right-wing conspiracy'' heavily funded by Scaife. Clinton was impeached in the House of Representatives, but the Senate failed to convict him on charges brought by the Republican-dominated lower house.

Candidate Clinton met with the Tribune-Review's editorial board, including Scaife, last month. Afterward, Scaife wrote an editorial titled "Hillary, Reassessed,'' telling his readers he was impressed by the former first lady.

The Pennsylvania vote will divvy up 158 delegates to the August Democratic national convention, but the party's rules for apportioning those delegates mean that even a big victory will likely do little to close Obama's overall lead.

Geoff Garin, Clinton's new top strategist, faced David Axelrod, Obama's chief strategist, Sunday with each accusing the other of negative campaigning. But the one word that was not heard, as it usually is from Clinton campaign officials, was August.

In the past Clinton has vowed to fight for the nomination right to the convention late that month.

When asked on NBC television's "Meet the Press'' if Clinton might drop out if she turns in poor showings in the June 3 primaries in Indiana and North Carolina, even if she wins in Pennsylvania, Garin said: "I would advise people to wait until June 3 when this process is played through, see how close, how close it is, how well the candidates are doing, how they're conducting themselves.''

Garin did not once repeat Clinton's determination to continue the struggle into the convention.

Also Sunday, Obama, who often argues that John McCain is the same as President George W. Bush, said the Republican presidential candidate would be better for the country than Bush had been.

"You have a real choice in this election. Either Democrat would be better than John McCain,'' Obama said to cheers from a rowdy crowd at Reading High School in central Pennsylvania. Then he said: "And all three of us would be better than George Bush.''

The comment threatened to undercut Obama's efforts _ and those of the entire Democratic Party _ to portray McCain as offering nothing more than an extension of Bush's unpopular tenure. At the very least, it provided fodder that Republicans can exploit in the general election.

Earlier, Obama renewed his criticism that McCain offers the same "failed'' policies of the Bush administration on everything from Iraq to the economy.

McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds responded: "The remark underscores that John McCain has the strength to change America and move this nation forward. Barack Obama is a new face who represents old ideas.''

Obama spokesman Bill Burton shot back: "It's hard to imagine a president doing a worse job than President Bush but one thing is clear, John McCain wants to do his best to emulate Bush's failed economic and foreign policies and even his divisive political tactics.''

McCain, who has benefited from the acrimony generated between Clinton and Obama, reasserted his determination not to repeal tax cuts pushed through by the Bush administration. He also promised to assemble a "league of democracies'' to work against Iran's perceived efforts to build a nuclear weapon.

"I've already had conversations with (French) President (Nicolas) Sarkozy. Just recently, again, I had conversations with (British) Prime Minister (Gordon) Brown. We could get together a league of democracies.

We could impact the Iranians in a very significant way,'' McCain said on ABC's "This Week.''

McCain has said he would not rule out using American military force against Iran should it be on the verge of gaining a nuclear weapon and if all other efforts to deter Tehran had failed.

Rice in Iraq, violence surges after Sadr threat

2008-04-20T22:29:00.000-07:00

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice backed Iraq's crackdown on militias in a visit on Sunday to Baghdad, where the worst fighting in weeks erupted after Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr threatened all-out war.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice speaks during a meeting with Iraqi government leaders in Baghdad April 20, 2008. (REUTERS/Ceerwan Aziz)

Rockets blasted the fortified Green Zone compound where Rice met Iraqi officials and praised their month-old campaign against Sadr's followers.

She had harsh words for the reclusive cleric, who on the eve of Rice's visit vowed "open war" if the crackdown continues. Sadr has not appeared in public in Iraq in nearly a year.

"He is still living in Iran. I guess it's all out war for anybody but him," Rice told reporters. "His followers can go to their death and he will still be in Iran."

A military spokesman said U.S. forces had killed 20 fighters overnight in a series of gunbattles and helicopter missile strikes in Sadr City, the east Baghdad slum that is a stronghold of Sadr's militia.

"I would say it's been the hottest night in a couple of weeks," the spokesman, Lieutenant-Colonel Steven Stover said.

Arriving on an unannounced visit, Rice met Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and said she wanted to support what she called a new political "centre" in Iraq that has backed Maliki's anti-militia campaign.

"It is indeed a moment of opportunity in Iraq thanks to the courageous decisions taken by the prime minister and a unified Iraqi leadership," Rice said in brief televised remarks with President Jalal Talabani after they held talks.

A rebellion by Sadr's Mehdi Army militia -- whose tens of thousands of black-masked fighters control the streets in many Shi'ite areas -- could abruptly end a period of lower violence at a time when some U.S. forces are starting to leave Iraq.

Rice did not take questions during the televised appearance, and later told reporters she did not know how seriously to take Sadr's threat of war, made in a statement on his website.

Sadr's threat dramatically raises the stakes in his confrontation with Maliki, who has threatened to ban Sadr's movement from political life unless he disbands his militia.

ROCKETS HIT GREEN ZONE

Maliki's crackdown has led over the past month to Iraq's worst fighting in nearly a year, spreading through the south and Shi'ite parts of Baghdad. Although fighting in the south has died down, the Baghdad clashes have continued unabated.

The crackdown has been backed by all parties across Iraq's sectarian and ethnic divide except the Sadrist movement.

Referring to that support for Maliki, Rice earlier told reporters there was a "coalescing of a centre in Iraqi politics" that was working together better than at any time.

As Rice met Maliki and other ministers, rockets could be heard hitting the Green Zone government and diplomatic compound where the prime minister has his office. Rice left the meeting about five minutes after an all-clear signal was given.

Washington says the rockets are fired from Sadr City by rogue elements of the Mehdi Army that it says are armed, trained and funded by Iran. Tehran denies responsibility.

Maliki's initial operation last month in the southern city of Basra went poorly, and U.S. commanders have acknowledged it was carried out hastily and badly planned.

Since then, however, the government forces have moved more carefully into Basra, and on Saturday they took control of the neighbourhood that had been the Mehdi Army's main stronghold.

"It has not been the smoothest of processes but it is an important step that the Iraqi government has taken," Rice said.

Sadr has pivoted back and forth between armed confrontation and peaceful politics throughout the five years since the fall of Saddam Hussein, while remaining hugely popular and staunchly hostile to the American presence he calls an "occupation".

He led two anti-American uprisings in 2004, but joined the political bloc that included Maliki and won parliamentary elections in 2005. Last year his followers quit the government for failing to demand an American withdrawal, but then Sadr abruptly declared a ceasefire, winning Washington's praise.

As his stance has changed, so has the response of American leaders. In 2004 they issued a warrant for his arrest, but more recently they praised his ceasefire and started referring to him with the respectful Arabic honorific "Sayyed".

Sadr's Mehdi Army has put up a fierce fight in Sadr City against Iraqi forces, who are backed by U.S. ground troops and air strikes. Fighting in the Sadr City slum has claimed hundreds of lives since last month.

South Korea has new bird flu case, culling 5 mln birds

2008-04-20T22:28:00.000-07:00

South Korea on Monday said it planned to cull a record 5.3 million birds as it announced its 17th case of bird flu in three weeks, in what has become the country's fastest and biggest outbreak of avian influenza.

South Korea has culled 4.86 million chickens and ducks since the beginning of April, as the highly virulent H5N1 strain, first reported in the southwest, has been confirmed in five provinces.

Chickens are culled at a farm with bird flu in Gimje, 215 km south of Seoul April 17, 2008. South Korea on Monday said it planned to cull a record 5.3 million birds as it announced its 17th case of bird flu in three weeks, in what has become the country's fastest and biggest outbreak of avian influenza. (REUTERS/The National Tax Service/Handout)

The agriculture ministry said on Monday it would start probing all of the country's 260 duck farms as a preemptive measure and continue quarantine work. Some 360 soldiers have been sent to the hardest-hit North Jeolla province to help slaughtering and burying farmed birds.

South Korea had to kill 5.29 million birds in its first outbreak between late 2003 and early 2004. The second outbreak in 2006-2007 saw about half that number culled.

No human deaths from the disease have been reported so far from the country.

Some 240 human deaths have been reported globally from the H5N1 strain and 381 confirmed cases of infection since 2003, according to World Health Organisation data.

China food safety law to allow for life in jail

2008-04-20T22:27:00.000-07:00

China unveiled a new draft food safety law on Sunday that provides for penalties of up to life imprisonment for people responsible for the production of substandard food.

The National People's Congress, or parliament, is seeking public comments on the draft until May 20, the official Xinhua news agency said.

A worker transports steamed buns at a store in Yingtan, Jiangxi province in this March 11, 2008 file photo. China unveiled a new draft food safety law on Sunday that provides for penalties of up to life imprisonment for people responsible for the production of substandard food. (REUTERS/Stringer)

It did not give a timeframe for the law's approval, but most drafts that reach the stage of seeking public comments generally pass with few changes to them.

Lesser violations of the law could incur fines, confiscation of income from sales of substandard products, or revocation of licenses, Xinhua said.

China has been hit by a series of food safety problems in the past few years, coming into the global spotlight last year through scandals over the quality of exported toothpaste, pet food and fish.

Domestic fears about food safety grew in 2004, when at least 13 babies died of malnutrition in Anhui province, in the east of the country, after they were fed fake milk powder with no nutritional value.

British actor and comedian Eddie Izzard eyes possible career in European politics

2008-04-20T22:26:00.000-07:00

British comedian Eddie Izzard, whose acting career is taking off, is eyeing yet another possible career _ politician.

Izzard, who plays Wayne Malloy in FX's "The Riches'' and who just finished shooting "Valkyrie,'' starring Tom Cruise, told Newsweek he sees himself getting into European politics at some point.

"We've got to make it work in Europe,'' the cross-dressing comedian, 46, told the magazine for its issue hitting newsstands Monday. "People are very worried about sovereignty and the loss of sovereignty. I think the stakes are if we don't make the European Union work, then the world is screwed. End of story.''

Izzard, who's lending his voice to the upcoming film "Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,'' said he enjoyed working on "Valkyrie.'' The film stars Cruise as Col. Claus Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg, the aristocratic army officer executed after a failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler in 1944.

Izzard's standup comedy act, "Stripped,'' is set to begin April 28 in Boston.

Enel CEO says rise of CO2 emission indicates Kyoto failure

2008-04-20T22:25:00.000-07:00

The continuing rise of carbon dioxide emissions are an indication the Kyoto Protocol is basically ineffective because it lacks greater global participation, the chief executive of Italian utility Enel SpA said at a the International Energy Forum.

The Kyoto Protocol is not working in part because signatories to the agreement account for only 30 percent of total emissions, only a few sectors bear the brunt of the reduction and technology transfer is not being given sufficient importance, Fulvio Conti said in a speech.

Conti also said that reciprocity should be encouraged between the companies of energy-consuming countries and those of producing ones.

"With this perspective, Enel is committed to opening a portion of its domestic market to Gazprom,'' Enel's CEO said in his speech Sunday.

Government ministers from oil-rich nations and international oil company executives were meeting in Rome for a three-day energy conference that ends Tuesday.

While the energy ministers of most OPEC states will be present, the group was not expected to announce any policy shifts during the International Energy Forum, which was being held as crude oil prices have reached a new high of US$117 a barrel.

Italy's outgoing development minister, Pier Luigi Bersani, told the conference in his opening remarks Sunday that the high price of oil will have an impact on inflation for all of 2008.

"The price of oil has had an impact on the inflation dynamic in many countries and it is reflected in part also on food stuffs in general,'' Bersani said. "This dynamic will persist for all of 2008.''

Earlier, Eni SpA Chief Executive Paolo Scaroni said that the share of profits taken by governments of oil-rich countries is cutting international oil companies' profits, in some cases below their capital costs.

"The average government take is now moving to overcome the critical barrier of 90 percent, which means that oil companies' profitability is decreasing,'' Scaroni said.

Western oil majors have had to face a spate of re-negotiations of their contracts as hydrocarbon-rich countries aim for a bigger slice of profits on the back of surging crude prices.

International oil companies need to "profoundly rethink their business model in order to survive and prosper,'' Scaroni added.

On the sidelines of the conference, Eni signed a memorandum of understanding with Qatar Petroleum International to pursue key joint projects in Africa and the Mediterranean focusing on natural gas and crude oil. It also envisions cooperation in the petrochemical industry and power generation.

It is the latest in a string of deals by Eni _ Italy's biggest oil and gas company _ to expand its ties with state-run oil companies.

Eni recently signed new deals with companies in Venezuela and is intensifying its ties with Gazprom. Late last year, Eni reached a deal with the Libyan government to jointly develop oil and gas projects in the North African country and extend existing contracts.

Eni pulled out of Qatar in 2002, saying it was too expensive to operate, but Scaroni said the "mistake'' had been rectified.

Benedict praises US church at Mass in Yankee Stadium, then heads home after 6-day visit

2008-04-20T22:24:00.000-07:00

Pope Benedict XVI celebrated Mass and American Catholicism in storied Yankee Stadium, telling his massive U.S. flock to use its freedoms wisely as he closed out his first papal trip to the United States.

Benedict beamed before a joyous crowd of 57,000 on Sunday, hours after making a solemn stop to pray at the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.

He called the Mass "a summons to move forward with firm resolve to use wisely the blessings of freedom, in order to build a future of hope for coming generations.''

And he repeated a core message of his six-day pilgrimage _ that faith must play a role in public life, citing the need to oppose abortion.

The unwavering truth of the Roman Catholic message, he said, guarantees respect for the dignity of all, "including the most defenseless of all human beings, the unborn child in the mother's womb.'' The crowd applauded the line.

Worshippers filled the seats, chanting, clapping and waving white and yellow handkerchiefs in the Vatican's colors as the white popemobile pulled in. At the end of the service the German-born Benedict again processed out slowly, serenaded by the strains of Beethoven's "Ode to Joy.''

Outside the stadium, two dump trucks filled with sand blockaded 161st Street before Mass, an extra level of security along with the heavy police presence. Pilgrims without tickets pushed up against metal police barricades, hoping to get a glimpse of the arriving pope.

Inside, ad-splashed outfield walls were draped in white with purple and yellow bunting. A white altar perched over second base, and the papal seal covered the pitcher's mound, suspended by white and yellow ribbons.

"I have never seen Yankee Stadium so beautiful, and I have season's tickets,'' said Philip Giordano, 49, a tax attorney from Greenwich, Connecticut, who won seats in the loge section behind home plate through a parish lottery. "It sure beats sitting in my local church.''

Added his wife, Suzanne: "I'm hoping to feel something from (Benedict). Everyone who has seen him says they crumple, their knees buckle. You come away just feeling different.''

New Orleans crooner Harry Connick Jr., on the pre-Mass concert program, remarked that he is often asked if he's a practicing Catholic.

"Practicing?'' he said. "I'm playing for the pope today.''

Benedict seemed to enjoy his long journey to the altar in the popemobile, waving to people in the stands. From the altar, he stood to acknowledge the crowd's roar when New York Cardinal Edward Egan welcomed him.

He praised the U.S. church, which has 65 million members, in his homily, saying that "in this land of freedom and opportunity, the church has united a widely diverse flock'' and contributed greatly to American society.

The pope departed on a special airliner nicknamed "Shepherd One'' after a farewell ceremony hosted by Vice President Dick Cheney, with Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Rodham Clinton and President Clinton in attendance. "May God bless America!'' the pope said before departing.

Earlier, on a chilly, gray morning, the pope blessed the site of the terrorist attacks and pleaded with God to bring "peace to our violent world.''

The visit by Benedict to ground zero was a poignant moment in a trip marked by unexpectedly festive crowds such as the one at Sunday's Mass.

Benedict was driven in the popemobile part-way down a ramp now used mostly by construction trucks to a spot by the north tower's footprint. He walked the final steps, knelt in silent prayer, then rose to light a memorial candle.

Addressing a group that included survivors, clergy and public officials, he acknowledged the many faiths of the victims at the "scene of incredible violence and pain.''

The pope also prayed for "those who suffered death, injury and loss'' in the attacks at the Pentagon and in the crash of United Airlines Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. More than 2,900 people were killed in the four crashes of the airliners hijacked by al-Qaida.

"God of peace, bring your peace to our violent world,'' the pope prayed. "Turn to your way of love those whose hearts and minds are consumed with hatred.''

Benedict invited 24 people with ties to ground zero to join him: survivors, relatives of victims and four rescue workers. He greeted each member of the group individually as a string quartet played in the background. In his prayer, he also remembered those who, "because of their presence here that day, suffer from injuries and illness.''

New York Deputy Fire Chief James Riches, father of a fallen Sept. 11 firefighter, said the pope's visit gave him consolation. "We said 'Where was God?' on 9/11, but he's come back here today and they've restored our faith,'' Riches said.

The site where the World Trade Center was destroyed is normally filled with hundreds of workers building a 102-story skyscraper, a memorial and transit hub. It bears little resemblance to the debris-filled pit where crews toiled to remove twisted steel and victims' remains.

The remains of more than 1,100 people have never been identified.

Back at Yankee Stadium, some worshippers filed out of the service slowly, trying to soak up the atmosphere as long as they could.

"It was great for the young, it was great for the old,'' Judith Halsey, a nurse from Bayonne, New Jersey, said of Benedict's visit as she left the Mass. "It was an uplifting time for the entire Catholic religion. Everyone needed this.''

McCain doesn't rule out preemptive war

2008-04-09T21:59:00.000-07:00

Republican U.S. presidential candidate John McCain said on Wednesday he would not rule out launching preemptive wars against future enemies.

President George W. Bush, in launching his 2003 invasion of Iraq, said it was necessary to forestall possible future attacks from a country that was developing weapons of mass destruction.

U.S. Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain (R-AZ) listens during a hearing on the the Senate Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington April 8, 2008. (REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst)

None of the weapons he alleged were in Iraq were subsequently found.

McCain, who has wrapped up his party's nomination to run for the White House in the November election, has maintained support for Iraq war and has said frequently that he would rather lose an election than a war.

When asked at a town hall meeting about the Bush policy on preemption, McCain said: "I don't think you can make a blanket statement about preemptive war because obviously it depends on the threat that the United States of America faces."

After the Sept. 11 attacks Bush approved a new national security strategy in 2002 that allowed the United States to strike first against U.S. enemies believed to be about to use weapons of mass destruction against America.

The doctrine triggered a wide debate and criticism from the administration's critics at the time.

In an October 2002 speech, Bush made the case for invading Iraq, saying: "Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof -- the smoking gun -- that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud."

McCain said the U.S. president should consult more closely with members of Congress so that the branches of government could act together if a threat were imminent.

"In normal times as you see a looming threat ... I think you need to consult more closely and more carefully not with every member of Congress but certainly the leaders of Congress."

Clinton attacks Obama, McCain over Iraq

2008-04-09T21:56:00.000-07:00

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Wednesday attacked her rivals over Iraq, saying Democrat Barack Obama is all talk when it comes to ending the war and Republican John McCain would keep it going.

Democratic presidential Senator Hillary Clinton is followed by the media after she questioned US Commander in Iraq General David Petraeus and US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker during their appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington April 8, 2008. (REUTERS/Joshua Roberts)

Clinton sought political gain during a week in which Iraq has taken on greater importance to American voters with the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, and the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, testifying to Congress.

New York Sen. Clinton said the expected Republican nominee for the November election, Arizona Sen. McCain, has no interest in ending the war.

She also questioned whether her rival for the Democratic nomination, Illinois Sen. Obama, was committed to pulling out U.S. troops as he says he would do.

"That's the choice. One candidate will continue the war and keep troops in Iraq indefinitely, one candidate only says he'll end the war," Clinton said at a high school in a Pittsburgh suburb.

"And one candidate is ready, willing and able to end the war and to rebuild our military while honoring our soldiers and our veterans," Clinton said of herself.

Clinton and Obama both say they would begin working to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq shortly after taking office in January 2009, a position McCain calls "a failure of leadership."

McCain, a strong supporter of the current U.S. strategy in Iraq in which thousands more U.S. troops were poured into the country in a "surge," defended the lack of a clear exit plan.

Many senators, both Democrats and Republicans, raised concerns about what they called the absence of a U.S. pathway out of Iraq after five years of war, 4,000 American dead and billions of dollars spent.

"The exit strategy is success of the surge, continued Iraqi ability to take over their security, requirements to have the democratic process go forward. It's the classic counterinsurgency strategy," McCain told the Fox News Channel.

Clinton spoke one day after Petraeus told Congress that the United States must halt troop withdrawals from Iraq in July for 45 days because security gains there are fragile.

