Victims of Costa shipwreck mark anniversary

GIGLIO, Italy (AP) — Survivors of the Costa Concordia shipwreck and relatives of the 32 people who died marked the first anniversary of the grounding Sunday with the unveiling of memorials to the victims, a tearful Mass in their honor and a minute of silence to recall the exact moment that the cruise ship rammed into a reef off Tuscany.
One of the most moving tributes came first, with the daybreak return to the sea of part of the massive rock that tore a 70-meter (230-foot) gash into the hull of the ocean liner on Jan. 13, 2012, when the captain took it off course in a stunt. The boulder remained embedded in the mangled steel as the 112,000-ton vessel capsized off Giglio island along with its 4,200 passengers and crew.
As fog horns and sirens wailed, a crane on a tug lowered the boulder back onto the reef off Giglio where it belonged, returning it to the seabed affixed with a memorial plaque. Relatives of the dead threw flowers into the sea and embraced as they watched the ceremony from a special ferry that bobbed in the waves under a gray sky.
They wept during the Mass and ran their fingers over the names of the 32 dead that were engraved on a bronze plaque unveiled at the end of Giglio's jetty, near where the Concordia still lays on its side. And later, under a cold rain, they gathered on the jetty holding candles to observe a moment of silence at 9:45 p.m., the exact moment when the Concordia slammed into the reef after Capt. Francesco Schettino took it off its pre-programmed course and brought it closer to Giglio as a favor to friends from the island.
While many tears were shed Sunday, relatives also seemed to have found some comfort in coming to the tiny fishing island of Giglio, where residents opened their homes and hearts to the survivors that frigid night.
"Having the possibility to see everything, we can accept it a bit more, but there is still a long way to overcome this loss, especially for my mother who suffered a lot for her son," said Madeleine Costilla Mendoza, whose brother Tomas Alberto Costilla Mendoza of Peru was a steward on the ship.
Schettino is accused of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and leaving the ship before all passengers were evacuated. He hasn't been charged but is living under court-ordered restrictions pending a decision on whether to indict him. Schettino maintains he saved lives by bringing the ship closer to shore rather than letting it sink in the open sea, and claims the reef he hit wasn't on his nautical charts.
In an interview broadcast Sunday with RAI state television, Schettino again defended his actions and blamed others on the bridge for failing to inform him of the situation in time, and then of botching his orders once he tried to steer clear of the reef.
He said he wanted to "share in the pain of all the victims and the families of the victims."
At Schettino's home in Meta di Sorrento, on the Gulf of Naples, no one answered the doorbell Sunday and the window shutters were closed.
Taking part in the anniversary commemoration was Capt. Gregorio De Falco of the Italian coast guard, who became something of a hero to survivors after his recorded conversations with Schettino during the evacuation were made public. In them, De Falco excoriated Schettino for having abandoned the ship before all passengers were off and ordered him to return, shouting the now-infamous order "Go on board (expletive)!"
De Falco said he wanted to go to Giglio to "embrace the victims, and the relatives of the victims." De Falco said he has shied from media attention since the disaster out of respect for the victims.
"I'm not a hero," he told reporters in Giglio on Sunday. "I just did my job."
The 32 people who died included 12 Germans, seven Italians, six French nationals, two Americans — Barbara and Gerald Heil of White Bear Lake, Minnesota — two Peruvian crew members, one Hungarian, one Spaniard and an Indian.
Indian waiter Russel Rebello was one of the two victims whose bodies were never recovered. Kevin Rebello, his brother, spent weeks on Giglio in the aftermath of the disaster awaiting word of the fate of his sibling and said he couldn't sleep ahead of Sunday's anniversary.
"I have been constantly thinking it is going to be again the same agony, even tonight, because it is going to be the same exact moment when all this happened," he told The Associated Press on Sunday. "So my heart is beating a bit faster I guess."
Elio Vincenzi, the husband of Maria Grazia Trecarichi of Italy, whose body also was never recovered, wept as he presented a ceramic statue of the Madonna to Giglio's mayor as a gesture of thanks during a ceremony honoring the coast guard, firemen and other rescue crews.
The Concordia remains on its side, grounded off Giglio's port. Officials now say it may take until September to prepare the ship to be rolled upright and towed from the rocks to a port to be dismantled — an operation on a scale that has never before been attempted. The cost has swelled to €400 million ($530 million).
While Sunday's commemoration was focused on the relatives of those who died, Giglio's residents were also being remembered for having opened their doors to the survivors who came ashore that night, cold, wet and traumatized after a chaotic evacuation.
Italian President Giorgio Napolitano sent a message of thanks to the island, praising its people for their "high sense of civic duty and humanity."
"It was something that was too big for us," said Giglio resident Silvana Anichini. "We are just not used to things like this, and then it turned out to be one of the biggest shipwrecks in the world."
Many survivors have stayed in touch with their Giglio hosts, connected in ways they never expected. Claudia Urru, who stayed home in Sardinia on the anniversary, says she speaks monthly with the Giglio family that took in her family and two other families that night. The hosts gave the survivors warm clothes and food.
For Christmas, her Giglio family sent a package of local sweets, and they have discussed having a reunion in Sardinia.
"This is the only thing good that has come of it," Urru said by phone last week.