Clinton called on President George W. Bush to propose a strategy for ending U.S. involvement in Iraq, and said he should not set up a long-term security agreement with the Iraqi government without approval from Congress.

"President Bush must not saddle the next president with an agreement that extends our involvement in Iraq beyond his presidency," said Clinton, who was flanked by retired military officials.

Clinton said U.S. troops should be guaranteed one month at home for every month they spend overseas, and should be allowed to leave the military when their contractual time is up.

She also proposed expanded educational, home loan and health benefits for troops and veterans.

Petraeus' testimony allowed Clinton, Obama and McCain to push their competing positions on the Iraq war, which remains unpopular with U.S. voters.

Obama joins Clinton, urges President Bush to boycott Olympic opening ceremonies in Beijing

2008-04-09T21:52:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama joined Democratic presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday in calling for President George W. Bush to boycott the opening ceremonies for the Olympic games in Beijing.

Clinton had commended British Prime Minister Gordon Brown for announcing that he will skip the August ceremonies in China's capital, and called on Obama and likely Republican presidential nominee John McCain to join her in urging Bush to do the same.

Obama did later in the day; his campaign issued a statement in which, for the first time, he urged Bush to boycott the festivities.

Activists are urging world leaders to stay away from the ceremonies to underscore concerns about China's human rights record, its handling of recent unrest in Tibet and its relationship with Sudan.

Obama said a boycott "should be firmly on the table,'' but that a decision should be made closer to the games.

"If the Chinese do not take steps to help stop the genocide in Darfur and to respect the dignity, security, and human rights of the Tibetan people, then the president should boycott the opening ceremonies,'' he said. "As I have communicated in public and to the president, it is past time for China to respect the human rights of the Tibetan people, to allow foreign journalists and diplomats access to the region, and to engage the Dalai Lama in meaningful talks about the future of Tibet.''

Obama previously had said he was conflicted about U.S. participation, but that "there should be consequences'' for China if it does not take steps to respect rights and freedoms in Tibet.

Clinton said Bush should use threat of a boycott to exert leverage on the Chinese government.

"I believe that the president should not attend the opening ceremonies because that it is giving a seal of approval by our United States government,'' she told reporters near Pittsburgh on Wednesday.

McCain spokeswoman Brooke Buchanan said he condemns "the brutal oppression'' the Chinese have inflicted on Tibetans, and thinks the president should monitor the situation and "keep his options open.

Candidates court black vote on King anniversary

2008-04-05T01:14:00.000-07:00

Republican presidential candidate John McCain and Democrat Hillary Clinton sought to shore up support among black voters on Friday in the city where civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was slain 40 years ago.

U.S. Republican presidential candidate John McCain places a memorial wreath at the Lorraine Motel, now part of the National Civil Rights Museum, where rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968, in Memphis, April 4, 2008. (REUTERS/Mike Segar)

Democrat Barack Obama honored King's legacy with a speech in Indiana, while his rivals attended activities in Memphis marking the anniversary of the day King was gunned down as he stood on a Lorraine Motel balcony.

"I think it's important to spread the message that Doctor King's work is unfinished in places like Indiana and North Dakota," Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, told reporters in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

As a steady downpour soaked a crowd outside the Lorraine Motel, Arizona Sen. McCain got a mixed greeting at a meeting of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

A couple of people shouted "No more war" as McCain, an Iraq war supporter, was introduced. There were scattered boos as McCain said, "I was wrong" for voting against creating a federal King holiday while he was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives in 1983.

Others shouted, "We forgive you."

McCain, who will face Obama or Clinton in the November U.S. presidential election, noted he had afterward supported a King holiday in his home state of Arizona.

"We can all be a little late sometimes in doing the right thing, and Doctor King understood this about his fellow Americans," McCain said.

McCain said he was a prisoner of war in North Vietnam when King was assassinated, and that the news was broadcast to the prisoners. "I think they knew that that it would hurt our morale and make us worry a great deal about our country, and they were right," he told NBC News.

Clinton spoke at Mason Temple, headquarters of the Church of God of Christ, where King gave his famous "I've been to the mountaintop" speech the day before he died.

She said if elected president she would appoint a Cabinet-level "poverty czar" to address the problems of the disadvantaged, the people for whom King fought.

"He never gave up and neither should we," Clinton said. "Like with any faith there were dark moments -- but he would always come back from those dark places. And so must we."

Under pressure from the Obama campaign, Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, released eight years of tax records on Friday that showed they made $109 million since leaving the White House, including $51 million from Bill Clinton's speeches.

The couple paid more than $33 million in taxes and gave more than $10 million to charity between 2000 -- their last year in the White House -- and 2007, the records showed.

Obama released his returns from 2000 to 2006 last week.

RACE ROILING

Forty years after King's assassination set off race riots in more than 100 U.S. cities, race is roiling U.S. politics this presidential election year.

Both McCain and Clinton have some fence-mending to do among African-Americans.

McCain rankled black voters by skipping a Republican debate on African-American issues in September.

Clinton irked some black voters by saying on the campaign trail that King was not solely responsible for improvements in civil rights laws and that 1960s President Lyndon Johnson had a lead role as well.

Obama has been criticized over inflammatory sermons given by the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the retired pastor at Obama's Chicago church, as he railed against the U.S. history of segregation.

Obama, who is getting overwhelming black support, told a crowd in Fort Wayne that American politics had not lived up to King's dream.

"For a long time, we've had a politics that's been too small for the scale of the challenges we face," he said. "Instead of having a politics that lives up to Doctor King's call for unity, we've had a politics that's used race to drive us apart."

A New York Times/CBS News poll published on Thursday found Obama's favorability rating among Democratic primary voters dropped 7 percentage points to 62 percent since late February. The decline was mostly among men and upper-income voters.

Clinton, who would be the first woman to win the White House, is scrambling to capture the Democratic presidential nomination from Obama in what seems an increasingly uphill battle.

Clintons made $109 million since 2000, returns show

2008-04-05T01:13:00.000-07:00

Democrat Hillary Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have made $109 million since 2000, including $51 million in speech income for Bill Clinton, according to eight years of tax information released on Friday.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton appears with her husband, former President Bill Clinton (L), at a rally in New York in this February 5, 2008 file photo. (REUTERS/Jim Young/Files)

The couple paid taxes of more than $33 million and gave more than $10 million to charity between 2000 -- their last year in the White House -- and 2007, tax records released by Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign showed.

Clinton, a New York senator, had been challenged by White House rival Barack Obama to release her tax returns as the two Democrats duel for the right to face Republican John McCain in November's election.

Obama made public his tax returns from 2000 to 2006 last week, renewing their battle over transparency. Campaign aides to Obama, an Illinois senator, had accused Clinton of being secretive and shielding documents from the public.

Presidential candidates often release their tax returns, although they are not required to do so. As senators, Obama and Clinton are both required only to file disclosure statements that give a wide range of income and provide few details on finances and holdings.

The Clinton's tax returns, released late on Friday afternoon, showed their income jumped from $350,000 in 2000, their final year in the White House, to $16 million in 2001, their first year out of office.

Their biggest money-making years were 2004 and 2007, when they made $20 million in each year. The 2004 income included more than $15 million in business income primarily from Bill Clinton's speeches.

"The Clintons have now made public 30 years of tax returns, a record matched by few people in public service. None of Hillary Clinton's presidential opponents have revealed anything close to this amount of personal financial information," Clinton spokesman Jay Carson said.

The Clinton campaign has pushed Obama to release records from his days in the Illinois legislature and his earlier tax returns.

In addition to Bill Clinton's lucrative speeches, the couple made about $40 million in book income between 2000 and 2007. Hillary Clinton made $10 million from her book "Living History" and $190,000 from "It Takes a Village," released in 1996.

Bill Clinton made more than $23 million for his autobiography "My Life," including a $15 million advance. He earned $6.3 million for "Giving," released last year.

The couple paid $33.7 million in federal taxes since 2000, which was 31 percent of their adjusted gross income. The $10 million in charitable donations was 9.5 percent of their adjusted gross income.

The campaign said the most recent Internal Revenue Service information showed taxpayers who earned more than $10 million a year gave an average of 3.1 percent of their income to charity.

In addition to seven years of tax returns, the Clintons released a summary of their 2007 finances based on estimates by their tax attorney.

The campaign said they will seek an extension beyond the April 15 tax deadline so they can receive information related to partnership income, including from a blind trust.

Haitians riot over prices, attack U.N. peacekeepers

2008-04-05T01:12:00.000-07:00

Protesters angry over rising living costs rioted in the southwestern Haitian town of Les Cayes, burning shops, shooting at peacekeepers and looting containers in a U.N. compound, the United Nations said in a statement on Friday.

Les Cayes was still tense after the riots on Thursday, and the U.N. force trying to maintain the peace in the volatile Caribbean country sent 100 peacekeepers as reinforcements, the statement said.

Food prices in Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, have soared in recent months, stoking anger against the government of President Rene Preval.

Preval's election in 2006 raised expectations that the country would finally start on the path to stability after decades of turbulence, culminating in the February 2004 ouster of former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

A small group of protesters broke into the U.N. compound in Les Cayes during Thursday's protest, damaging the main gate and ignoring warning shots from peacekeepers, the statement said.

"The protesters also burned shops in Les Cayes and threw rocks and fired weapons at some of the blue helmets during the night."

Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the more prosperous Dominican Republic, has been relatively tranquil recently, although a resurgence in kidnappings and crime has alarmed the United Nations.

Just under 9,000 Brazilian-led U.N. peacekeepers and civilian police are stationed in Haiti.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon this week called on the international community and Haiti's leaders to keep up their efforts to bring stability to the country. "The potential for regression remains," he said in a report.

Historic building in Quebec City is nearly destroyed in a fire, collapses

2008-04-05T01:11:00.000-07:00

One of Quebec's most historic buildings was caught up in a massive fire and collapsed late Friday. No injuries were reported, police said.

Witnesses said there was a fire, followed by an explosion at the Quebec City Armoury, which was built in 1884 and used to house the Voltigeurs, a Canadian Forces reserve unit and the oldest French infantry regiment in the country.

Most of the building collapsed about two hours after the fire began, leaving only a brick wall and two towers standing at the main entrance.

Police say they do not know what caused the fire. At least eight fire trucks and dozens of firefighters were battling the flames. The building, which was being renovated, also contained a museum.

South Korea reports new suspected bird flu case

2008-04-05T01:10:00.000-07:00

South Korea on Saturday reported a suspected outbreak of the H5 strain of bird flu at a farm in the southwest of the country, near another farm that authorities said earlier this week had an outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain.

The farm ministry said the latest outbreak took place at a duck farm and it has yet to confirm if it is also the H5N1 strain. It expects to finish testing on Monday.

Ducks are seen wading on a stream in Sungnam, south of Seoul, in this February 24, 2006 file photo. South Korea on Saturday reported a suspected outbreak of the H5 strain of bird flu at a farm in the southwest of the country, near another farm that authorities said earlier this week had an outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain. (REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon)

Workers on Saturday will cull about 6,500 ducks at the farm that was raising about 12,500 ducks in Jeongeup, which is 27 km from the farm that had the H5N1 outbreak, the ministry said.

On Thursday, the country confirmed the first outbreak of highly virulent bird flu in 13 months at a farm in Gimje, about 215 km south of Seoul, and started culling over 300,000 chickens and other poultry.

The ministry also banned distribution of 3.6 million animals within a 10 km radius of the Gimje outbreak site and the destruction of eggs produced, and already distributed, in the area.

The country has had seven outbreaks of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu between November 2006 and March 2007 and has spent 58.2 billion won ($59.17 million) on quarantine measures.

Bird flu has killed 238 people globally since 2003, according to the World Health Organisation.

It largely remains an animal disease, but the big concern is that it could mutate into a disease that easily passes from one person to another, triggering a deadly global pandemic.

Chinese media acknowledge rare pilots' strike

2008-04-05T01:08:00.000-07:00

Pilots flying for a subsidiary of China Eastern Airlines turned back midflight to southwestern Chinese airports early this week, in a rare strike to protest lower pay and other conditions, state media reported on Saturday.

Organized labour strikes are unusual in China, where there is only one legal, government-backed union.

Chinese maintenance workers walking under a China Eastern aircraft at Hong Qiao Airport in Shanghai in this June 8, 2005 file photo. Pilots flying for a subsidiary of China Eastern Airlines turned back midflight to southwestern Chinese airports early this week, in a rare strike to protest lower pay and other conditions. (REUTERS/Aly Song/Files)

Seventeen flights returned to their departure airports in Yunnan Province after takeoff on Monday and Tuesday, in a protest by pilots of China Eastern subsidiary Yunnan Airlines.

Pilots upset that they were limited to domestic routes and therefore shorter flying hours and lower pay than counterparts in the parent company were further discouraged to find they would be taxed heavily on overtime pay, local media reported this week.

State-run television reported the strike during the midday news on Saturday, as well as passengers' complaints, after a week in which officials repeatedly denied any such strike had happened.

A China Eastern spokesman told Reuters earlier in the week that there had been no strike, and that some flights had simply taken off from Yunnan's capital, Kunming, and then returned because of poor weather. Reached on Saturday, the spokesman had no further comment.

Leading financial magazine Caijing said on Friday that pilots would not be published, citing an air administration official, after local media had reported the pilots would be banned for life.

Yunnan Airlines' flight routes include many popular tourist destinations, including the mountain towns of Dali and Lijiang. The strike came a few days before a long weekend holiday.

A boom in air travel means China is increasingly short on pilots, while cut-throat competition between airlines keeps their profit margins tight.

Last month, pilots for Shanghai Airlines and the newly formed Wuhan East Star Airline coordinated "sick-ins", in two separate incidents, media reported.

Diana jury retires for weekend, no decision

2008-04-05T01:07:00.000-07:00

The jury at the inquest into Princess Diana's death retired for the weekend on Friday after failing to reach a decision in three days of deliberations.

Diana and her lover Dodi al-Fayed died in August 1997 when their Mercedes limousine, driven by chauffeur Henri Paul, crashed in a Paris road tunnel while being pursued by paparazzi photographers.

The 11-member jury, who will return to court on Monday, have a choice of five possible verdicts.

They could decide her death was accidental or opt for unlawful killing through gross negligence either by Henri Paul, by "following vehicles" or by both.

The fifth option, which could give renewed life to the conspiracy theories that have surrounded Diana's death for the past decade, is an open verdict if the jury find there is insufficient evidence to support any substantive verdict.

FACTBOX - Prince Philip in hospital

2008-04-05T01:04:00.000-07:00

Queen Elizabeth's 86-year-old husband Prince Philip has been taken to hospital with a chest infection, Buckingham Palace said on Friday.

Here are some key facts about him:

* Philippos Schleswig-Holstein Soenderburg-Glucksburg was born on a dining room table on the Greek island of Corfu on June 10, 1921, the fifth child and only son of Prince Andrew of Greece.

* Philip's parents went into exile when he was 18 months old. They sailed from Corfu with him sleeping in a cot made hurriedly from orange boxes.

* He was educated at Gordonstoun, a tough school in Scotland, where his son, Prince Charles was later an unwilling pupil, and became a naturalised British citizen, looking and sounding every bit the English gentleman.

* Philip joined Britain's Royal Naval College at Dartmouth, southern England, as a cadet, in 1939. He graduated top of his class and served on battleships, cruisers and destroyers during World War Two. He was mentioned in dispatches, took part in the Allied landings in Sicily and was in Tokyo Bay when the Japanese surrendered in 1945.

* Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip first met when at the wedding of Prince Philip's cousin, Princess Marina of Greece, to The Duke of Kent, who was an uncle of Princess Elizabeth, in 1934.

* They were married at Westminster Abbey on November 20, 1947 in a spectacular ceremony attended by statesmen and royalty from around the world.

* He continued his naval career until 1951, then took indefinite leave and devoted himself fulltime to public duties when Elizabeth became queen a year later.

* Philip's reputation, and that of the queen, has suffered as the marital problems of their children have mounted.

* He is known for his acerbic wit but has also caused offence with off-the-cuff remarks: He once told British students in China: "If you stay here much longer, you'll be slitty-eyed

Loyalty and the Clintons: how far does it go?

2008-04-05T01:02:00.000-07:00

If loyalty is the currency of politics, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton should have a full coffer to tap for her U.S. presidential bid.

US Democratic presidential candidate Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) speaks at a "Hillary Live" fundraising event at the Wilshire Theater in Beverly Hills, California April 3, 2008. (REUTERS/Mark Avery)

But the former first lady and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, who prize loyalty from their wide national support base, are struggling to keep that allegiance alive at a time when they need it the most.

Clinton is fighting for her political life, trying to sway so-called superdelegates -- party leaders and elected officials -- to stick with her in the race against front-runner and rival Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.

Clinton, observers say, is fiercely devoted to her staff, and both she and her husband expect and usually receive allegiance from their associates.

But ties to Bill Clinton's administration have not always translated into support for his wife's candidacy, to the frustration of the former first couple.

"They start with the assumption that anybody who was with them in the (previous Clinton) administration, should be with them now, and when people decide to go to Obama, most of those people are in pretty bad standing," said one former Clinton White House staffer, who asked not to be named.

Sen. Clinton, that official said, was more forgiving than her husband if a supporter comes back to the fold, as some have done after backing candidates such as former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who bowed out of the Democratic race to face Republican John McCain in the November election.

"She's not stupid. She would rather have talented staff come back than waste a lot of energy icing them."

But "icing" does take place.

When New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a former energy secretary and ambassador for Bill Clinton, endorsed Obama, he was tagged with a "Judas" label by an outraged member of the Clinton camp, former adviser James Carville.

"I believed that Richardson's appointments in Bill Clinton's administration and his longtime personal relationship with both Clintons ... merited a strong response," Carville wrote in an opinion piece in The Washington Post.

NOT ALWAYS A TWO-WAY STREET

Richardson, who dropped his own presidential bid earlier this year, said the loyalty argument had been taken too far.

"Carville and others say that I owe President Clinton's wife my endorsement because he gave me two jobs," he wrote in a separate Washington Post opinion piece.

"Do the people now attacking me recall that I ran for president, albeit unsuccessfully, against Senator Clinton? Was that also an act of disloyalty?"

Maybe not. But he probably shouldn't expect another Cabinet post if Sen. Clinton pulls off a victory.

Bruce Buchanan, a professor of government at the University of Texas, said loyalty with the former first couple was not always a two-way street.

"They have historically, especially President Clinton, thrown people over the side when they were no longer of any use," he said.

Clinton supporters dispute that characterization.

"The Clintons, I think, are people who are loyal, but they have their eyes open," said Douglas Schoen, a former Clinton adviser, saying the two would not retain staff who became liabilities as President George W. Bush has done with officials such as former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

"The Bush family, perhaps in some ways to their credit but in the pragmatic political sense unwisely, reciprocate loyalty much more readily than the Clintons do," Buchanan said.

Clinton may be guilty of holding on to staff too long as well. She retained campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle until early February after a string of primary losses to Obama, eventually replacing her with another loyalist, Maggie Williams, who was a top aide to Clinton as first lady.

As she trails Obama in the race for delegates who determine the nomination, the big question now will be the faithfulness of the superdelegates, and the next state nominating contest in Pennsylvania on April 22 could be key.

"Even superdelegates who have committed themselves to Clinton will start bailing out if Obama comes close -- much less wins -- in Pennsylvania," said Fred Greenstein, professor emeritus of politics at Princeton University.

"Politics also involves pragmatism, and that can call for switching."

Snacking Mugabe, flying penguins greet April Fools

2008-04-01T16:23:00.000-07:00

Flying penguins, lampooned heads of state, foul-mouthed chefs gone polite and a car that repels full-bladdered dogs topped the list of April Fool pranks around the world on Tuesday.

A girl watches a parade during a traditional celebration of April Fool's Day in Skopje April 1, 2008. Children in Skopje parade in costumes every year on April Fool's Day. (REUTERS/Ognen Teofilovski)

An elaborate BBC video of flying penguins topped a rich offering of spoofs in Britain that included Gordon Ramsay, Alistair Darling and a full-page advert from BMW.

The Independent newspaper reported that foul-mouthed TV chef Ramsay was banning swearing in all his restaurants after Australian authorities refused an application for him to set up an eatery on the grounds of "decency".

The BMW advert, carried in several newspapers, purported to introduce Canine Repellent Alloy Protection, an ingenious system of delivering an electric shock to any dog thinking of relieving itself against a BMW wheel.

The Daily Telegraph featured a story based on BBC footage of a colony of penguins that flies thousands of miles to the rainforests of South America to sunbathe (http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/epeng001.shtml?src=ip_potpw).

With an eye to last week's French state visit, the Sun said diminutive President Nicolas Sarkozy will be stretched five inches to help him see eye to eye with supermodel wife Carla Bruni.

MUGABE'S LATE NIGHT SNACK

In southern Africa, Zimbabwe's election provided rich material for the newspapers, with front page stories mocking President Robert Mugabe.

Johannesburg paper the Times said Mugabe had been seen around the grounds of the official residence of South African President Thabo Mbeki, who has faced criticism over his "quiet diplomacy" that has failed to end Zimbabwe's crisis.

"I saw a Mugabe looking in the fridge last night. Mbeki is clearly too embarrassed to entertain Mugabe at meal-time," the paper quoted a witness as saying.

It quoted a Mugabe spokesman named as "Roli Flapo" as saying it was "no business of the Western, imperialist, reactionary media whether or not a comrade visits a fridge at any time of day or night."

In Australia, various companies and media organisations got into the swing of April 1 when pranks are allowed until noon with a range of hoaxes designed more to amuse than trick people.

Google Australia announced that it was to launch a new feature "enabling you to search for content on the Internet before it is created" so you could get tomorrow's news today including share prices and sports results. (http://www.google.com.au/intl/en/gday/index.html).

NOT ALL PRANKS WORK OUT

Virgin Blue, Australia's second-largest airline, put an advert in newspapers across Australia that read: "Stand Up and Be Discounted," offering half price fares if passengers would stand for a flight with a complimentary calf massage for flights of over two hours.

"We've had over 1,000 click-throughs onto the Web site we set up (http://www.virginblue.com.au/nochairfare) and people had a very good humor about it. We like to have a bit of fun," said Virgin Blue spokeswoman Leonie Vandeven.

April Fools' Day dates back centuries but its origins remain unclear.

The Museum of Hoaxes, a Web site set up by self-described "hoaxpert" Alex Boese in 1997, said references began to appear in the late Middle Ages.

But Boese said the most widespread theory about its origin dates back to late 16th century, when France switched from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar meaning the start of the year moved from late March to January 1.

Those who continued to celebrate the New Year during the week that fell between March 25 and April 1 had various jokes played on them. Boese said there was no evidence to back this.

But not all April Fools hoaxes work out.

The worst hoax, according to Boese, was in 1998 when a newspaper owned by Saddam Hussein's son Uday informed readers that U.S. President Bill Clinton had decided to lift sanctions against Iraq. It admitted later that it was just joking.

He does, however, list the top 100 April Fools' Day hoaxes, which is headed by the Swiss Spaghetti Harvest. This dates back to 1957 when the BBC news show Panorama announced Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop due to a mild winter with footage of Swiss peasants pulling spaghetti strands from trees.

Boese said April Fools' Day has never been a widely celebrated tradition but he believed pranks are becoming more common with the Internet offering fertile ground.

"Also advertisers have come to realize that a funny prank can generate lots of good publicity," he said in an e-mail.

Judge says Diana's butler "did not tell the truth"

2008-04-01T16:21:00.000-07:00

Princess Diana's butler Paul Burrell did not tell the truth at the inquest into her death, the presiding judge told a jury in London on Tuesday.

A photograph of the Princess of Wales left by a mourner is adorned with a rose August 31, 2002 on the gates of Kensington Palace on the fifth anniversary of her death. (REUTERS/Chris Helgren/Files)

"All in all, you may think Burrell's behaviour has been pretty shabby," Lord Justice Scott Baker told the jury as he concluded the official inquiry into the death of Diana and her lover Dodi al-Fayed in a Paris car crash in 1997.

Burrell, the butler who called himself "Diana's Rock", faced a three-day grilling from lawyers when he appeared at the inquest in January. He was repeatedly asked how much he really knew about secrets he was supposed to have held for Diana.

In February, Scott Baker asked Burrell to return to court to explain discrepancies between his evidence and comments attributed to him in a tabloid newspaper, but he refused.

"It was blindingly obvious wasn't it, that the evidence that he gave in this courtroom was not the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth," Scott Baker said on Tuesday.

In a scathing reference to Burrell's emotionally charged testimony, he told the jury: "I advise you to proceed with caution especially when and if you are left with the impression that he only told you what he wanted you to hear."

The coroner was summing up to the jury after they had heard from more than 250 witnesses over the past six months in an inquest into Diana's death.

Harrods' owner Mohamed Al-Fayed, Dodi's father, fought a long legal battle to have the inquest heard by a judge and jury. Under British law, an inquest is needed to determine the cause of death when someone dies unnaturally.

The inquest was delayed for 10 years because Britain had to wait for the French legal process and then a British police investigation to run their course before it could begin.

Both police inquiries decided it was a tragic accident because chauffeur Henri Paul was drunk and driving too fast.

"PROBLEM SOLVED"

Tuesday's proceedings were held up for two hours after the court received a last-minute e-mail from France referring to a possible sample from Paul, who died at the wheel of the speeding Mercedes which was being pursued by paparazzi.

But the judge resumed after an extensive break, telling the jury without going into any detail "The problem has been solved. There is nothing to be concerned about."

On Monday, the opening day of his presentation to the jury, the judge dismissed conspiracy theories held by Mohamed al-Fayed, father of Dodi.

Al-Fayed had claimed Diana and his son were killed by British security services on the orders of Queen Elizabeth's husband, Prince Philip, because the royal family did not want the mother of the future king to have a child with Dodi al-Fayed.

The 11-member jury is due to be sent out on Wednesday to consider their decision after the judge finishes his summing up. They have five verdicts to choose from.

They can opt for unlawful killing through gross negligence by the chauffeur, by "following vehicles" or by both.

The other two alternatives are accidental death or an open verdict if the jury felt there was not enough evidence to support any substantive verdict.

'Rambunctious' McCain says he had chip on shoulder

2008-04-01T16:20:00.000-07:00

Republican presidential candidate John McCain has a reputation for sometimes losing his temper, and based on his speech on Tuesday, he was even worse in high school in the 1950s.

Republican presidential candidate U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) greets supporters at his New Hampshire primary night rally in Nashua January 8, 2008. (REUTERS/Mike Segar/Files)

McCain is on a nostalgic tour this week of places that were instrumental to his upbringing as he tries to reintroduce himself to Americans, and grab some headlines while Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton dominate news coverage with their battle on who will face McCain in the November election.

Arizona Sen. McCain returned to Episcopal High School near Washington, where he graduated in 1954, and told students about being judged by his peers as "the worst rat," a title rendered to him as a first-year student for piling up demerits and other acts of immaturity.

McCain said he arrived at the private boarding school as a "pretty rambunctious boy, with a little bit of a chip on my shoulder." And he said he would respond aggressively when challenged.

Some colleagues in the U.S. Senate who have felt his wrath might agree.

"In all candor, as an adult I've been known to forget occasionally the discretion expected of a person of my years and station when I believe I've been accorded a lack of respect I did not deserve," he said.

If his detractors had known him at Episcopal, he said with a smile, "they might marvel at the self-restraint and mellowness I developed as an adult."

McCain, 71, who spent 5 1/2 years as a Vietnam prisoner of war, is using the trip to tell Americans he is a flawed individual who respects duty, honor and sacrifice for the good of the country.

He visits the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, on Wednesday, where he graduated fifth from the bottom of his class, then goes on to Florida, where he trained as a pilot, and back home to Arizona, where his political career began.

"I have been a very imperfect public servant," McCain said. "I have always tried to do well, I always try to do better, but I have made more than my share of mistakes."

During a question-and-answer session with the students, a young woman asked him why he was holding an obviously campaign event at the high school, saying she had been told it was not to be a political event.

"This meeting is over," McCain joked.

Then he said he was on the tour to emphasize values and principles that guided him and to offer a vision of how to tackle challenges, and he apologized "if you are unwillingly in attendance here."

McCain is expected next week to offer a plan for helping homeowners who are having trouble paying their mortgage bills due to adjustable-rate loans, the central cause of the current housing crisis.

Democrats have criticized him for not offering more details on what he would do to help repair the U.S. economy. A broader economic speech is expected later in April.

McCain, in an interview with ABC's "Good Morning America," gave some idea of what he was talking about.

"I think we can have many procedures for doing so. Having lenders and borrowers sit down together and the lending institutions having the ability to provide some relief; maybe some other incentives for people to stay in their own homes, which I'll be presenting in the next few days," he said.

Cubans rush to buy DVD players, electric bikes

2008-04-01T16:19:00.000-07:00

Cubans crowded shops on Tuesday to buy DVD players and electric bikes that went on sale for the first time as new President Raul Castro moved to lift many restrictions in the one-party socialist state.
A customer looks at electrical scooters on display at a store in Havana April 1, 2008. (REUTERS/Enrique De La Osa)

Stores were authorized to sell dozens of electric goods that were previously banned, including microwave ovens, flat-screen televisions and even computers.

"This should have been done long ago. They should never have been banned," said Felipe, a 53-year-old engineer, who lined up impatiently to buy his first DVD player.

The Philips and Panasonic DVD players were priced between $118 and $162, much more expensive than in other countries but lower than the going rate on Cuba's thriving black-market.

Raul Castro succeeded his ailing brother Fidel Castro as president on Feb. 24, promising to lift "excessive prohibitions" on daily life in Cuba.

His government has since moved quickly to allow Cubans to buy cellular phones and stay at hotels previously reserved for foreigners.

The changes made so far by Cuba's first new leader in half a century are aimed at reducing pent up frustrations in the country of 11 million where the ruling Communist Party has a firm grip on power.

Cubans welcomed greater access to consumer goods that are available virtually anywhere else in the world.

"After so many years of restrictions, this is great. Now Cubans have new options and I can resolve my transport problem," said Raydel Leyva, 42, the first at a Havana shopping center to buy a battery-driven moped made in China and priced at $900.

"These measures are meant to improve life and make us feel better living in our country," he said.

With wages averaging $17 a month in Cuba, many of the new goods on sale were out of reach for most pockets, but even some of those who could not afford to buy anything were happy they are now available.

"The prices are astronomical. But at least I have the choice, and I can save up to buy things I want. People will work harder to buy them," said Gelis, a self-employed tennis coach.

COMPUTERS COMING

Computers, which until now could only be bought in Cuba by government or foreign companies, were also supposed to go on sale but none had changed hands by Tuesday afternoon.

At a shop in western Havana, Microsoft keyboards and mouses were on show, but Dell laptops and desktop computers were still in their boxes awaiting for prices to be decided.

A saleswoman said computers with 80 gigabytes of hard drive memory, 512 megabytes of RAM and a Celeron P4 chip made by Intel would sell for about $865.

"I have been saving up for three years, since I was 15, and I think I am close to buying one," said Paula, a university student waiting for the new stock to come in.

Cubans have to pay for the consumer goods in hard currency CUCs, or convertible pesos, worth 24 times more than the Cuban pesos that state wages are paid in.

About 60 percent of Cubans have access to CUCs, through cash remittances from relatives in the United States, bonuses, tips from tourists and black market dealings.

Havana shops had on sale 21-inch flat-screen television sets and home theater sets worth more than $1,300. It would take a Cuban with average six years to earn enough to buy one.

"This is all good and fine, but my purchasing power is too low to buy anything," said Yaima, a teacher who earns 592 pesos a month, about $26.60. "I'll have to wait until they strengthen the peso."

Historic Aboriginal paintings stolen, recovered within hours

2008-04-01T16:17:00.000-07:00

Seven historic Aboriginal paintings were stolen Tuesday from an Australian museum then recovered hours later after the thief apparently changed his mind and dumped them in a park, police said.

The paintings, valued at more than US$460,000 (euro290,000) by officials at the Northern Territory Museum and Art Gallery, were undamaged.

The thief broke into the museum in the northern city of Darwin before dawn and took six paintings from the early days of the Papunya Tula movement -- an artists' collective in central Australia credited with creating a modern Aboriginal style that is now world renowned -- and a seventh of a central Australian landscape.

Police said a blood-spattered broken window, security footage and other clues indicated the culprit had smashed it with a rock and spent 15 minutes inside while security alarms rang out.

About seven hours later, detectives found the seven paintings in parkland near the Darwin Bowls and Social Club, territory police said in a statement.

A 37-year-old man has been charged with unlawful entry, stealing and criminal damage, and will appear in court Wednesday, police said. The man is believed to have acted alone.

The museum's director, Anna Malgorzewicz, said that whatever their market value, the historical significance of the Papunya art was beyond price.

"They are one of the first bodies of work from that particular area, so historically very important,'' she told reporters.

A small group of artists founded the movement in the tiny settlement of Papunya in the early 1970s. Aboriginal tribal motifs were traditionally painted in ochre on bodies or even scratched into the desert sand. The Papunya Tula artists are considered the first to have rendered such tribal art on board or canvas.

The style, often featuring thousands of dots in bright acrylic colors, became known as Western Desert and has become iconic, lining art galleries around the world and even being daubed on a Qantas Airways jetliner.

Paintings by the style's most famous artist, the late Emily Kame Kngwarreye, now regularly sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Papunya is at the western edge of the Macdonnel Ranges, 240 kilometers (150 miles) from the central Australian town of Alice Springs. It was founded in the 1950s as a place for indigenous people of the wider region to live, and the population now numbers just a few hundred people.

NY mobster Vinny Gorgeous gets life in prison in 2001 gangland hit

2008-04-01T16:15:00.000-07:00

-A former beauty salon owner known within the Mafia as Vinny Gorgeous has been sentenced to life in prison without parole for the 2001 killing of one of his gangland rivals, federal prosecutors said.

A Brooklyn jury convicted Vincent Basciano in 2006 of racketeering, attempted murder and gambling, but deadlocked over a murder charge in the slaying of Frank Santoro.

After a retrial, Basciano was convicted of the murder charge in July 2007.

Basciano, who once owned the Hello Gorgeous salon, used a 12-gauge shotgun to kill Santoro because he believed Santoro wanted to kidnap one of his sons, prosecutors said.

One of Basciano's lawyers, Ephraim Savitt, did not return a telephone message seeking comment Monday evening. However, the lawyers have said prosecutors built the case on untruthful testimony by mob turncoats.

Basciano became the acting boss of the Bonanno organized crime family after the arrest of Joseph Massino.

Massino was sentenced in 2005 to life in prison for orchestrating murders, racketeering and other crimes over a 25-year period. He avoided a possible death sentence by providing to the government evidence against Basciano and other mobsters.

While imprisoned together, Massino secretly recorded Basciano discussing a plot to kill a prosecutor, resulting in new charges against Basciano, authorities said. If convicted in that upcoming trial, Basciano could face the death penalty

Readers express concern for Sufiah

2008-04-01T16:14:00.000-07:00

- The sad story of Sufiah Yusof, the child prodigy who had reportedly become an adult hooker, has elicited many sympathetic responses from bloggers and Netizens.

British tabloid News of the World had published a report that the Math genius, who had entered Oxford University at the age of 12, was now charging £130 (RM829) for sex through a Manchester-based hookers’ website for “Asian escorts”.

One blogger wrote after reading the story: “You may come to the conclusion that this is a classic example of a child being pushed too hard.

“A child who was forced into ‘education slavery’ far too young without being able to enjoy her childhood.

“I believe that most of what she had done in the past was an act of defiance; a mutinous act against her father to state, ‘Hey, stop pushing me around. I need a life too!’”

An old friend of Sufiah’s responded: “As a human and woman I do really care about her and am also worried about her religion.

“I know it must be some secret of her life that made her lost. How can I contact or e-mail her?”

A blogger from Malaysia wrote: “I am sad with what had happened. Come back to Malaysia, you have many friends here.”

Some said she should be forgiven and guided back to the right path through religious teachings.

News of the World had reported, “Calling herself Shilpa Lee, the former child prodigy still juggles with figures on a hookers’ website, describing herself as a ‘very pretty size 8, 32D bust and 5’5” tall - available for booking every day from 11am to 8pm’.”

The newspaper’s reporter had posed as a potential client and “she laughed and joked as she led him to her small apartment where a bed was already set out in the lounge.”

Several grainy pictures of her in the nude were also published in the tabloid.

Boycott Dutch products, say consumer groups

2008-04-01T16:13:00.000-07:00

The Muslim Consumers Association of Malaysia has called on Muslims to boycott Dutch-made products to protest against the screening of anti-Islam film Fitna by Dutch legislator Geert Wilders.

The association, together with the NGO Consultative Council and the Muslim Restaurants Association of Malaysia, said in a statement that the video “openly insulted the Quran.”

Such an irresponsible act could affect world peace and relations between religious groups and Muslim consumers should object to the act, it said.

“We believe the boycott will send a clear message to people not to play with the sensitivities of Muslims,” it said.

The PAS Central Youth Council also called for a boycott of Dutch products, saying that it condemned the screening of the film and demanded immediate action by the producer to retrieve it.

In Malacca, Malay Islamic World Secretariat chairman Datuk Seri Mohd Ali Rustam described the filmmaker as “uncivilised” and “insane” as his actions may result in losses and harm to innocent people affected by the film.

He said the secretariat was expected to send a protest note to the Dutch Embassy over the film.

He supported moves by companies here to initiate legal action against Wilders if they suffered losses following a call to boycott Dutch products by Muslim consumers.

In Nilai, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi urged Muslim intellectuals and youths who have been campaigning for the Opposition through the Internet to show their indignation against the film through the medium.

“They should take advantage of their resourcefulness and skills which they had used against the establishment, this time to defend Islam,” he told reporters after opening the National Fatwa Council meeting.

Wilders had launched the film on the Internet after Dutch distributors refused to release it on Thursday.

The Malaysian National Islamic Students Association has sent a protest note to the Dtuch government, expressing its disappointment over the film.

Only 10 SIM cards per person, says MCMC

2008-04-01T16:12:00.000-07:00

Mobile phone users are not allowed to buy or have more than 10 SIM cards from one telecommunication company effective Tuesday.

Dealers registering details of prepaid card buyers must also transmit the information directly to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) via a GPRS MyKad reader.

Commission chairman Datuk Dr Halim Shafie said these measures were necessary to prevent abuses and enhance the security of data provided by consumers.

"At present, many of the dealers input the details of buyers of prepaid cards manually either via forms or online. This information is then stored with the dealers before it is eventually sent to us.

"This allows more opportunities for the sensitive information of consumers to be compromised. Using the reader, which costs some RM2,000 apiece, the information will be channelled directly to us," he said, adding that guidelines on the matter had already been issued to both telecommunications companies and dealers earlier this year.

Dr Halim was speaking to reporters Tuesday at a conference on the local communications and multimedia market, which was launched by Deputy Energy, Water and Communications Minister Datuk Joseph Salang here.

He said the guidelines would also require service providers to keep better records of their dealers as well as to ensure registration of prepaid card buyers was done properly.

Failure to adhere to the guidelines can result in the telecommunications firms penalising their dealers, including suspending or even terminating their contract.

Asked on the grace period for the dealers to obtain the GPRS MyKad reader, Dr Halim said the MCMC would continue to monitor the progress of the implementation of the guidelines.

"The reader should be regarded as a tool of trade by the dealers for their businesses," he said.

On the restriction for sale of not more than 10 SIM cards to a customer, he said the MCMC had traced one man who had more than 400 SIM cards.

"When we asked him, he said people have been registering as mobile phone users under his name so this was clearly a case of fraud. To prevent such abuse in the future, we will restrict the sale for the purpose of security. Why does a person need 400 SIM cards in the first place?

"In this case, we compounded the service provider," he said.

Clinton says no intention of dropping out

2008-03-30T03:57:00.000-07:00

Defying mounting pressure from some party leaders to bow out, Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton told The Washington Post she will stick it out through the remaining primaries and the contested Florida and Michigan results are resolved.

New York Senator and democratic Presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton smiles as she is introduced during a campaign stop in Hammond, Indiana March 28, 2008. (REUTERS/Frank Polich)

"I know there are some people who want to shut this down, and I think they are wrong," Clinton said in an interview in Sunday's editions.

"I have no intention of stopping until we finish what we started, and until we see what happens in the next 10 contests, and until we resolve Florida and Michigan. And if we don't resolve it, we'll resolve it at the convention."

Democrats in Florida and Michigan broke party rules and held primaries in January but the results were invalidated. Clinton won both primaries, but her rival, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, was not on the ballot in Michigan.

Clinton trails Obama in the race for 2,024 Democratic nominating delegates. But she says she can still beat the Illinois senator and that all Democrats should get a chance to vote. She has tried and failed to schedule a revote or have the votes in Florida and Michigan count.