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Politicians slam "extremely generous" wind power cable scheme

LONDON (Reuters) - A new system devised to attract investors to spending money on connecting Britain's offshore wind farms is too generous and does not offer a good deal for consumers, a parliamentary committee said on Monday.
The government wants a huge fleet of offshore wind farms to produce between 8 percent and 15 percent of Britain's electricity by 2020 to reduce carbon emissions.
All wind farms built at sea need to be connected to the onshore grid by expensive subsea cables.
To ensure that the transmission cables are built, energy regulator Ofgem and the government's Department of Energy and Climate Change have put in place a licence tender system whereby investors receive returns of 10-11 percent.
The Committee of Public Accounts, however, was critical of the system and described it as "extremely generous".
"Not only is it unlikely that this new licensing system for bringing electricity from offshore wind farms onto the national grid will deliver any savings for consumers, it could well lead to higher prices," committee chairwoman Margaret Hodge said.
Licencees will receive a total of about 17 billion pounds through the system, a cost that will eventually be passed on to consumers through electricity bills.
The committee interviewed representatives from the government, the regulator and the electricity industry to assess the new regime.
"We have not seen convincing evidence to show that there will be savings for consumers from this scheme compared with potential alternatives," the committee said.
The politicians recommended that the regulator should consider imposing a system linked to retail prices and to request that investors disclose actual returns they make from operating the cables.
The committee said that the government and regulator should also analyse whether 20 years of guaranteed income is beneficial or whether shorter licence periods are necessary.
It was also concerned about competition in the offshore wind transmission market because four out of six licences that have already been issued were won by one company, Transmission Capital Partners.
"The department and the authority (regulator) must also ensure that the offshore electricity transmission market remains competitive and does not become an oligopoly," the committee said.

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Somali witnesses to failed rescue describe mayhem

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — The night of mayhem and death started with the sound of helicopters above pitch-black fields. When it was over, the French intelligence agent who had been held hostage for more than three years was almost certainly dead, as was at least one French commando, and the home that served as the agent's final jail was destroyed. And now the Somalis living in the muddy farm town had new cause to fear the militants controlling their street.
It was too dark to see beyond the brief glow of flashlights, but noise was everywhere, said Ali Bulhan, who woke up when the earth started vibrating to the beat of the helicopter rotors. And the flashlights were abruptly extinguished when the French soldiers shot the Somalis who had turned them on to see what was happening in their town in the dead of night, said town elder Hussein Yasin.
The commandos were there to free a French intelligence agent captured on Bastille Day in 2009. The man, known by his code-name Denis Allex, was chained up, abused and moved from one safe house to another, French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Sunday. Le Drian said the government decided to stage the rescue a month ago, when Allex's location seemed to have settled down "in a spot accessible by the sea."
Helicopters were dispatched from a French ship that had been on an enforced news blackout for weeks, according to the French newspaper Le Point. When the commandos arrived in Bulomarer late Friday, children began screaming in confusion and fighters from the Islamist al-Shabab, which has controlled the town for years, began racing along the streets, their cell phones pressed to their ears.
"They had a terrible night as well," said Ali Bulhan, who refused to give his last name for fear of reprisal.
President Barack Obama said Sunday that the U.S. military provided "imited technical support" to French forces leading the operation, but the Americans had no direct role in the assault on the al-Shabab compound. Obama disclosed the U.S. role Sunday in a letter alerting Congress about the deployment of U.S. forces.
Obama said U.S. combat aircraft briefly entered Somali airspace to support the rescue operation, if needed, but did not employ their weapons during the operation. The president said he directed U.S. forces to support the French rescue operation "in furtherance of U.S. national security interests."
The local accounts, along with that of a Somali intelligence official and the French defense minister, offer a glimpse into a chaotic rescue attempt in which nothing seemed to go as planned.
"Extracting a hostage is extremely difficult," Le Drian said.
Yasin said the gunbattle started on the ground when the French commandos encountered an Islamist checkpoint. Al Bulhan said only a few hours could have passed between that moment and the time when the French helicopters stopped firing on homes and instead ferried the surviving French troops to safety "but it felt like an entire day."
French officials, including the president, and a Somali intelligence official said Allex was almost certainly killed by his captors. The intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not permitted to speak to the press, said Sunday that the home where the agent was held was destroyed in the attack Saturday, and that intelligence networks "do not have any information indicating he is still alive."
Al-Shabab has offered no proof for its claims that Allex was still alive and that a wounded French soldier was in its custody as well. French officials acknowledge a missing soldier, but say they believe he is dead.
"Bullets rattled every corner," Ali Bulhan said. "Helicopters were firing at nearby homes."
The fighting took an even steeper toll on the Islamists, according to French officials and locals. Ali Bulhan said he thought the fighters had already taken away the bodies of their comrades. French officials said they counted 17 dead among the Islamists.
After the sounds of battle faded and the helicopters were gone, frightened al-Shabab fighters locked down the town, added checkpoints, arrested junior commanders for fear someone had tipped off the French forces, and seized cell phones of residents, Ali Bulhan said.
"I was told that the dead French soldier was hiding and was shot after he turned on a flashlight," he said. He did not know when, but later saw the body of a European being dragged into a car.
Businesses shut down for the day Sunday.
"It was a burial day for the fighters," Ali Bulhan said, "and a deadly day for the French as well."