"We cannot got forward until Florida and Michigan are taken care of, otherwise the eventual nominee will not have the legitimacy that I think will haunt us," the New York senator and former first lady told the Post.

Some Democratic leaders want the Clinton-Obama battle resolved as soon as possible so the party's presidential nominee can focus on defeating the presumptive Republican nominee, Arizona Sen. John McCain, in the November general election.

Campaigning Pennsylvania on Saturday, Obama said Clinton can stay in the race as long as she wants. He also expressed confidence that Democrats will coalesce around the winner, despite the often bitter contest.

"My attitude is that Senator Clinton can run as long as she wants. Her name is on the ballot and she is a fierce and formidable competitor," said Obama, adding that the notion that Democrats have been split by the prolonged nominating contest "is somewhat overstated."

OLIVE BRANCH

Holding out an olive branch to her supporters, Obama said Clinton "obviously believes that she would make the best nominee and the best president, and I think that she should be able to compete and her supporters should be able to support her for as long as they are willing or able."

Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, was on a six-day bus tour through Pennsylvania where Clinton is running well ahead in polls in advance of that state's April 22 primary.

At rallies in Indiana and Kentucky, crowds objected loudly when Clinton mentioned calls for the Democratic primary contest to conclude.

Obama said the Democratic Party will need to move quickly and decisively to pick its nominee in early June when the state-by-state nominating contests are winding down, and turn its attention to taking on McCain.

"I think it is important to pivot as quickly as possible for the super-delegates or others to make a decision as quickly as possible," to give the nominee time to choose a running mate and plan for the party's convention in August, Obama said.

Super-delegates are elected officeholders and other party leaders who also weigh in on the nominating contest. Obama and Clinton are avidly courting them to try to lock down the nomination.

Obama also downplayed fears that the contest will continue to divide Democrats in the election against McCain.

"You can't tell me that some of my supporters are going to say 'Well, we'd rather have the guy who may want to stay in Iraq for 100 years because we are mad that Senator Clinton ran a negative ad about Senator Obama. And I think the converse is true as well," he said.

Obama and Clinton support pulling U.S. combat troops out of Iraq. McCain has argued they could be needed there for years.

Clinton says China holdings threaten U.S. security

2008-03-30T03:56:00.000-07:00

The Bush administration has jeopardized national security and the ability to intervene in world crises because of the huge U.S. debt held partly by China, Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton said on Saturday.

US Democratic presidential candidate Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) speaks during a campaign event at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, March 24, 2008. (REUTERS/Tim Shaffer)

The New York senator, who argues she is better prepared to deal with economic and foreign policy problems than rival Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, told a rally in Indiana that the United States' $9 trillion in gross national debt puts it at the mercy of other nations.

She said President George W. Bush's policies contributed to rising U.S. debt and also have hamstrung Washington's ability to lead.

"That is what George Bush's policies mean in real world terms -- that we have put our nation's security and our leadership of the world at risk because of this indebtedness," Clinton said.

Clinton made China the focus of her criticism, which she has repeated throughout Indiana, a state that has suffered from manufacturing job losses that many blame on unfair trade practices and companies outsourcing jobs to China.

Clinton hopes to win Indiana's Democratic nominating contest on May 6 in a bid to close the gap with Obama who leads in amassing delegates who determine the party's nominee.

In her campaign remarks, she lamented China's hold over the U.S. economy.

"We are so dependent upon decisions made in other countries' capitals," Clinton said, singling out China's potential power over U.S. foreign policy decisions because of its financial leverage.

Clinton cited a discussion she had with a retired general who raised a "nightmare scenario" in which China threatened Taiwan and the U.S. president wanted to send ships toward the island to ward off Beijing.

"He said, 'You know, suppose the Chinese decide that they're going to go after Taiwan the way we see them, you know, with Tibet,'" Clinton said, describing the general's remarks and referring to the recent unrest in Tibet.

"'We start to move the fleet, and the Chinese say, 'Fine. You do that, we will dump your dollars. We will flood the market. We will not buy any more of your debt.'"

China currently holds about $490 billion in U.S. Treasury securities and has foreign exchanges reserves totaling more than $1.5 trillion dollars.

Clinton accused Beijing of manipulating its currency and of not holding its exporters to the same health and environmental standards that U.S. companies must meet.

The U.S. trade deficit with China soared last year to a record $252 billion even as the U.S. trade gap with the rest of the world decreased.

Many U.S. lawmakers complain that China deliberately undervalues its currency to boost exports and limit imports and have pressed Bush to be more aggressive in addressing the issue.

Judge wraps up Diana inquest after 250 witnesses

2008-03-30T03:55:00.001-07:00

After almost six months and more than 250 witnesses, the judge presiding over the inquest into Princess Diana's death wraps up the case on Monday with his summary to the jury.

Pictures of Dodi Al Fayed and Princess Diana are displayed in the window of Harrods in London, August 31, 2007. (REUTERS/Chris Radburn/Pool)

Few areas of the private life of the "People's Princess" were spared before Lord Justice Scott Baker and a string of sensational allegations were explored in court.

Did security services kill Diana on the orders of Britain's Royal Family? Was she pregnant? Did the 36-year-old plan to get engaged? Was her phone bugged?

To some the inquest was an unnecessary 10 million-pound ($20 million) soap opera. To others it was a chance to bring closure in a tragedy of lives unfulfilled.

Friends, family, faith healers, spies, bodyguards, police chiefs and butlers -- everyone had an opinion on Diana.

The jury was flown to Paris to see the crash scene in a road tunnel and the hospital where she died in August 1997.

Mohamed al-Fayed, whose son Dodi died alongside Diana in a high-speed car crash after a brief summer romance, pointed the finger of blame at the royals.

On a day of high drama in London's High Court, the owner of the luxury London store Harrods accused Prince Philip, Queen Elizabeth's husband and Diana's former father-in-law, of being a "Nazi" and a "racist".

His voice cracking with emotion, he said Diana, divorced from heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles, had "suffered for 20 years from this Dracula family".

"It was slaughter, not murder," said al-Fayed who believed Diana and Dodi had been planning to announce their engagement.

Diana's confidante Annabel Goldsmith was convinced the affair was a summer fling. Just days before she died, Diana told Goldsmith she needed marriage "like a rash on the face".

"Affairs of the heart are impossible to fathom," said Diana's stepmother Raine Spencer, resplendent in black hat and veil, talking like a character from the pages of a romantic novel by her own mother, author Barbara Cartland.

Paul Burrell, Diana's former butler, told the inquest her mother had called her a whore for dating Muslim men.

Al-Fayed fought a long legal battle to have the inquest heard by a judge and jury. Under British law, an inquest is needed to determine the cause of death when someone dies unnaturally.

It was delayed for a decade because Britain had to wait for the French legal process and then a British police investigation to run their course before the inquest could begin.

Both police probes concluded it was a tragic accident because chauffeur Henri Paul was drunk and driving too fast.

The jury, expected to retire on Wednesday to consider their verdict, will have to decide if it was an accident or if there is any evidence of a plot.

The judge will at first be seeking a unanimous decision and, failing that, will settle for a majority verdict, court officials said.

For full coverage of the inquest visit

Berlin Zoo chief threatened over kitten killings

2008-03-30T03:55:00.000-07:00

German police are investigating an anonymous threat against Berlin Zoo's director after he confessed he once killed four kittens by breaking their necks.

Zoo Director Bernhard Blaszkiewitz said he had killed the wild kittens in 1991, saying they posed a threat to the zoo's animals as they can carry disease.

"I can tell you that the zoo reported a threat and we are investigating," a Berlin police spokesman said. He declined to give more details.

Blaszkiewitz defended his decision to kill the kittens in a newspaper interview published on Saturday.

"I still think it was the right thing to do," he told daily Die Welt. "Wild house cats are a big danger for people and animals and therefore they cannot be tolerated in (the zoo)."

Inquest jury near deliberations on death of Princess Diana and her lover

2008-03-30T03:53:00.000-07:00

Flashing lights, swarming paparazzi, a mysterious Fiat Uno, a swiftly aborted proposal to assassinate a Balkan leader - what will jurors make of it all in reaching a judgment on the deaths of Princess Diana and her lover Dodi Fayed?

Testimony has ranged far and wide in an extraordinary coroner's inquest, without shedding much light on claims that they were victims of a plot directed by Prince Philip. The coroner, Lord Justice Scott Baker, is expected to begin his summation Monday, which may take several days before it goes to the jury.

The key question for the jurors is whether the car crash in a Paris road tunnel on Aug. 31, 1997, was an accident or something more sinister.

Mohamed Al Fayed has not budged from his belief that his son and the princess died at the hands of British security agents, acting at the prince's behest.

French police concluded that the couple died in an accident, caused in part by excessive speed and by the high blood-alcohol level of the driver, Henri Paul. A British police investigation reached the same conclusion.

More than 240 witnesses have given evidence since the inquest began on Oct. 2. Al Fayed's late bid to force the coroner to summon Prince Philip to testify, and for written questions to be put to Queen Elizabeth II, was summarily rejected by a higher court.

The inquest was in part an exploration of how the couple's speeding Mercedes came to slam into a concrete pillar, after apparently having a glancing collision with a white Fiat Uno; and in part an examination of Al Fayed's belief that he knew who drove the Uno, who employed him and why.

Diana's close friends, Prince Philip's private secretary, a former head of the Secret Intelligence Service and Diana's former butler, Paul Burrell, are among those who have been in the witness box.

There has been evidence that Diana feared dying in a car crash, but also had speculated about death in a helicopter or airplane crash; there was testimony that she feared Prince Philip, her former father-in-law.

The basic scene is familiar: the couple's car crashed as they were pursued from the Ritz Hotel by a pack of paparazzi photographers.

Some witnesses near the Alma tunnel said they saw flashes of light in the instant before the crash, other witnesses didn't notice any. Al Fayed's claim is that flashing lights disoriented the driver and sent the couple's car skidding into a crash.

But there was precious little evidence to back up Al Fayed's claims that his son and Diana were engaged, that she was pregnant and that Philip was at the head of a murder plot.

As the inquest progressed, some distance opened between Fayed and the lawyers working for him.

Michael Mansfield, Al Fayed's main advocate, steered away from accusing Philip or of claiming that MI6 assassinated the couple. He did suggest that rogue agents might have been involved.

"Mr. Al Fayed ... has certain beliefs which he has made clear. He is plainly not a member of MI6 or, certainly, the establishment either,'' Mansfield told the coroner on Feb. 20.

"He has certain beliefs and I have never at any stage withdrawn any of his beliefs but you will see I have focused very carefully on elements of what he is suggesting that may be true; in other words, for which there is, forensically, evidence to support his beliefs.''

Mansfield has suggested that Diana's campaign against land mines was the motive for the conspiracy, and that elements of the government and the arms industry were frightened that Diana was assembling a dossier about land mines; a dossier, he said, that was "capable of exposing historically British involvement in Angola because of who manufactured the weaponry, how it was got in there.''

Al Fayed believes the "establishment'' simply didn't want Diana to marry his son. When he testified on Feb. 18, Al Fayed affirmed his belief that the conspirators included Prince Philip; Prince Charles; former Prime Minister Tony Blair; Diana's sister, Sarah McCorquodale; her brother-in-law Robert Fellowes; two former chiefs of London police; driver Henri Paul; the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency; Diana's attorney, the late Lord Mishcon; two French toxicologists; Britain's ambassador to France; members of the French medical service; and three bodyguards he once employed.

Al Fayed has claimed that Diana's brother-in-law, Fellowes, was in Paris on the night of the crash sending messages to agents back in Britain. But none of Al Fayed's lawyers put that allegation to Fellowes when he testified.

Al Fayed was the only witness to claim that he knew that Diana was engaged to marry Dodi Fayed. He was told of the engagement, Al Fayed said, in a telephone call hours before the crash.

Likewise, Al Fayed was the only witness to definitely assert that Diana was pregnant.

The pathologist who examined her body said he saw no evidence, her former lover Hasnat Khan said Diana was conscientious about taking her birth control pills, and staff aboard Al Fayed's yacht, Jonikal, said they found opened contraceptive packages in her cabin.

Former MI6 agent Richard Tomlinson, who disclosed that a colleague had once proposed assassinating a Serb leader, has also claimed that flashing lights were part of the plan. When he testified, however, Tomlinson acknowledged that he was wrong in claiming the proposal was aimed at former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, and probably wrong about the lights too.

Richard Dearlove, a former head of MI6, testified that the assassination proposal was swiftly dismissed.

Al Fayed said he had been thwarted in attempts to prove his theory. "How can you want me to get the proof?'' Al Fayed said. "I am facing a steel wall of the security service, Official Secrets Act.''

The coroner asked Al Fayed if he could possibly be wrong.

"No way, 100 percent,'' Al Fayed said. "I am certain. I am the father who lost his son. And I know exactly the situations. I know exactly the facts.''

Olympic Beijing faces big challenge kicking a smoking habit

2008-03-30T03:52:00.000-07:00

Cui Dalin, China's deputy sports minister, told legislators that the Beijing Olympics would inspire to Chinese to live healthier lives.

Then he stepped out into a nonsmoking hallway - and lit a cigarette.

The recent incident illustrates the uphill battle China faces as it prepares to take what health advocates hope will be a big step against smoking in what is the world's biggest tobacco market. A ban on smoking in most Beijing public places, similar to efforts in major North American, European and Asian cities, is expected to take effect in May, aimed at meeting China's pledge of a smoke-free Olympics.

China is home to 350 million smokers - a third of the global total. More than 150 Chinese cities already have limited restrictions, but the capital would be the first to ban smoking in all restaurants, offices and schools, said health expert Cui Xiaobo, who helped draft the regulations.

The restaurant ban may be limited at first.

"There's no way it will work!'' said Jin Xianchun, a co-owner of Little Jin's Seafood Restaurant, where diners were smoking up a storm as they chose live fish and shrimp from tanks. "Of course it will affect my business. ... We will try our best to enforce, it but really... .'' She shook her head.

Cigarettes are woven into Chinese daily life. They're an icebreaker, a way of greeting a friend, and a means of bribery.

A night out typically means a good meal and cigarettes paired with baijiu, a clear sorghum liquor with a vicious kick.

Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, the late communist founding fathers, were heavy smokers, and their favorite brands are as well known as they are: Panda for Deng and Zhonghua (China) for Mao.

Almost 2 trillion cigarettes are sold every year, at prices as low as 1.50 yuan ($0.20; euro0.13) for a pack of 20, complete with a discreet warning on the side of the box that says "Smoking is harmful to your health.'' The government estimates 1 million Chinese die smoking-related deaths annually - projected to double by 2020.

Beijing has had some smoking restrictions since 1995, when the municipal government prohibited lighting up in large public venues such as schools, sports arenas and movie theaters.

The new rules, which were announced in state media Saturday, expand the scope to include restaurants, bars, hotels, offices, vacation resorts and all indoor areas of medical facilities, according to a draft released earlier this year.

"The whole world will be watching Beijing, because its success means a big step toward the success of the whole world, given the large smoking population of China,'' said Cui, an associate professor at the Capital University of Medical Sciences in Beijing.

Organizers of the Aug. 8-24 Olympics have said they want smoking bans in all hotels serving athletes and all competition venues and restaurants in the Olympic Village by June.

Last October, Beijing banned smoking in the city's 66,000 taxis, threatening drivers with a 200 yuan (US$28; euro17.75) fine if they are caught.

After a branch of the Meizhou Dongpo restaurant chain went smoke-free, revenues dropped by 5 to 8 percent in the first two months, but picked up as word got out to nonsmokers, said deputy manager Guo Xiaodong.

"Smoke-free restaurant: A mountain forest in the city,'' say posters in the restaurant. A man with a pack of cigarettes by his plate grumpily relents when his friend reminds him he can't light up.

"Some customers didn't understand why there was a ban in a restaurant, a public place.

They think cigarettes and liquor can't be separated,'' Guo said.

In 2005 China ratified World Health Organization rules that urge it, within three years, to restrict tobacco advertising and sponsorship, put tougher health warnings on cigarettes, raise tobacco prices and taxes, curb secondhand smoke, prohibit cigarette sales to minors and clamp down on smuggling.

"The problem is that there are commercial interests that make it hard,'' said Sarah England, who heads the tobacco control department of the WHO's Beijing office. She means the state-run tobacco industry, which made 388 billion yuan (US$53.6 billion; euro34 billion) last year, up 25 percent from a year earlier.

Meng Qiliang, a vice governor in the tobacco-rich southern province of Guizhou, is willing to try kicking his pack-a-day habit.

"I've been smoking since I was 26. It's hard to give up,'' said Meng, 50, taking a deep drag from the metallic blue filter of his cigarette.

But if push comes to shove? "I'll just eat some chocolate instead.''

World governments start talks on climate change agreement

2008-03-30T03:51:00.000-07:00

Governments from nearly 200 countries will launch discussions Monday on forging a global warming agreement, a process that is expected to be fraught with disagreements over how much to reduce greenhouse gases and which nations should adhere to binding targets.

The weeklong, United Nations climate meeting in Bangkok comes on the heels of a historic agreement reached in December to draft a new accord on global warming by 2009.

Without a pact to rein in rising greenhouse gases in the next two decades, scientist say warming weather will lead to widespread drought, floods, higher sea levels and worsening storms that could put billions of people at risk.

"The challenge is to design a future agreement that will significantly step up action on adaptation, successfully halt the increase in global emissions within the next 10 to 15 years, dramatically cut back emissions by 2050, and do so in a way that is economically viable and politically equitable worldwide,'' said Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, which is hosting the meeting.

All governments, including the United States, agree emissions need to be reduced to avert an environmental catastrophe. But the major polluters remain far apart over how best to achieve these goals.

Adding to the complexity of negotiations will be disputes over how best to help poor countries adapt to environmental changes by speeding up the transfer of technology and financial assistance from rich nations.

The European Union has proposed that industrialized countries slash emissions by 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. The U.S., which is one of the world's top polluters, has repeatedly rejected mandatory national reduction targets of the kind agreed to under the Kyoto Protocol a decade ago.

Japan, which is struggling to meet its emissions-cut obligations under the Kyoto pact, is looking for less stringent conditions this time around. It has talked of using 2005 rather than 1990 as the baseline for reductions and is campaigning for industry-based emission caps.

Under its plan, global industries such as steel or cement would set international guidelines for greenhouse gas emissions.

Proponents, including the United States, say that would help set a level playing field for competitive industries.

Critics, however, worry sectoral caps could be used to favor industries in richer countries with access to more advanced technology, while those in less developed nations would suffer.

Another contentious issue will be which countries will be required to make cuts under the new pact and how best to determine the level of reductions.

While the EU says the West has to take the lead in reducing emissions, the United States argued it should not have to make cuts that would hurt the U.S. economy unless China and India agreed to the same.

"We're willing to take on international binding targets as long as other major economies -- both developed and developing -- do so,'' U.S. negotiator Harlan Watson told The Associated Press.

"The primary concern is the so-called leakage issue,'' Watson said. "If you take commitments and you have energy intensive industries, they might want to move to other countries which don't have commitments.''

China has argued that developed countries should be required to take the lead in reducing pollution because their unrestrained emissions over the past century contributed significantly to global warming.

De Boer has said that requiring China and other developing countries like India and Brazil to take on binding targets "is not realistic.''

"Developing countries see that as problematic,'' he said. "The problem of climate change as we see it today is a result of rich countries' emissions, not the result of poor countries' emissions. The historic responsibility of this problem lies with industrial nations.''

Alden Meyer, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said a compromise might be building on the agreement reached in Bali where developing countries for the first time agreed to take voluntary actions that were "measurable, reportable and verifiable.''

Meyer said the West could provide the technology that would allow poor nations to reduce their emissions in certain sectors like steel and cement.

"Now you have this new animal agreed to in Bali. That is a big deal,'' he said. "You're opening negotiating space for new tools and mechanisms that will help developing countries bend down their emission curves while achieving sustainable development strategies.''

Cities worldwide switch off lights to raise awareness of global warming

2008-03-30T03:50:00.000-07:00

From the Sydney Opera House to Rome's Colosseum to the Sears Tower's famous antennas in Chicago and San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge, floodlit icons of civilization went dark for Earth Hour, a worldwide campaign to highlight the threat of climate change.

The environmental group WWF urged governments, businesses and households to turn back to candle power for at least 60 minutes starting at 8 p.m. Saturday wherever they were.

The campaign began last year in Australia, and traveled this year from the South Pacific to Europe to North America in cadence with the setting of the sun.

"What's amazing is that it's transcending political boundaries and happening in places like China, Vietnam, Papua New Guinea,'' said Andy Ridley, executive director of Earth Hour. "It really seems to have resonated with anybody and everybody.''

Earth Hour officials hoped 100 million people would turn off their nonessential lights and electronic goods for the hour. Electricity plants produce greenhouse gases that cause climate change.

In Chicago, lights on more than 200 downtown buildings were dimmed Saturday night, including the stripe of white light around the top of the John Hancock Center. The red-and-white marquee outside Wrigley Field also went dark.

"There's a widespread belief that somehow people in the United States don't understand that this is a problem that we're lazy and wedded to our lifestyles. (Earth Hour) demonstrates that that is wrong,'' Richard Moss, a member of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the climate change vice president for WWF, said in Chicago on Saturday.

Workers in Phoenix, Arizona, America's fifth-largest city, turned out the lights in all downtown city-owned buildings for one hour. San Francisco concluded the display as the Golden Gate Bridge, Coit Tower and other landmarks extinguished lights for an hour.

New Zealand and Fiji were first out of the starting blocks this year. And in Sydney, Australia -- where an estimated 2.2 million observed the blackout last year -- the city's two architectural icons, the Opera House and Harbour Bridge, faded to black against a dramatic backdrop of a lightning storm.

Lights also went out at the famed Wat Arun Buddhist temple in Bangkok, Thailand; shopping and cultural centers in Manila, Philippines; several castles in Sweden and Denmark; the parliament building in Budapest, Hungary; a string of landmarks in Warsaw, Poland; and both London City Hall and Canterbury Cathedral in England.

Greece, an hour ahead of most of Europe, was the first on the continent to mark Earth Hour. On the isle of Aegina, near Athens, much of its population marched by candlelight to the port. Parts of Athens itself, including the floodlit city hall, also turned to black.

In Ireland, where environmentalists are part of the coalition government, lights-out orders went out for scores of government buildings, bridges and monuments in more than a dozen cities and towns.

But the international banks and brokerages of Dublin's financial district blazed away with light, illuminating floor after empty floor of desks and idling computers.

"The banks should have embraced this wholeheartedly and they didn't. But it's a start. Maybe next year,'' said Cathy Flanagan, an Earth Hour organizer in Dublin.

Ireland's more than 7,000 pubs elected not to take part -- in part because of the risk that Saturday night revelers could end up smashing glasses, falling down stairs, or setting themselves on fire with candles. Likewise, much of Europe -- including France, Germany, Spain and European Union institutions -- planned nothing to mark Earth Hour.

Internet search engine Google lent its support to Earth Hour by blackening its normally white home page and challenging visitors: "We've turned the lights out. Now it's your turn.''

Gerakan deputy sec-gen quits all posts

2008-03-30T03:49:00.002-07:00

Gerakan deputy secretary-general Datuk Lee Kah Choon has resigned from all his seven party posts, effective Sunday.

The former Jelutong MP was also the party’s assistant secretary and Jelutong division chairman.

In the March 8 polls, Gerakan contested 12 parliamentary constituencies and 31 state seats, but won only two parliamentary and four state seats.

Lee’s father recently passed away at his home in Taman Robina in Butterworth.

Lee Ah Yong, 101, died of natural causes and left behind two sons and five grandchildren.

MIC branch dissolved, members become PAS supporters

2008-03-30T03:49:00.001-07:00

The Kampung Jebong MIC branch in Simpang here was officially dissolved when 110 of its members quit the party to become members of "Kelab Penyokong PAS" (PAS Supporters Club).

Branch chairman M. Muninathan, accompanied by committee members, submitted their application forms to Bukit Gantang MP Roslan Shaharom at a village temple here on Saturday night.

Roslan said the welfare of the former MIC branch members and members of the Indian community would be taken care of.

"We will take care of you because any problems affecting the Indian community will also affect members of the other communities," he said.

Roslan said he was indebted to the Indian community here as more than 95% of Indian voters within the Bukit Gantang parliamentary constituency had voted for him in the recently-concluded general election.

He said members of the community had every reason to rejoice as two of the three state seats in the constituency had been won by Barisan Rakyat, and the victors -- Mohd Osman Mohd Jailu (Changkat Jering) and Tai Sing Ng (Kuala Sepetang) -- had been appointed exco members of the new Perak state government.

German police-bomber video may radicalise Islamists

2008-03-29T04:26:00.000-07:00

The head of Germany's Federal Crime Office (BKA) said on Friday a video which appears to show Germany's first Muslim suicide bomber in Afghanistan might radicalise Islamists in Germany.

Spiegel Online has published a video allegedly from the Taliban showing a man of Turkish origin who grew up in the state of Bavaria. He is suspected of involvement in a suicide attack this month on a compound used by NATO and Afghan forces which caused several casualties.

The recording showed 28-year-old Cuneyt Ciftci and several other men planning the attack, studying plans, carrying chemicals and constructing an improvised bomb.

"We think the video could produce an imitation effect," BKA President Joerg Ziercke told a conference in the western city of Wiesbaden. "We share the concern that it will have a stimulating effect on fanatics, also in Germany."

He added, however, that it was not yet clear whether the man was in fact the perpetrator and the BKA was still trying to identify the body of the killer.

The video showed the man in question, but did not picture him directly carrying out the attack at the beginning of March in eastern Afghanistan.

One picture in the video obtained by Spiegel Online shows Ciftci at the wheel of the car with the bomb and at the end of the video he is seen praying next to the car.

A few frames later, the attack on the Sabari District Centre in the province of Khost is shown.

Hamas urges Arabs to back reconciliation push

2008-03-29T04:25:00.000-07:00

Hamas wants this weekend's Arab summit to back a Yemen-sponsored reconciliation agreement between the group and its Palestinian rival Fatah, a pro-Hamas Web site quoted the group's leader as saying on Friday.

A Palestinian boy wearing a Hamas headband cries during a Hamas rally in Gaza March 28, 2008. Hamas wants this weekend's Arab summit to back a Yemen-sponsored reconciliation agreement between the group and its Palestinian rival Fatah, a pro-Hamas Web site quoted the group's leader as saying on Friday. (REUTERS/Suhaib Salem)

Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, in exile in Syria, was also quoted as urging Arab leaders at their Damascus summit to support its fight with Israel. But he reiterated the Islamist group was open to a conditional truce with the Jewish state.

The Gaza-based Web site said Meshaal wrote to Arab leaders requesting support for Hamas-Fatah dialogue, after a Yemen-brokered agreement to revive talks between the rival factions appeared to falter this week.

Meshaal called on Arab leaders to "shoulder your national and brotherly responsibility to foster a Palestinian-Palestinian dialogue", according to the report, which was also carried by London-based pan-Arab newspaper al-Hayat.

Hamas seized control of Gaza last June after routing Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah forces. Abbas then sacked a Hamas-led unity government and pursued U.S.-backed peace talks with Israel.

After months of hostilities, the factions agreed this week to restart direct talks to "return the Palestinian situation to what it was before the Gaza incidents." But an apparent dispute quickly broke out.

Hamas has said talks will start on April 5, while Abbas's office insisted the Islamist group must first relinquish control of the Gaza Strip -- a condition Hamas has rejected.

According to the Web site, Meshaal also urged Arab leaders to support the group's fight against Israel and to protest against an Israeli-led blockade of Gaza, defending militant cross-border rocket attacks from Gaza as self defence.

But he also reiterated Hamas was ready to discuss a "comprehensive" ceasefire with Israel, which regularly launches raids in the territory it says are targeted at militants.

Several thousand Hamas supporters rallied in northern Gaza to press Arab leaders to do more to end the blockade.

"We need a practical decision to end the siege," senior Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya told the rally.

Hamas has said any ceasefire would depend on an end to Israeli acts of "aggression" in Gaza and the West Bank and the reopening of Gaza border crossings.

Egypt, with U.S. blessing, has been trying to broker a cessation of hostilities between Israel and militants in Gaza.

Israel, denying it is involved in ceasefire negotiations but saying it would have no reason to strike Hamas if salvoes ceased, has stopped targeting the group's Gaza militants in what appears to be a de facto truce between the two enemies.

Hamas has suspended rocket fire, although other militant groups have kept up sporadic attacks.

"All Palestinian factions of resistance have expressed full readiness to deal with the issue of calm, on condition that it be comprehensive, reciprocal and simultaneous," Meshaal was quoted as saying.

The two-day Arab summit opens in Damascus on Saturday.

BA cancels flights in continuing Heathrow T5 chaos

2008-03-29T04:24:00.000-07:00

British Airways Plc cancelled a fifth of flights from its new $8.6 billion terminal at London's Heathrow airport on Friday as chaos from its shambolic opening spilled into a second day.

Baggage remains at a closed check-in desk at the new Terminal 5 building at Heathrow Airport in London March 27, 2008. British Airways Plc cancelled a fifth of flights from its new $8.6 billion terminal at Heathrow airport on Friday as chaos from its shambolic opening spilled into a second day. (REUTERS/Luke MacGregor)

BA said it dropped the short-haul flights to "create more capacity" as it attempted to recover from the mess left by Thursday's opening when nearly 70 flights were cancelled, leaving passengers distraught.

Chief Executive Willie Walsh warned travellers that problems could persist into the weekend.

"I would expect some disruption tomorrow (Saturday), but I think it will get better every day as we become accustomed to the building and the quirks of the systems," he said.

"Yesterday was definitely not British Airways' finest hour," he said. "There were problems in the car parks, airport areas, computer glitches and the baggage system."

Baggage-handling and check-in problems at Heathrow's much-vaunted fifth terminal (T5) provoked a public relations disaster for the carrier that once styled itself the "world's favourite airline" -- and weighed on its shares.

BA fell more than 3 percent on Friday, hit by the T5 chaos and jitters ahead of Sunday's start of the "open skies" deal to create greater competition on trans-Atlantic routes.

"I don't think it will be material, but it's certainly bad for sentiment and not good for the BA brand," BlueOar Securities analyst Douglas McNeill said. "You'd need several days of severe disruption to really impinge on BA's financial performance."

"AMAZING NEW BUILDING"

BA's rivals, which resent Spanish-owned airport operator BAA gifting BA its own dedicated terminal, were quick to capitalise.

"Terminal 1, which now has 40 percent less passengers to accommodate following BA's move to Terminal 5, is running like clockwork," said bmi, BA's main competitor at Heathrow.

Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic said 200 BA passengers had already switched across to longhaul Virgin flights because of the problems.

"Our daily Dubai and Hong Kong services have seen the largest switch, with many more BA passengers expected to move across in the next few days," said spokesman Paul Charles.

The open-plan T5 is Britain's largest enclosed space, equivalent to the size of about 50 soccer pitches. It was touted as the answer to the delays passengers can face at the other four terminals at the world's third-busiest airport.

As opposed to Thursday, when some passengers were told they could only check in hand luggage and some flights left with no luggage in the hold at all, British Airways said customers could now check in both hand and hold luggage.

Some stranded passengers -- many of whom publicly denounced the airline -- spent the night in the gleaming terminal, reluctant to pay for nearby hotels even though BA, which is using T5 exclusively, had promised to reimburse them.

"I am very sorry that the problems have meant that some of our customers did not experience the true potential of this amazing new building," Walsh said.

British Airways spent months promoting the gleaming Richard Rogers-designed terminal, packed with high-end shops and restaurants, bringing photographers and journalists from all over the world to London to show off the complex.

Libby Trickett breaks women's world 50 freestyle mark

2008-03-29T04:23:00.002-07:00

Libby Trickett broke the world record in the women's 50-meter freestyle at the Australian swim championships and Olympic trials Saturday.

Trickett, formerly Libby Lenton and competing under her married name for the first time at this event, finished in a time of 23.97 seconds to lower Marleen Veldhuis's 50 mark of 24.09 by .12 seconds.

Dutch swimmer Veldhuis set the mark last Monday at the European championships.

Trickett now has both the 50 and 100-meter freestyle world records after setting a new mark in the 100 on Thursday when she beat the 53.30 mark set by Germany's Britta Steffen in Budapest, Hungary, on Aug. 2, 2006.

Trickett's 50 record was the eighth world record set at the Australian titles at the Sydney Olympic Park Aquatic Centre, site of the 2000 Olympics swimming.

On Saturday, Trickett lowered her own personal best time by over half a second in the 50.

"I never really thought I could go this quick before,'' said Trickett. "I have not been able to put together a good 50 meters before. But after the 100 I was just so excited for this race.'

Tennessee zoo breeds endangered frogs through in-vitro fertilization

2008-03-29T04:23:00.001-07:00

A new breeding program at the Memphis Zoo could nearly double the known population of an endangered frog species.

Biologists estimate there are only about 100 adult Mississippi gopher frogs left in the wild, but zoo officials say they have successfully produced 94 tadpoles through in-vitro fertilization.

The reclusive, stocky frog measures about three inches (7.6 centimeters) long as an adult and has large hind feet made for digging through holes and burrows made by other animals. They have a pointed snout and large eyes, which they cover with their front feet when threatened.

The species once lived in Louisiana's lower coastal plain, parts of Mississippi and the Mobile River delta in Alabama, but now is only found in two locations in Mississippi.

Named by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as an endangered species in 2001, the frog's habitat in longleaf pine forests and breeding sites in isolated ponds has been threatened by natural processes and residential development.

Linda LaClaire, a biologist for the wildlife service, oversees the frog's habitats in Mississippi and says the agency hopes to use the new tadpoles to grow the population in the wild.

"They are endemic to the longleaf pine forest, which is almost gone in the south,'' LaClaire said. "We also have a disease problem that creates tremendous mortality in tadpoles.''

The zoo, which has been successful at in-vitro fertilization of another amphibian, says this is the first ever captive breeding of the Mississippi gopher frog.

"We can now replicate this on a regular basis and hopefully can apply what we have learned to other endangered amphibians,'' said Dr. Andy Kouba, the zoo's director of research and conservation.

Kouba said the tadpoles are currently about the size of a half dollar and just started sprouting legs. While the adult frogs that were used in the breeding are not on display, Kouba said the zoo might consider putting the new frogs in a public exhibit.

"They like to hide, so we have to figure out a way to display them appropriately,'' he said.

Poison drummer arrested on rape warrant

2008-03-29T04:22:00.000-07:00

Poison drummer Rikki Rockett was arrested on a rape warrant and his case was turned over to the district attorney's office, which will consider whether to pursue charges, officials said Friday.

Rockett, 46, was arrested Monday at or near Los Angeles International Airport, Los Angeles police said. He was booked and released, and was awaiting an extradition decision by Mississippi prosecutors.

A woman in Mississippi filed a complaint that she was raped on Sept. 23, 2007, at the Silver Star Casino, Neshoba County sheriff's investigator Ralph Sciple said.

"The subject, Rikki Rockett, forcibly had sex with an adult in one of the hotel rooms,'' according to a complaint.

Sciple said the woman contacted authorities several days after the alleged attack. He did not discuss details of the case, but said his office believed the woman's complaint warranted review by the district attorney.

The casino-hotel complex in Philadelphia, about an hour northeast of Jackson, is owned by the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians.

Rockett, whose real name is Richard Ream, did not have a listed number in the Los Angeles area and could not be reached Friday for comment.

Rockett was booked into the Los Angeles County jail under his stage name and released early Tuesday, according to jail inmate information on the county sheriff's Web site. Sciple said there was no immediate attempt to bring Rockett back to Mississippi and a decision on extradition would await action by the district attorney.

Rockett and singer Bret Michaels founded Poison, the glam-metal band with a string of hits in the 1980s, including "Talk Dirty to Me.''

Piers Morgan triumphs on finale of Trump's `The Celebrity Apprentice'

2008-03-29T04:21:00.000-07:00

Piers Morgan is hired. The former British tabloid editor was crowned the winner on NBC's "The Celebrity Apprentice,'' triumphing over Trace Adkins.

The final task on Thursday's finale was to hold a charity event. Adkins was in charge of taking care of the talent, The Backstreet Boys. Morgan was responsible for the auction and food.

Adkins sold more tickets, but Morgan - who has been a judge on NBC's "America's Got Talent'' - raised the most money, earning an additional $250,000 prize for his charity.

"Apprentice'' host Donald Trump said Morgan "did an amazing job'' and showed up his celebrity competitors, who included Gene Simmons.

Trump called Adkins, whose single "You're Gonna Miss This'' has climbed the country charts, a "special human being. A beautiful guy.''

Morgan's charity is the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund, which provides help for families of U.S. military personnel who died in the line of duty. Morgan's brother has served two tours of duty in Iraq, and his brother-in-law has served two tours of duty in Afghanistan.

Mexican bull thrown in jail for allegedly devouring corn fields

2008-03-29T04:19:00.002-07:00

A prisoner is behind bars in southern Mexico for acting beastly.

Residents of the town of Canalumtic say the bull devoured their corn crops and destroyed two wooden shops, so they had it thrown in the slammer.

The bull will not be released until the owner pays damages, to be determined by a local judge, police commander Felipe Gomez said Friday.

The owner, Moises Santiz, said he'll pay a maximum of US$400 (euro250) - the same price he forked over for the bull four months ago.

Santiz said he bought the animal on Nov. 4 and let him out to graze. The bull disappeared on March 1 and was later found tied up in the patio of a private home in Canalumtic, held prisoner by an angry resident.

It's not the first time an animal has been jailed in Mexico's southern state of Chiapas. Last year, a dog was locked up for 12 days after biting someone. His owners were ordered to pay a US$18 (euro11) fine.

Scrap nomination quota: Dr M

2008-03-29T04:19:00.001-07:00

The nomination quota to contest top posts in Umno should be abolished, as it is being abused to prevent members from nominating candidates, said former party president Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

He pointed out that when he was president, anyone was free to challenge him, and although at that time there was already the quota in place, “those days it was easy to get 60 divisions (nominations)”.

However, he added, when Gua Musang MP Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah wanted to challenge Umno president and Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in 2004, he only managed to get one nomination from his own division.

“(This is) because other divisions were told not to nominate him. There was no freedom. I think it’s about time they revised this provision because of the tendency of the people with the power to stifle any move to criticise or oppose them,” he said after launching the Perkim annual general meeting on Saturday.

Dr Mahathir, who is Perkim president, said there was nothing wrong with having a contest for the presidency in the upcoming December party election, adding that other Umno presidents including him were also previously challenged.

On who was likely to challenge Abdullah, Dr Mahathir said it could be Razaleigh (who had offered himself) or others.

Top U.S. Democrat wants party contest decided by July 1

2008-03-28T09:41:00.001-07:00

The Democratic Party chairman said on Friday he hopes the increasingly contentious rivalry between presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton can be decided by July 1 to avoid a fight at the party's convention.

U.S. Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean speaks in Vienna, Virginia, in this November 30, 2007 file photo. Dean said on Friday he hopes the increasingly contentious rivalry between presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton can be decided by July 1 to avoid a fight at the party's convention. (REUTERS/Joshua Roberts/Files)

Howard Dean, former Vermont governor and a presidential candidate in 2004, urged the two candidates to focus on the November general election battle against Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the likely Republican presidential nominee.

"I think it would be nice to have this all done by July 1," Dean said on ABC's "Good Morning America" program. "If we can do it sooner than that, that's all the better.

"There has been some personal criticism," he said. "We don't want this to degenerate into a big fight at the convention."

Dean told CNN he believes Democratic delegates from Michigan and Florida will eventually be seated at the party's August nominating convention in Denver.

The Democratic primary elections in Michigan and Florida were invalidated after both states disobeyed party rules and held their balloting earlier in the year to hold greater sway over the selection of candidates.

Efforts to rerun the two primaries have failed.

"I think the delegates are eventually going to be seated in Florida and Michigan as soon as we get an agreement between the candidates on how to do that," Dean said.

Obama, an Illinois senator, has captured more state primaries, more votes and thus more of the pledged convention delegates who will help decide which Democrat faces McCain in November's presidential election.

But Clinton, a New York senator, has won contests in several large states and hopes to persuade the party's superdelegates that she will be the stronger general election candidate.

Superdelegates -- party officials not pledged to a particular candidate -- have emerged as likely kingmakers in the fight between Clinton and Obama.

Dean said he wants superdelegates to speak publicly about whom they support so that the loser would feel fairly treated.

"The candidates have got to understand that they have an obligation to our country to unify," Dean said in another interview on CBS' "Early Show." "Somebody is going to lose this race with 49.8 percent of the vote and that person has got to pull their supporters in behind the nominee."

Obama to gain endorsement in key upcoming primary state

2008-03-28T09:39:00.002-07:00

Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey plans to endorse Democrat Barack Obama on Friday, a move that could help the presidential candidate make inroads with the state's white working-class voters dubbed "Casey Democrats.''

Campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the endorsement will come as Obama begins a six-day campaign swing through Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania's April 22 primary is the next big prize in the drawn-out nomination battle between Obama, the Illinois senator, and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York. Clinton, who holds a double-digit lead in Pennsylvania polls, needs a victory in the state to keep her nomination fight alive.

Casey is a first-term senator and the son of a popular former governor of the state.

Casey is Catholic and, like his father, is known for his opposition to abortion and support of gun rights. His support could help Obama make inroads among Catholic voters.

Pennsylvania has an estimated 3.8 million Catholics, or just over 30 percent of the state's population, and the percentage among Democrats is estimated to be slightly higher.

Obama's team hopes that Casey will help narrow Clinton's huge lead among white working-class voters - men in particular.

Clinton routed Obama among that demographic in Ohio and Texas on March 4, raising questions about his electability in November. In recent weeks, Obama has stressed economic issues important to the middle class, and he is outspending Clinton on television advertising that features blue-collar imagery.

Clinton and her supporters have been making their own direct appeals: backers Kathleen Kennedy Townsend and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., both members of the Kennedy political dynasty, last week wrote a letter to Pennsylvania Catholics emphasizing her plans on health care, mortgage foreclosures and fuel costs. Clinton has been endorsed by Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, giving her access to his potent political operation.

Obama has lacked a major endorsement by a statewide Pennsylvania politician, and Casey's could help jump-start his Pennsylvania campaign. Casey has close ties to organized labor, which has been divided in Pennsylvania between the two candidates.

Casey had a 62 percent approval rating among Democrats in a recent Quinnipiac University poll.

Casey's move could also be seen as a political jab at the Clintons. Bill Clinton was the Democrats' presidential nominee in 1992 when Casey's father was not given a prime-time speaking position at the party's convention, which outraged many of the state's conservative Democrats.

Casey is scheduled to join Obama in Pittsburgh Friday and campaign with him as Obama travels by across Pennsylvania by bus.

The bus tour will feature "listening sessions,'' a technique Clinton used in her 2000 Senate campaign to convince skeptical New Yorkers that she was not just a carpetbagger looking for a plum post after leaving the White House.

Though trailing in the state, Obama hopes to prevent Clinton from racking up a large win in the state which could eat away at his delegate advantage and give her new life in the final primaries running to June.

It may be a tough sell for some in the state, which has a sizable elderly population. In the previous primaries, older Democrats have favored Clinton, while younger voters tend toward Obama.

Casey served two four-year terms as state auditor general. He lost a 2002 gubernatorial bid in the Democratic primary to Rendell.

Casey was elected to the Senate in 2006, defeating conservative Republican incumbent Rick Santorum. Obama campaigned for Casey, but so did Clinton and her husband.

21 die in Indonesia after drinking herbal remedy

2008-03-28T09:39:00.001-07:00

Indonesian police are investigating the deaths of 21 people after they drank a concoction labeled as a herbal remedy, a spokesman said Friday.

Lt. Col. Yatim Suyatmo said officers had yet to determine whether the brew was deliberately poisoned or inadvertently contaminated during production.

The victims in the town of Jambi on Sumatra island all died over the last two weeks, he said, adding that the drink was made in a local factory.

Scores of companies in Indonesia produce pills and drinks labeled as herbal remedies or tonics. The government, which is seeking to regulate the sector, say many contain unspecified chemicals.

Cuba ends restriction on cellular phones

2008-03-28T09:38:00.000-07:00

Cuba said on Friday it will allow all Cubans to buy and use mobile telephones for the first time in the latest step by new President Raul Castro to improve access to consumer goods.

A man uses a mobile phone in Havana March 28, 2008. Cuba said on Friday it will allow all Cubans to buy and use mobile telephones for the first time in the latest step by new President Raul Castro to improve access to consumer goods. (REUTERS/Enrique De La Osa)

Cuba has the lowest rate of cellular telephone use in Latin America and the service has been restricted until now to foreigners or government officials and employees.

Cuban telecommunications monopoly ETECSA, a joint venture with Telecom Italia, said it would begin selling the service to the general public within days in hard currency.

"ETECSA is able to offer mobile phone service to the public," it said in a statement published in the Communist Party newspaper Granma.

Many Cubans have for long wanted access to cellular phones and hoped it would be among the first steps taken by Raul Castro, who succeed his ailing brother Fidel Castro as Cuba's first new leader in almost half a century on Feb. 24.

"This shows there is a change in mentality at the top and recognition that Cuba has to move into the 21st century," a young computer technician said, asking not to be named.

Raul Castro has begun lifting some of the many restrictions on the daily life of Cubans as he tries to meet popular demands for better living standards in the socialist state.

Taking office last month, he promised to start lifting "excessive regulations and prohibitions" within weeks.

Some Cubans already have mobile phones registered in the name of foreigners or their work places. They will now be able to put the contracts in their own names, ETECSA said.

Cubans will be able to buy computers and DVD players next month for the first time, if they have the hard currency to pay for them. Just two years ago, banned DVD players were being confiscated by airport customs officials on arrival in Cuba.

Raul Castro, 76, has also launched a restructuring of agriculture to reduce bureaucratic bottlenecks and boost food production.

A major public complaint that his government will have to deal with is that wages paid in Cuban pesos are too low, while consumer goods have to be paid for in convertible pesos, or CUCs, worth 24 times more than pesos.

Cubans will pay for their mobile telephones with prepaid cards bought in CUCs that will allow them to receive and make international calls.

ETECSA, in which Telecom Italia has a 27 percent stake, said the hard currency income would be invested in the expansion of land lines, where Cuba has the sixth lowest density in Latin American.

About 60 percent of Cubans have access to hard currency from cash remittances sent by relatives living abroad, mainly in the United States, or through factory and farm bonuses and tips from foreign tourists.

In the streets of Havana, the freeing of cellular phones services came as welcome news to all.

"It was an obvious measure. There will have to be more like it to get rid of the thousand and one obstacles that make life bitter in Cuba," said university student Jofre Valdes, 23.

"This was an anachronism. They have to end all unnecessary restrictions," said state employee Humberto Vega.

Italians wary of mozzarella scare but eat on

2008-03-28T09:37:00.000-07:00

Carefully selecting a lump of fine buffalo mozzarella, a Milan cheesemonger points to a certificate stuck to the glass-fronted fridge which is meant to appease cautious customers about its origins and quality.

Balls of freshly made buffalo mozzarella cheese float in brine at a dairy in Caianello March 27, 2008. (REUTERS/Stefano Renna/Agnfoto)

Ever since news broke that some of Italy's best mozzarella was being made with milk contaminated with cancer-causing dioxin, Alfredo says customers have been hesitant to buy the cheese until they know where it comes from.

"People see what is happening and they are scared," said the cheesemonger, who asked to be identified by his first name only.

"There has been a small impact. We put up the certificate to show where our product comes from and that helps."

Buffalo mozzarella is one of Italy's best known culinary specialities and a byword for fresh and natural Italian produce. It is known abroad for its use on pizza, but purists eat it on its own or with a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil.

The cheese costs at least twice as much as mozzarella made with cow's milk, and Italy makes 33,000 tonnes of it a year, 16 percent of which is sold abroad.

Seeking to avert a major food scare, Italy has sealed off 83 dairy farms in the southern Campania region around Naples after finding nearly one in five buffalo mozzarella producers were making cheese with higher-than-permitted levels of dioxin.

Italy has told the European Commission it has not exported any contaminated mozzarella but it took the precaution on Friday of ordering a recall of cheese from 25 affected producers from Campania, where Italy's best buffalo mozzarella is produced.

"Seeing what is happening to a symbol of Italian produce makes you want to cry," said Lino Stoppani of upmarket Milan food shop Peck. "We have seen caution. Customers are sensitive. Certainly, there has been a fall in mozzarella consumption."

HEALTH RISKS

Officials believe the dioxin levels are linked to a recent garbage crisis in Naples and nearby Campania area, where locals burned rubbish in streets and open fields as dumps were full.

Police have also been investigating whether feed given to buffalo herds was tainted, possibly by gangsters linked to illegal waste disposal.

Italian officials are playing down health risks for the public and say special checks are being made to guarantee the safety of the cheese.

A consumer group has advised Italians not to eat it until the final results of tests and the names of the producers concerned are made public. A leading group of producers said sales were down 30 percent in the first two months of the year, with a revenue loss of 30 million euros ($47.29 million).

On Friday, France briefly prohibited sales of some Italian mozzarella, but later lifted the order after winning assurances from Rome that none of the suspect cheese was exported there.

Japan and South Korea have stopped imports of buffalo mozzarella over contamination concerns.

But some consumers in Italy say they are not fearful.

"My first reaction was not to eat it as this is scary," said Milanese pensioner Mario Rossi as he shopped in a supermarket, where rows of mozzarella cheese were stacked, untouched. "But I will continue eating it, though with caution."

At Milan's Obika Mozzarella Bar, a restaurant specialising in quality mozzarella, diners happily munched on the cheese. The restaurant, which has branches in Rome and London as well, says it has not felt any impact from the scare so far.

"Our clients trust us. ... This is something that has scared a lot of people but it is a case of counterfeit," founder Silvio Ursini said by phone, underlining that all cheese used by his restaurants undergoes thorough checks.

Pizzeria owner Pino Malastrana was not worried either.

"I buy four kilograms of it a day," he said, tucking into a plate of buffalo mozzarella. "And I've been using it all up."

Muslim nations condemn Dutch Koran film

2008-03-28T09:35:00.000-07:00

Iran, Pakistan and Indonesia on Friday condemned a film by a Dutch lawmaker that accuses the Koran of inciting violence, as Dutch Muslim leaders urged restraint.

Islam critic Geert Wilders launched his short video on the Internet on Thursday evening. Titled "Fitna", an Arabic term sometimes translated as "strife", it intersperses images of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and Islamist bombings with quotations from the Koran, Islam's holy book.

The film urges Muslims to tear out "hate-filled" verses from the Koran and starts and finishes with a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammad with a bomb under his turban, accompanied by the sound of ticking.

The cartoon, first published in Danish newspapers, ignited violent protests around the world and a boycott of Danish products in 2006. Many Muslims regard any depiction of the Prophet as offensive.

Iran called the film heinous, blasphemous and anti-Islamic and called on European governments to block any further showing. Pakistan's Foreign Office summoned the Dutch ambassador to lodge a protest.

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation and a former Dutch colony, also condemned the film.

"We are of the view that the film has a racist flavour and is an insult to Islam, hidden under the cover of freedom of expression," a Foreign Ministry spokesman said. "We call on Indonesian people not to be incited."

Dutch Muslim leaders appealed for calm and called on Muslims worldwide not to target Dutch interests. The Netherlands is home to about 1 million Muslims out of a population of 16 million.

"Our call to Muslims abroad is follow our strategy and don't frustrate it with any violent incidents," Mohammed Rabbae, a Dutch Moroccan leader, told journalists in an Amsterdam mosque.

"Looking for conflict there is looking for conflict with us," he said before an imam made a similar appeal in Arabic.

The Dutch Islamic Federation went to court on Friday to try to stop Wilders from comparing Islam to fascism, saying he incited hatred of Muslims.

"INFLAMING HATRED"

Dutch authorities reported a calm night in contrast to the unrest that swept the country after the murder by a militant Islamist in 2004 of Dutch director Theo van Gogh, who made a film accusing Islam of condoning violence against women.

Dutch security officials raised the national risk level to "substantial" this month because of the Wilders film and perceptions of an increased al Qaeda threat.

In a poll conducted on Friday, pollster Maurice de Hond found that only 12 percent of 1,200 people surveyed thought the film represented Islam accurately, while 72 percent said it showed the extremism of a certain group.

However, 43 percent agreed that Islam was a serious threat to the Netherlands over the long term. Some 53 percent said this wasn't the case.

Wilders has been under heavy guard because of Islamist death threats since the murder of director van Gogh. Support for his anti-immigration Freedom Party rose in anticipation of the film to about 10 percent of the vote.

The Dutch government has distanced itself from Wilders and tried to prevent the kind of backlash Denmark suffered over the Prophet cartoons.

Dutch exporters association Fenedex said it did not expect a negative impact on Dutch companies in Muslim countries.

There was a small protest by dozens of Islamists in Karachi on Friday, demanding that Pakistan sever diplomatic ties with Denmark and the Netherlands.

NATO has expressed concern the film could worsen security for foreign forces in Afghanistan, including 1,650 Dutch troops.

Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said in a televised speech on Thursday he rejected Wilders' views and was pleased by the initial restrained reactions of Dutch Muslim organisations.

The European Union supports the Dutch government's approach and believes the film serves no purpose other than "inflaming hatred", the Slovenian EU presidency said in a statement:

"The European Union and its member states apply the principle of the freedom of speech which is part of our values and traditions. However, it should be exercised in a spirit of respect for religious and other beliefs and convictions."

BA cancels flights in continuing Heathrow T5 chaos

2008-03-28T09:34:00.000-07:00

British Airways Plc cancelled a fifth of flights from its new $8.6 billion terminal at London's Heathrow airport on Friday as chaos from its shambolic opening spilled into a second day.

Chief Executive Willie Walsh warned travellers that problems could persist into the weekend.

"I would expect some disruption tomorrow (Saturday), but I think it will get better every day as we become accustomed to the building and the quirks of the systems," he said.

"Yesterday was definitely not British Airways' finest hour," he said. "There were problems in the car parks, airport areas, computer glitches and the baggage system."

BA fell more than 3 percent on Friday, hit by the T5 chaos and jitters ahead of Sunday's start of the "open skies" deal to create greater competition on trans-Atlantic routes.

"AMAZING NEW BUILDING"

BA's rivals, which resent Spanish-owned airport operator BAA gifting BA its own dedicated terminal, were quick to capitalise.

"Terminal 1, which now has 40 percent less passengers to accommodate following BA's move to Terminal 5, is running like clockwork," said bmi, BA's main competitor at Heathrow.

Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic said 200 BA passengers had already switched across to longhaul Virgin flights because of the problems.

"Our daily Dubai and Hong Kong services have seen the largest switch, with many more BA passengers expected to move across in the next few days," said spokesman Paul Charles.

"I am very sorry that the problems have meant that some of our customers did not experience the true potential of this amazing new building," Walsh said.

U.N. climate talks to test U.S. shifts

2008-03-28T09:33:00.000-07:00

Up to 190 nations will start work on a new U.N. climate treaty in Bangkok on Monday, in a test of how far the world has progressed after years of deadlock highlighted by a U.S. outburst about a duck in 2005.

A man walks through a parched field in Laguna province south of Manila in this July 29, 2007 file photo. (REUTERS/Stringer/Files)

"If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it is a duck," chief U.S. climate negotiator Harlan Watson said in Montreal, denouncing what he called a veiled bid to launch negotiations on a pact to combat global warming.

Opposed to the start of any negotiations, he gathered up his papers and walked out of a late-night United Nations meeting, leaving the other, stunned delegates around the table. He returned only the next day after concessions were made.

Less than three years later, Watson will sit down for the March 31-April 4 meeting in Bangkok with many of the same officials who were in Canada to start negotiations due to end in late 2009 with a tough global treaty to fight climate change.

But questions remain over whether the United States, the only rich country opposed to caps on emissions of greenhouse gases under the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, has really changed or is merely being dragged into negotiations.

Bangkok may also give signs about how far developing nations led by China and India are willing to go in rein in their rising emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels. They worry that any curbs could slow their economic growth.

"I think the U.S. really has changed," Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat in Bonn, told Reuters. He also praised willingness by developing nations to act.

He said U.S. President George W. Bush had come to office in 2001 saying scientists disagreed about whether climate change was a threat but now saw it as a serious problem.

A main spur for urgency has been the U.N. Climate Panel, which said last year it was at least 90 percent sure human activities were to blame for a warming that will bring more floods, heatwaves, droughts and rising seas.

FLEXIBILITY

"I think we have demonstrated a lot of flexibility," Watson told Reuters. "We never think we get enough credit -- nor enough credit for what we have been doing all along."

Washington has made big investments in technologies such as hydrogen even though it opposes Kyoto, which obliges 37 rich nations to cut emissions by 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12. A new treaty would seek to involve all countries.

Watson said he did not remember his exact words about the duck in Montreal but said they were along the lines of the quote above. In a joking protest, environmentalists bought yellow plastic ducks and handed them to delegates.

Montreal ended with agreement to start an informal "dialogue" on actions to fight climate change, specifying at U.S. insistence that it was not a prelude to negotiations.

The WWF environmental group said the United States, long the top emitter of greenhouse gases but being caught by China, had been forced into a corner by rising worries about climate change and a more assertive approach by poorer nations such as China.

The United States was the last to drop objections to the launch of negotiations at U.N. talks in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2007 -- and only after its delegates were booed.

"They were totally isolated and they couldn't stomp out of the room any more," said Martin Hiller of the WWF.

"The United States has been dragged kicking and screaming all the way," said John Lanchbery, principal climate advisor to the British Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

"All that will change at the end of the year," he said, noting that Republican presidential candidate John McCain and Democratic hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton favoured tougher action.

Still, Watson predicted the next president would face demands by Congress for tougher action by nations such as China and India in return for any U.S. curbs on greenhouse gases. "I think that's going to be a bottom-line requirement," he said.

De Boer also said many developing nations were making concessions. "China and India have not been reluctant to act on climate change, but they have objected to having commitments imposed on them that would hurt their economic growth," he said.

Zimbabwe army on alert for crucial election

2008-03-28T09:32:00.000-07:00

Zimbabwe's security forces went on full alert on Friday to quash violence during the most crucial election since independence, with President Robert Mugabe facing the biggest challenge of his 28-year rule.

Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe greets supporters after arriving for his final election rally at Highfields in Harare March 28, 2008. (REUTERS/Howard Burditt)

In one of his last rallies before Saturday's poll, Mugabe struck a familiar theme, mocking the opposition MDC and attacking former colonial power Britain.

"This is a vote against the British. The fight is not against the MDC ... the MDC is just a puppet, a mouthpiece of the British," he told 6,000 people on the outskirts of Harare.

Mugabe blames sanctions by Britain and other Western nations for the collapse of the economy in his once-prosperous nation, now suffering the world's highest inflation, at 100,000 percent, a virtually worthless currency, and food and fuel shortages.

Opponents blame his policies for ruining Zimbabwe.

Army and police chiefs say they will not accept an opposition victory, stoking accusations that Mugabe will use his incumbent power to rig the election.

Police chief Augustine Chihuri said on Friday security and defence forces had been put on full alert and would not allow declarations of victory before official results were announced -- expected to take several days.

"May we remind everyone that those who think and do evil must fear, for the defence and security forces are up to the task in thwarting all threats to national security," he told a news conference, flanked by army and security chiefs.

FORMIDABLE CHALLENGE

Mugabe faces his most formidable challenge in Saturday's presidential, parliamentary and council elections, with a two- pronged assault from ruling party defector Simba Makoni and Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the biggest MDC faction.

Both hope to exploit widespread misery caused by an catastrophic economic crisis they blame on the veteran leader, who took power at independence in 1980 after leading a guerrilla war against white rule.

If no candidate wins more than 51 percent of the vote on Saturday, the election will go into a second round, when the two opposition parties would likely unite. Analysts say Mugabe will do his utmost, including rigging, to avoid this happening.

Analysts would also expect a violent crackdown against MDC supporters in the three-week hiatus between the two votes.

Tsvangirai, widely seen as the strongest challenger to Mugabe, said in an interview on Friday that he would invite moderate members of Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party into a national unity government if he wins the election.

"There has to be consultation with the leadership of the reform elements, not the rabid elements, those who want to see the government moving forward," he told the Financial Times.

Tsvangirai, like most observers, downplayed the possibility of Kenya-style bloodshed if Mugabe rigged victory.

"I am not calling for a demonstration," he said.

Tsvangirai wound up his campaign with a rally at Domboshava, a semi-rural area 30 kilometres north of Harare, telling a crowd of about 2,000 people that security forces who served under Mugabe would not face retribution if he wins the election.

Tsvangirai mocked Mugabe for blaming Western sanctions, which include travel bans on ZANU-PF leaders, for Zimbabwe's crisis.

"If someone says 'Mugabe and your wife, you've stolen too much money to go and shop at Harrods in England... are those sanctions?'," he asked.

Tsvangirai and Makoni accuse Mugabe of planning to rig the vote. "We believe there is a very well thought-out, sophisticated and premeditated plan to steal this election from us," Makoni said.

Most international election observers have been banned from Zimbabwe, except for a team from the regional SADC grouping, which critics accuse of taking too soft a line with Mugabe.

CAP: Kids viewing porn, drinking beer in cybercafes

2008-03-28T09:29:00.000-07:00

Schoolchildren are being allowed into local cybercafes to view pornographic anime and play sex-based computer games such as Nasty Anime Game and The Sexy Empire, according to the Consumers Association of Penang.

Its president S.M. Mohamed Idris said a parent handed them 11 CD-ROM games depicting naked women in various poses after catching his son playing such a game at a cybercafe.

“The parent conducted her own investigations and found that the games could easily be bought for only RM5 each from shops in shopping malls on the island.

“We also conducted random checks on about 15 cycbercafes two days ago and found that these children, aged between 13 and 15, were being allowed into the premises without any adult supervision.

“A few of these children who were questioned, admitted to visiting cybercafes to play the sex-based computer games and also to watch hentai which is pornographic Japanese anime,” he said Friday.

Mohamed Idris said they also visited pornographic websites on the cybercafes’ computers, which did not have filtering programmes. The cybercafes charged between RM3 and RM7 for an hour’s use of their computers.

“We also found these schoolchildren openly smoking and drinking beer which were sold in these premises.

“The Education Ministry and local government authorities should act immediately to halt such unhealthy activities,” he said.

Copies of the pornographic computer games were later handed over to George Town OCPD Asst Comm Azam Abd Hamid at his office in Patani Road.

ACP Azam said the police were aware of the problem and had raided several cybercafes, which were popular haunts for teenagers.

“A few operators were arrested. Students caught playing truant were handed over to their parents.”

Obama says Rezko had bigger role in fundraising

2008-03-15T02:08:00.000-07:00

U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Friday an indicted Chicago businessman raised up to $250,000 for his previous political campaigns, a higher figure than he previously reported, according to two Chicago newspapers.

The Illinois Democratic senator's campaign has previously said it donated to charity more than $150,000 in contributions traced to Antoin "Tony" Rezko. The property developer and restaurant entrepreneur is on trial, accused by federal prosecutors of extorting bribes and campaign donations as well as money laundering.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama speaks in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania, March 11, 2008. Obama said on Friday an indicted Chicago businessman raised up to $250,000 for his previous political campaigns, a higher figure than he previously reported, according to two Chicago newspapers. (REUTERS/Keith Bedford)

Obama has long denied there was anything in his relationship with Rezko that relates to the corruption trial and there is no evidence he did anything wrong.

Obama, a former Illinois state senator, told the Chicago Sun-Times in an interview that "Rezko was not my largest fundraiser but a significant fundraiser" in his 2004 U.S. Senate campaign.

Saying the contributions could be as high as $250,000, he said, "It's hard for me to know precisely."

Besides Rezko's fundraising, a 2005 real estate deal with Obama has drawn scrutiny.

Obama told the Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune it was a mistake to deal with Rezko who was under grand jury investigation at the time of their property dealings.

"He never once asked me for any favors, or ever did any favors for me," Obama told the Sun-Times. "He never gave me any gifts or gave me any indication he was setting me up to ask for any favors in the future."

On the same day in 2005 that Obama purchased a Georgian mansion for $1.65 million, $300,000 less than the original asking price, Rezko's wife, Rita, purchased the adjoining lot from the same seller at the full $625,000 asking price. The sellers have said Obama was the highest bidder.

Later, Obama expanded his side yard by purchasing a sliver of Rezko's lot for $104,000.

Obama renounces fiery pastor's comments

2008-03-15T02:07:00.000-07:00

U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday repudiated what he called "inflammatory and appalling remarks" made by his Chicago pastor, seeking to quell another campaign controversy tinged with race.

Democratic presidential hopeful Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) delivers a speech at the Chicago History Museum in Chicago, Illinois, March 12, 2008. (REUTERS/Frank Polich)

The Democrat from Illinois, who would be the first black president, used stronger words than he has in the past to distance himself from widely circulated sermons by his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright of Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's South Side.

In Wright's sermons over the years, which have been circulated in the media and on the YouTube Web site, he has called the Sept. 2001 attacks retribution for U.S. foreign policy, cited the U.S. government as the source of the AIDS virus, and railed against a racist America.

"I vehemently disagree and strongly condemn the statements that have been the subject of this controversy," Obama said in statement, responding to persistent media coverage of Wright's sermons.

"I categorically denounce any statement that disparages our great country ... I also believe that words that degrade individuals have no place in our public dialogue, whether it's on the campaign stump or in the pulpit," he said.

Obama, who is locked a close race with New York Sen. Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination, said he had not been present during the sermons in question. Obama joined Wright's church 20 years ago, before starting his political career.

"Had I heard them in church I would have expressed that concern directly to Rev. Wright," Obama told MSNBC, adding that Wright was no longer on the campaign's spiritual advisory council, the African American Leadership Committee.

At the time he learned of the sermons, he said did not leave the church where he was married and his daughters were baptized because Wright was retiring.

DISTANCING

Previously, Obama has sought to distance himself from Wright's comments by chiding him as "an uncle you don't always agree with." But Friday's repudiation was reminiscent of one he made after Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, known for making anti-Semitic and racist comments, declared his support.

Earlier this week, 1984 vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro resigned from Clinton's campaign after saying that Obama's success was due to his race. Obama refused to condemn those comments as racist because he said they were not meant that way.

In a sermon late last year, Wright, who is black, talked about why he believed voters would support Clinton over Obama.

"Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people," Wright said. "Hillary! Hillary can never know that. Hillary has never been called a nigger."

Several commentators, including one in the Wall Street Journal, said Wright's sermons were alarming as they come from the man Obama has referred to as his spiritual confidant and the source of one his books' titles, "The Audacity of Hope."

But others said it was unlikely to be a serious problem for Obama's campaign ahead of the next state nominating contest against Clinton in Pennsylvania on April 22.

"There may well be Clinton and (presumed Republican nominee John) McCain supporters who'll try to push the issue but I don't think it will settle in because too many Americans are churchgoers of one sort or another and have heard their pastor say something about 'hellfire' or whatever, and they don't agree with it," said political analyst Dick Simpson of the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Obama praised Wright, a former U.S. Marine, as a "respected biblical scholar" who has "preached the gospel of Jesus, a gospel on which I base my life. In other words, he has never been my political advisor; he's been my pastor."

Clinton says Obama voted for oil firm tax breaks

2008-03-15T02:06:00.000-07:00

Sen. Hillary Clinton on Friday renewed her attack on oil company profits and accused Sen. Barack Obama, her rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, of supporting tax breaks for oil companies.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Hillary Clinton addresses the media about rising fuel prices with John Curran, Independent Gulf station owner, at his gas station in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania March 14, 2008. (REUTERS/David DeNoma)

Speaking at a campaign rally for about 2,000 supporters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Clinton said both Obama and Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain had voted for a bill to cut oil company taxes.

"They voted yes to more giveaways to the oil companies," she said during a 40-minute speech.

Citing Exxon Mobil Corp's latest annual profit of $40 billion, Clinton said that as president, she would require oil companies to invest in alternative forms of energy or else be subject to a windfall profits tax.

She pledged to set up a $50 billion Strategic Energy Fund to develop non-fossil fuel energy sources, and would pay for it by ending tax subsidies that she said have been enjoyed by oil companies during the administration of Republican President George W. Bush.

Clinton and Obama are locked in a bitter Democratic fight in the state-by-state contests to determine who will face McCain in November's presidential election. Pennsylvania's April 22 contest has the biggest single-state haul of nominating delegates - 158 - remaining in the race.

The new U.S. administration, Clinton said, should place a high priority on the search for clean, renewable sources of energy such as wind and solar.

"We have to have the same commitment to the energy race as we had to the space race," the New York senator said.

Development of alternative energy sources and the promotion of energy independence could generate 5 million new jobs in the next 10 years, she added.

Obama's campaign did not immediately respond to Clinton's statements on the economy. The Illinois senator gave several television interviews on Friday night to repudiate controversial remarks made by his Chicago pastor.

Earlier in the day, during a visit to a Pennsylvania gas station, Clinton also called for higher fuel economy standards for vehicles and a one-year moratorium on additions to the nation's strategic oil reserves.

Clinton told the rally the U.S. economy is in trouble and she accused Bush, who acknowledged current economic strains in a speech in New York on Friday, of being too late to recognize the problems and being willing to do "very little" about it.

With oil at around $110 a barrel, she said Bush had failed to negotiate lower prices with major producers such as Saudi Arabia.

"You will not catch me as your president holding hands with the Saudis," she said. "I will be holding them accountable."

Lindsey Davis, 26, said before the speech she hadn't made up her mind which Democrat to vote for, and wanted to hear Clinton's views on the economy, Iraq and gay rights.

Japan's space lab set, Canada's new robot next

2008-03-15T02:02:00.000-07:00

Spacewalking astronauts will work on assembling a Canadian robotic system on Saturday following the successful installation of the first segment of Japan's lab on the International Space Station.

The Japanese Kibo module is moved by the International Space Station's arm in this view from NASA TV March 14, 2008. (REUTERS/NASA TV)

Saturday's spacewalk will be the second of five planned during space shuttle Endeavour's busy 16-day mission in space. The plans had been in doubt until late on Friday when power was restored to the robotic system.

But Friday was Japan's moment of space glory.

Wearing protective masks and goggles, station commander Peggy Whitson, Japanese astronaut Takao Doi and lead shuttle spacewalker Rick Linnehan floated into an equipment-jammed storage closet that will be hooked up in May with Japan's main laboratory, named Kibo, or "Hope."

"This is a small step for one Japanese astronaut, but a giant entrance for Japan to a greater and newer space program. Congratulations," Doi radioed to Japan's new space control center outside Tokyo.

The cylinder is basically a storage compartment for the main segment of the three-piece Kibo, scheduled for delivery on a May space shuttle flight. The final piece will be flown up in early 2009.

It follows the installation in February of Europe's lab on the ISS, which is now truly a global affair. The opening of Kibo marks the first time in the 10 years of space station construction that equipment from all 15 partner countries is operating together in orbit.

"You are our 'kibo' -- our hope," said Japan's Mission Control commentator. Upon completion, Kibo will be about the size of a double-decker bus and the station's largest lab.

'IT'S ALIVE'

Shortly after the opening of Kibo, NASA managed to restore power to the Canadian robotic system that had been delivered to the station by the shuttle along with the first segment of Japan's lab.

"It's alive," quipped Pierre Jean, acting program manager of the Canadian space station program.

A flaw in an electrical circuit had left the $209 million robot, dubbed Dextre, without heaters to protect its systems from the minus 128.88 C temperatures of space.

"It was quite a relief and a real sense of success to see it power up," Phil Engelauf of NASA's mission management team told a media briefing.

The robot, which has human-like features with a body and a pair of gangly arms, is designed to add manual dexterity and a further 9 metres of reach to the space station's crane to assist with detailed exterior maintenance tasks.

Engineers attempted to fix the problem with a software patch, but later discovered a hardware error was to blame.

The 1.5 tonne Dextre, brought up in nine pieces, was to be assembled during spacewalks on Saturday and Monday. Jean said the body of the robot would be raised during Saturday's spacewalk so the arms could be attached.

The spacewalk is scheduled to begin at 8:23 p.m. EDT (0023 GMT on Sunday) and will be conducted by Linnehan and Mike Foreman. It is expected to last seven hours.

The Endeavour crew reached the station on Wednesday for a 12-day construction and servicing call to the station.

The shuttle blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Tuesday and is scheduled to land back on Earth on March 26.

Keris, pistols stolen from Malacca museum

2008-03-15T02:01:00.000-07:00

Police are investigating the burglary of several exhibits from Malacca’s Ethnography Museum believed to have been stolen Saturday.

Melaka Tengah OCPD ACP Johari Yahya confirmed that a report had been lodge by the Malacca Museum Corporation (Perzim) over the loss of eight Malay keris (curved daggers) and three Dutch-era pistols.

“We are still investigating and have requested a forensic team from Kuala Lumpur to assist in investigations,” he said here on Saturday.

When contacted, Perzim’s acting general manager Kamis Abas said staff discovered the items missing from two showcases when they were preparing to open the museum for viewing at 9am Saturday morning.

He added that the missing keris were considered antique items owing to their age while the three Dutch pistols were replicas obtained from Europe several years ago.

The exhibits were housed at Malacca’s famous 18th Century Dutch red-coloured Stadhuys that was converted into the state’s main museum in the mid-1980s.

Popcorn ingredient causes lung disease - U.S. study

2008-03-14T03:17:00.000-07:00

A chemical used to give butter flavor to popcorn can damage the lungs and airways of mice, U.S. government experts reported on Thursday.

Tests on mice show that diacetyl, a component of artificial butter flavoring, can cause a condition known as lymphocytic bronchiolitis, said the team at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, part of the National Institutes of Health.

A popcorn seller stocks up in Barnes, southwest London July 5, 2007. A chemical used to give butter flavor to popcorn can damage the lungs and airways of mice, U.S. government experts reported on Thursday. (REUTERS/James Boardman)

The condition can lead to obliterative bronchiolitis -- or "popcorn lung" -- a rare and debilitating disease seen in workers at microwave popcorn packaging plants and at least one consumer.

At least two microwave popcorn makers -- ConAgra Foods Inc and Weaver Popcorn Co Inc -- have said recently they would stop using diacetyl.

Laboratory mice made to inhale diacetyl vapors for three months developed lymphocytic bronchiolitis, the NIEHS team said.

"This is one of the first studies to evaluate the respiratory toxicity of diacetyl at levels relevant to human health," Daniel Morgan at NIEHS, whose team led the study, said in a statement.

Writing in the journal Toxicological Sciences, the researchers said findings suggest that workplace exposure to diacetyl contributes to the development of obliterative bronchiolitis.

The hard-to-treat condition causes vague symptoms such as cough and shortness of breath, and steadily worsens, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Congress has been working on a bill to order quick action by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to limit exposure to diacetyl. The House of Representatives passed a bill last year but the Senate has not acted.

The Food and Drug Administration said last September it was investigating a report of a man who came down with the life-threatening disease after eating several bags of butter-flavored microwave popcorn each day.

Caribbean plans tsunami warning system by 2010

2008-03-14T03:16:00.000-07:00

Caribbean states will set up a joint tsunami warning center before the end of the decade, governments agreed at a meeting in Panama on Thursday.

Supporters want the center to relay information from national geological institutes across the region, providing an early warning system that could help prevent deaths and infrastructure damage in the event of a tsunami.

Peter Koltermann, executive secretary of the United Nations Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, told a meeting of around 30 Caribbean states that the likelihood of a tsunami hitting the region at some point was "probable."

He said a regional warning center could help prevent disasters like the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which killed around 230,000 people.

Koltermann had said during a session on Wednesday that "the situation in the Indian Ocean was similar to the Caribbean. Nobody believed it would happen, but it happened."

He said Panama's interoceanic canal could be vulnerable to a sea surge from an underwater earthquake, and any shutdown would hit global trade. "If this canal does not work for one week, four weeks, or six weeks because of a tsunami, it is a huge danger and loss for the economy."

Participating countries included Jamaica, Barbados and Central American nations.

Although most tsunamis occur in the Pacific Ocean, experts estimate there have been around 105 tsunamis in the Caribbean and surrounding areas in the last 500 years, including one in Panama in 1882, causing more than 4,500 deaths.

It was not clear where the warning center would be located. Barbados, Puerto Rico and Venezuela were named as possible hosts by sources familiar with the discussions.

The center's $250,000 annual budget is expected to be met by national governments, France and the United States -- who sent representatives to this week's meeting -- and the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

Novartis sued in Calif. over kids' cough medicine

2008-03-14T03:15:00.000-07:00

A California mother has sued drug maker Novartis AG in what the company believes to be the first proposed class action involving its Triaminic children's cough and cold medicines since overdose fears prompted a recall of the drugs.

The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, said several studies have shown deaths and serious injuries linked to over-the-counter children's cold remedies.

A general view shows the headquarters of Novartis in Basel January 17, 2008. (REUTERS/Christian Hartmann)

As a result, Novartis "either knew... or reasonably should have known that their cough and cold products were ineffective and dangerous when used by children under the age of six," the lawsuit said.

A Novartis spokeswoman said the company had not seen the lawsuit and had no comment on it. The company, which recalled Triaminic oral infant cough and cold medicines late last year, said it believed the lawsuit is the first to bring claims involving the drugs.

The lawsuit was brought by Kelly Carter, who dosed her 4-year-old son with Triaminic Daytime Cough & Cold in 2007. It was not immediately clear from the lawsuit whether or how the drug harmed Carter's son. Her attorney could not be reached for comment.

Novartis sells a number of products under the Triaminic brand. The lawsuit alleges that Americans spend more than $2 billion annually on over-the counter cough and cold remedies for children.

In October, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, a trade group representing makers of over-the-counter medicines, said overdoses of oral infant cough and cold medicines have led to death and serious injury in rare instances.

The group stressed that the medications are safe when used as directed.

U.S. Food and Drug Administration reviewers have recommended that over-the-counter cough and cold medicines that contain decongestants and antihistamines should come with new instructions saying they are not for very young children.

According to a recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, over-the-counter cough and cold drugs send an estimated 7,000 U.S. children under the age of 12 to emergency rooms every year, mostly for overdoses.

DEET works by masking body odor from bugs

2008-03-14T03:14:00.000-07:00

The bug repellent DEET works by making mosquitoes and their brethren unable to smell the sweet aroma of human sweat that alerts them that a meal of blood is nearby, scientists said on Thursday.

This knowledge may help guide the creation of new repellents based on the same principle but without possible health worries, they said.

The chemical was first produced by government scientists in 1946 after the jungle warfare of World War II hammered home the need to prevent mosquito and other insect bites. It has been available to the public since 1957.

It is the world's most widely-used topical agent against mosquitoes and other blood-eating insects. It repels mosquitoes which spread malaria, a leading killer in parts of the developing world, as well as ticks which spread Lyme disease. But it does not kill them.

Until now scientists had not grasped exactly how it works.

Mosquitoes are crazy for two human scents: sweaty body odor and the carbon dioxide in breath. They use different receptors in their olfactory system -- the sensing system for smell -- to detect these odors to locate their prey.

"Humans are very smelly, so there's a large number of compounds that attract mosquitoes," Leslie Vosshall, head of Rockefeller University's Laboratory of Neurogenetics and Behavior, said in a telephone interview.

In experiments on mosquitoes and fruit flies, her team determined that DEET serves sort of a chemical cloak, masking certain human odors.

"You become invisible to them," Vosshall said.

The scientists tracked the electrical activity of cells in the mosquito olfactory system while exposing them to DEET. They found that it blocked bugs from smelling body odor but not the carbon dioxide in breath.

Without the scent of body odor, the bugs cannot figure out that a succulent person is nearby, the scientists said.

"Lots of things out in nature will release carbon dioxide -- swamps, for example -- and that's not a good thing to go after if you're a mosquito," said Vosshall, whose findings were published in the journal Science.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said about a third of the U.S. population is expected to use DEET annually. The agency said about 140 products containing DEET are registered with the EPA by about 39 different companies.

A safety review concluded in 1998 that insect repellents containing DEET are not a health threat, but DEET should not be used on children under two months old, the EPA said.

"There are problems with DEET," Vosshall said. "It's oily, it melts plastic, you can't use it on babies, you have to reapply it on every piece of exposed skin frequently. It does actually penetrate your skin and enter your blood stream."

She said there have been rare cases in which people had seizures after putting on too large a dose.

Man sprints onto Heathrow runway in security breach

2008-03-14T03:13:00.000-07:00

A man sprinted onto a runway at London's Heathrow airport on Thursday, the day before Queen Elizabeth was due to open its giant new Terminal Five, in the second major security breach in less than a month.

An aircraft prepares to land at Heathrow airport in London March 11, 2008. A man was arrested on Thursday after running onto a runway at London's Heathrow airport carrying a bag, police said. (REUTERS/Alessia Pierdomenico)

Police arrested the man and blew up his bag in a controlled detonation but found no bomb, a spokeswoman said.

The world's busiest international airport has been the target of protests from environmentalists angered at the opening of the new terminal and plans to boost traffic with the addition of a third runway and a sixth terminal.

"I can confirm that at approximately 2:05 p.m. (1405 GMT) a man was seen airside at Heathrow airport on the northern runway. He's been arrested by police and he's currently in custody," a police spokesman said.

Last month protesters opposing the expansion plans breached the airport's security to unveil a banner on top of a parked passenger jet. Others chained themselves to the roof of parliament. Organisers have threatened more action.

Police declined to speculate on the arrested man's motives.

Television pictures showed several emergency cars with flashing lights parked on the airport runway.

About two hours after the incident airport operator BAA said both runways had reopened.

"Some short delays have occurred but we are expecting to return to normal later this afternoon," said a spokeswoman for BAA, owned by Spanish firm Ferrovial.

A spokesman for Queen Elizabeth said there were no plans to cancel her appearance at Friday's opening ceremony for the new Terminal Five.

"At this stage there's no reason to expect that it will not go ahead as planned," a spokesman for the Queen said.

Security at the airport has also been a high-profile issue since 2006 when British authorities said they had thwarted a plot to smuggle explosives onto trans-Atlantic flights.

"The important thing about the Heathrow incident is that the person was detained, that all the security precautions went quickly into action, that he's now being interviewed and that all possible steps were taken," Prime Minister Gordon Brown told reporters at a European summit in Brussels.

Nazi tanks offered for sale in Bulgaria

2008-03-14T03:12:00.002-07:00

Nazi tanks, half-buried for decades along Bulgaria's south-eastern border as a Cold War defence against a NATO invasion, will be auctioned next week, military officials said on Thursday.

The 97 rusty World War Two relics, which have lain forgotten since communism collapsed in 1989, came into the spotlight in December when police arrested thieves who stole a rare model and reportedly smuggling it into Germany.

The theft prompted a recovery operation to save the remaining machines, some of which will go to the national military history museum, while others will be sold at auction. The first auction is due on March 19.

"There is a huge collector interest," General Boiko Arabadzhiiski, head of logistic unit at the Bulgarian chief of staff told a news conference.

The price of a full-set German tank could reach millions of euros, officials said.

Several year ago, a Russian collector offered to buy a German Panzer IV tank from the museum for 4 million levs ($3.19 million), the museum deputy director Boiko Milenov said.

Hundreds of private collectors and some foreign museums have bought documents to take part in next week's auction, which will offer recovered parts of six German T3 and T4 tanks.

The defence ministry has so far recovered 55 German tanks, some of which will be sold at a second auction in late May.

Bulgaria, which joined NATO in 2004, received over 200 tanks, tank destroyers and heavy assault guns by the Nazis during the World War Two. The Balkan country smelted down some tanks after the war.

But the communist regime that took over in 1944 and was a member of the now dissolved Warsaw Pact, intentionally half-buried 75 along the border with Turkey, which was a member of the rival NATO military alliance.

A second line of defence of some 170 Soviet T-34 tanks was later added in the 1970s.

Looters have badly damaged and stripped bare many of the forgotten tanks. Local media have said the one which was stolen last year was reportedly a present from Adolf Hitler to Bulgaria's former queen, Joanna.

Police arrested two Germans and one Bulgarian army officer for the theft.

U.S. father-daughter duo charged in $70 mln fraud

2008-03-14T03:12:00.001-07:00

A father-and-daughter team accused of duping 15,000 mainly elderly British investors out of $70 million was arrested in Florida on Thursday and charged with a series of crimes, U.S. officials said.

Paul Robert Gunter, 58, of Odessa, Florida, and Zibiah Joy Gunter, 25, of Oldsmar, Florida, are suspected of hijacking the identities of dormant, publicly traded companies and selling fake stock in them to clients in Britain through high-pressure and misleading sales techniques.

The duo persuaded their victims to transfer more than $70 million into their bank accounts in Florida and elsewhere, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency said in a statement.

"This is part of an ongoing investigation into a mass marketing crime scam known as boiler room fraud," said Deputy Chief Inspector Robert Wishart, head of the Money Laundering Unit at the City of London Police.

"Thousands of British people have fallen victim to this crime -- in this inquiry alone, we estimate that around 15,000 mostly elderly people have lost money," Wishart said in the statement issued by ICE.

Gunter and his daughter were charged with conspiring to commit and committing mail fraud, wire fraud, securities fraud, and money laundering.

The charges carry maximum penalties of five to 25 years in prison. The money laundering charge also carries a fine of twice the total gain to the defendants, or twice the total loss to victims, whichever is larger.

U.S. soldiers, militia exchange fire in south Iraq

2008-03-14T03:09:00.000-07:00

Fighters from the Shi'ite Mehdi Army and U.S. soldiers exchanged rocket and mortar fire on Thursday, threatening a ceasefire declared by the militia's leader, the anti-U.S. cleric Moqtada al Sadr.

A demonstrator chants slogans as he holds an image of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr during a protest in Baghdad's Sadr City in this February 22, 2008 file photo. Fighters from the Shi'ite Mehdi Army and U.S. soldiers exchanged rocket and mortar fire on Thursday, threatening a ceasefire declared by the militia's leader, Sadr. (REUTERS/Kareem Raheem)

Sadr, whose militia fought two battles against U.S. forces in southern Iraq in 2004, extended a ceasefire last month, but at the weekend issued a statement telling followers they could defend themselves if attacked.

The ceasefire has been praised by U.S. commanders for reducing violence, with attacks across Iraq down by 60 percent since last June. But U.S. forces are stretched thin by an increase in attacks in Baghdad and northern Iraq since January.

There were no reports of clashes involving Mehdi Army fighters elsewhere in Iraq, suggesting the Kut exchanges were isolated to that city.

An Iraqi police official, who asked not to be identified, said as many as 11 Katyusha rockets landed on the U.S. base near Kut, 170 km southeast of Baghdad late on Wednesday.

Police described the attackers as gunmen but residents said they were Mehdi Army fighters.

Two Iraqi men, who police and witnesses said were brothers, were killed and four others, including a 6-year-old girl, were wounded when U.S. soldiers fired mortar rounds after the rocket attack, the police official said.

A U.S. military spokeswoman said the Americans responded after four rockets were fired at the base. She had no information about civilian casualties but said no U.S. soldiers were hurt in the exchange.

Iraqi police said the rockets were fired from Kut's Shuhada district, one of four Mehdi Army strongholds raided by Iraqi police on Wednesday, a day after Sadr's militia clashed with security forces.

A Reuters witness saw police checkpoints set up at intersections around Shuhada on Thursday but there was no sign of gunmen or clashes.

Luwaa Sumaisem, a senior Sadrist member in the holy Shi'ite city of Najaf, said the clashes began on Tuesday after a disagreement between Iraqi security forces and a group of mourners, some of whom were Mehdi Army members.

"This dispute developed into clashes. We call on all the parties to calm down and keep the situation in Kut stable," Sumaisem told Reuters by telephone.

VIOLATIONS

There had been no major violations of the ceasefire until fighting erupted on Tuesday.

Hussein al-Quraishi, a Kut police lieutenant who identified himself as the uncle of the two brothers who were killed, said he saw two men in a pick-up truck and two on motorcycles launch six rockets from a field near his house towards the U.S. base.

He said mortar rounds landed on four houses about 30 minutes later, his brother's house collapsing.

"If the gunmen want to fight, there is the American base, let them go there and fight," Quraishi said as he wiped tears from his eyes with his shirt sleeves. "What is our fault? Our children are horrified. My brother's sons were killed."

Newly married Hussein Kareem said he, his wife and parents rushed from their house after the first explosions. He said a mortar round later crashed through his bedroom roof.

"How can I rebuild my house? Who will compensate me? The government or the gunmen?" Kareem said.

Kut's police chief said on Wednesday 11 people were killed in Tuesday's gun battles, in which U.S. special forces called in air strikes after Iraqi authorities asked for help.

In Diyala province north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said soldiers accidentally shot dead a young girl.

The killing of Iraqi civilians has long put a strain on relations between Baghdad and Washington, who this week began talks on future relations and the presence of U.S. troops after the current U.N. mandate expires at the end of this year.

Boy, 11, missing since Sunday

2008-03-14T03:06:00.000-07:00

An 11-year-boy, Muhammad Asmawi Jalaludin (pic) went missing from Kampung Kerinchi on Sunday and his mother and six siblings are pining for his return.

Asmawi was last seen playing with his friends at one of the blocks of Kerinchi flats located about 200m from his house at about 5pm.

Brickfields acting OCPD Supt Azri Abdul Rahman said yesterday that the boy would usually play video games at the nearby premises with his friends.

He said Asmawi’s friends claimed that the Petaling Jaya SRK La Salle pupil had gone home at 6.30pm on Sunday.

“The boy was last seen in Mid Valley by his friends. We are scrutinising the CCTV clips in the shopping complex to find out if he was there,” Supt Azri said.

He said Asmawi’s mother, Rozita Abu Hassan, 50, had received an SMS demanding ransom. Police have identified the sender of the SMS but have yet to track him down.

Rozita, a single mother of seven, said: “Usually Asmawi goes cycling and plays football in the evening and would be back by 5pm.”

She said when her youngest son failed to come home, she searched the area until 9pm.

“I felt very worried for his safety so I lodged a report at the Kerinchi police station,” said the stall operator.

“It has now been four days. I just wish that my son is back home with us, safe and sound.”

Anyone with information on Asmawi’s disappearance can contact the Rakan COP hotline at 03-2115 9999 or SMS to 32728 or call Rozita at 019-255 0279.

Democrat Obama beats Clinton in Mississippi

2008-03-11T20:44:00.000-07:00

Democrat Barack Obama easily beat rival Hillary Clinton in Mississippi on Tuesday, giving him new momentum in their heated presidential fight as they head to the next showdown in Pennsylvania in six weeks.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) answers questions during a campaign stop at the Gamesa Wind Corporation in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania, March 11, 2008. (REUTERS/Keith Bedford)

Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, rode a wave of heavy black support to victory and extended his lead over Clinton in pledged delegates to the August nominating convention. The Illinois senator also won on Saturday in Wyoming.

Clinton revived her hopes in the Democratic race last week by beating Obama in primaries in Ohio and Texas, prolonging their bitter Democratic fight for the right to face Republican John McCain in November's presidential election.

"What we have tried to do is steadily make sure that in each state we are making the case about the need for change in this country, and obviously the people of Mississippi responded," Obama said in an interview on CNN.

Clinton did not speak publicly after the result, but her campaign manager, Maggie Williams, released a statement thanking the New York senator's supporters in Mississippi.

"Now we look forward to campaigning in Pennsylvania and around the country as this campaign continues," Williams said.

Both candidates were already in Pennsylvania on Tuesday, looking ahead to its April 22 contest that has 158 delegates at stake -- the biggest single-state haul remaining in the race for the nomination.

While voters in Mississippi were still casting their ballots, racial remarks about Obama by a prominent Clinton supporter sparked a harsh exchange between the two camps.

"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position," Geraldine Ferraro, the Democratic vice presidential candidate in 1984 and the only woman ever nominated by a major party for either of the top two U.S. political offices, told a California newspaper.

"And if he was a woman he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept," Ferraro said.

Clinton said she did not agree with the comments and called them "regrettable," but the Obama camp accused her of a double standard for refusing to rebuke Ferraro and remove her from her finance position with the campaign.

Obama's top foreign policy adviser resigned last week after telling a British newspaper Clinton was "a monster."

"I don't think Geraldine Ferraro's comments have any place in our politics or in the Democratic Party. They are divisive," Obama told a Pennsylvania newspaper.

"I would expect that the same way those comments don't have a place in my campaign they shouldn't have a place in Senator Clinton's either," he said.

VOTER BLOCS

Exit polls in Mississippi showed Obama won about 90 percent of black voters, who were expected to make up about half of the state's Democratic primary electorate, and continued to hold big leads among young voters.

Clinton, a New York senator and former first lady, retained her advantage with older voters, exit polls showed. The two candidates have developed consistent bases of support within the Democratic Party.

Obama's win in Mississippi will add to his nearly insurmountable lead over Clinton in the pledged delegates who will help decide the nominee. Mississippi has 33 pledged delegates at stake.

But neither Obama nor Clinton is likely to reach the 2,025 delegates needed to clinch the nomination without help from nearly 800 "superdelegates" -- party officials and insiders free to back any candidate.

The states of Michigan and Florida, which were stripped of their delegates in a dispute with the national party and held unsanctioned contests won by Clinton, also could figure in a final resolution of the tight race.

Officials in both states have discussed redoing their contests so they would produce delegates to the convention, but the candidates, the state parties and national party would have to agree on the timing, funding and formats.

Clinton, who has repeatedly criticized Obama for failing to live up to his rhetoric, told supporters in Pennsylvania her rival's promises were not matched by his actions.

"My opponent is here in Pennsylvania talking about energy policy and I think specifically about wind energy and that's great," Clinton said.

"Except in 2005, when we had a chance to say 'no' to Dick Cheney and his energy bill, my opponent said 'yes' and voted for it with all of those tax subsidies," she said.

NY Republicans threaten to impeach Gov. Spitzer

2008-03-11T20:43:00.002-07:00

New York state Republicans threatened on Tuesday to impeach Gov. Eliot Spitzer if he does not quit over a sex scandal that has raised questions over whether he could face criminal charges.

New York Governor Eliot Spitzer addresses the media with his wife Silda Wall Spitzer at his office in New York, March 10, 2008. (REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton)

The threat added to pressure on Spitzer, a Democrat and former state chief prosecutor who made his name fighting white-collar crime on Wall Street, to step down after a report that he hired a high-priced prostitute.

Local media cited sources saying Spitzer, 48 and married with three daughters, may resign as early as Wednesday.

"If he does not resign within the next 24 to 48 hours, we will prepare articles of impeachment to remove him," said James Tedisco, leader of the Republicans in the state Assembly.

"We need a leader in place that has the support of people on both sides of the aisle," Tedisco said.

Democrats hold a majority in the Assembly, and such a move toward ousting the governor would need some Democrats to vote with Republicans to produce the required majority vote.

The scandal broke publicly after The New York Times said on Monday that the governor hired a $1,000-an-hour prostitute and was caught on a federal wiretap at least six times on Feb. 12 and 13 arranging to meet with her at a Washington hotel.

Spitzer apologized on Monday for what he described as a "private matter" but said nothing about resigning.

He neither confirmed nor denied the report.

Unidentified sources told New York's Newsday newspaper that Spitzer had as many as seven or eight liaisons over the last several years with prostitutes supplied by an international call girl ring based in New Jersey. For each encounter, Spitzer paid several thousand dollars, the sources told the newspaper.

Spitzer, once viewed as a rising star in the Democratic Party, spent the day at his Manhattan home with the media camped outside.

Despite the pressure to resign, Spitzer was undecided, a senior aide to the governor told the New York Sun newspaper.

"He has not made up his mind," Lloyd Constantine, the adviser, was quoted as saying. "It is more correct to say that he is not resigning."

Another source told the Sun Spitzer was trying to reach a deal with prosecutors over possible criminal charges.

Lt. Gov. David A. Paterson, who would assume the state's top post if Spitzer resigned, told The New York Times he had not spoken to Spitzer since Monday.

"The governor called me yesterday, he said he didn't resign for a number of reasons, and he didn't go into the reasons, and that's the last I've heard from him," he was quoted as saying.

FINANCIAL TRANSACTIONS

The Times, citing unidentified law enforcement officials, reported the investigation began last year during an IRS review of suspicious financial transactions as reported by banks.

"The payments were made over a period of several months in a way that investigators believe was intended to conceal their purpose and source, which could amount to a crime called structuring," punishable by up to five years in prison, the Times said.

Spitzer was elected with nearly 70 percent of the vote in 2006 following a stint as state attorney general -- when he conducted investigations into financial cases that attracted much publicity but also resentment on Wall Street.

The Wall Street Journal said Spitzer had shown a lack of restraint in overly aggressive tactics as attorney general.

"The stupendously deluded belief that the sitting Governor of New York could purchase the services of prostitutes was merely the last act of a man unable to admit either the existence of, or need for, limits," it said in an editorial.

At the heart of the scandal is a criminal complaint unveiled last week charging four people with running a prostitution ring dubbed The Emperors Club. Two of the four suspects are in custody and two are out on bail.

Prostitution is illegal in most U.S. states, but clients of prostitutes are rarely charged. This case is in the hands of federal, not state, authorities.

The Times said Spitzer was an individual identified as Client 9 in court papers filed last week. Client 9 arranged to meet with "Kristen," a prostitute who charged $1,000 an hour, on Feb. 13 in a Washington hotel and paid her $4,300, according to the court documents.

Obama plans hands-on Mideast role - advisers

2008-03-11T20:43:00.001-07:00

Barack Obama will take a hands-on approach to Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking if elected U.S. president but without pressuring Israel any more than his rivals for the White House, advisers say.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) speaks during a campaign stop at the Gamesa Wind Corporation in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania, March 11, 2008. (REUTERS/Keith Bedford)

Obama's advisers assail U.S. President George W. Bush for taking a low-profile approach during the first seven years in office and for not following up more vigorously on the Annapolis peace summit he launched in November.

"What is true is that (Obama) is undeniably and openly committed to putting his own presidential power in the service of trying to help the Israelis achieve a two-state solution with the Palestinians," said a close Obama adviser who was not authorized by the campaign to speak for attribution.

"That doesn't equate to pressure. It does equate to a sustained commitment."

To highlight his engagement on the issue, Obama's campaign issued a statement on Tuesday summarizing a phone conversation he had earlier with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni in which he reiterated backing of Israel's right to defend itself as well as support for the peace talks.

But the Democrat, who would be the first black American president if elected in November, has yet to fully outline a detailed approach to Middle East peacemaking. He has vowed not to change the unflinching support of Israel that is a cornerstone of U.S. Middle East policy.

Critics have raised doubts about his commitment to the Jewish state, floating rumors that Obama is a Muslim and linking him to Louis Farrakhan, a U.S. political figure known for his anti-Israel rhetoric.

Obama is a Christian and has denounced Farrakhan. His campaign is upset by what they see as scurrilous attacks by those seeking to erode his support with U.S. Jewish voters.

CRITICISM

Some foreign policy conservatives have openly questioned Obama's approach on the Middle East, criticizing his call for direct talks with U.S. foes like Iran and suggesting he would be more inclined than other presidential candidates to pressure Israel to make concessions toward the Palestinians.

"There is no evidence to that," said Daniel Kurtzer, former ambassador to Israel and Egypt, recently recruited to advise Obama on the Middle East and reach out to Jewish voters.

The senior adviser said Obama is highly sensitive to the dilemma many Israelis face, on the one hand wanting peace but worrying about the ability of divided Palestinians to follow through on promises made in talks.

"The Israelis have every reason to be cautious and skeptical as they evaluate whether they have a Palestinian partner that is not only committed to peace but also capable of delivering on that," the adviser said.

Rep. Robert Wexler, a Florida Democrat who the senator consults on Middle East issues said, "Senator Obama believes that the next president of the United States must be significantly engaged in creating the dynamic to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." But he added that does not entail pressuring the Israelis to make concessions "they would otherwise not consider."

In the Arab world, where many view U.S. policy as biased toward Israel, there is intense interest in whether Obama's approach to the Middle East would be different.

Some Muslim commentators closely following the U.S. election find little sign of that in his rhetoric or Senate record, which includes his co-sponsorship of a resolution during the 2006 Lebanon war that strongly backed Israel's right to defend itself. Hussain Abdul-Hussain, a U.S.-based journalist for the Daily Star of Lebanon wrote: "Even from a Lebanese viewpoint, there is no reason to believe that Obama would be better than Bush on Israel."

HAMAS

While in sync with Bush's policy of championing Israel's right to defend itself, Obama also backs the administration's policy of shunning the militant group Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip last June, in favor of talks with rival Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Obama is facing greater difficulty in defining for voters his views on the Middle East than is New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, his rival for the Democratic nomination and a former first lady, or Arizona Sen. John McCain, the Republican nominee who has been a prominent voice on foreign policy for years.

On Israel, McCain is likely to be as staunch an ally as fellow Republican Bush. Clinton benefits from the reputation that her husband, Bill Clinton, had of rock-solid support for the Jewish state.

In trying to make his views known, Obama a year ago gave a speech to AIPAC, the Washington-based pro-Israel lobbying group, and recounted a 2006 trip to Israel.

Achieving peace in the Middle East will require the lifting of heavy stones by the United States and Israel, he said.

But Obama added that any effort to reach a two-state solution "begins with a clear and strong commitment to the security of Israel: our strongest ally in the region and its only established democracy. That will always be my starting point."