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Pope makes longtime aide a bishop in St. Peter's

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI has rewarded his longtime loyal secretary by making him a bishop in an elaborate ceremony in St. Peter's Basilica.
The pontiff and Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, a fellow German, embraced warmly. Benedict, 85, held up well during the nearly three-hour long service Sunday, which also marked Epiphany, a Catholic feast day.
Gaenswein, 56, has been Benedict's closest aide for years, and helped steer the papal household through an embarrassing scandal of leaked documents last year. A Vatican court convicted the pope's former butler, Paolo Gabriele, of stealing the documents from the papal apartment. Benedict has since pardoned him.

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Orthodox believers celebrate Epiphany with icy dip

SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — Thousands of young men are plunging into icy rivers and lakes across Bulgaria and Romania to retrieve crucifixes cast by priests in an old ritual marking the feast of Epiphany.
By tradition, a wooden cross is cast into the water and it is believed that the person who retrieves it will be freed from evil spirits.
In the central Bulgarian city of Kalofer, 350 men in traditional dress waded into the icy Tundzha River with national flags. Led by the town's mayor and encouraged by a folk orchestra and homemade plum brandy, they dance and stomp in the rocky riverbed.
In the Romanian Black Sea port of Constanta, some 3,000 Orthodox believers turned out to watch priests hurl three crosses into the icy sea. Dozens— some wearing diving suits— dived into the waters to retrieve the crosses.

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Cameron plays down status of top credit rating

LONDON (Reuters) - Prime Minister David Cameron said the credibility of his deficit-cutting policy was more important than the judgment of credit rating agencies, as the threat of third recession since the financial crisis looms.
Britain has held onto its top triple-A credit rating while the United States and France have suffered downgrades, but that endorsement has looked increasingly shaky as the economic outlook darkens.
A loss of the rating would be a blow to Cameron and his Conservative-led coalition, which has staked its political reputation on maintaining the top rating and nursing Britain's economy back to health by cutting its deficit.
Cameron told BBC television on Sunday the opinion of the international debt markets was more significant than a credit rating.
"What matters most of all is are you able to pay your debts, maintain your debts at a low rate of interest," he said.
"The ratings you have are all hugely important, but in a way the real test is, what are the interest rates the rest of the world is demanding in order to own your debt."
Ministers have been increasingly playing down the significance of credit ratings as the economy struggles and the crisis in the euro zone, Britain's largest trading partner, reduces the near term prospects for growth.
Cameron said the key to keeping the faith of financial markets was the government's programme of cutting state spending to bring its deficit under control.
"You can only keep your interest rates low if you have a credible strategy for getting on top of your deficit and getting on top of your debt," he said.
Britain has seen the interest rate on its government debt fall to extremely low levels, thanks in part to the Bank of England buying 375 billion pounds of the debt, while rates have soared in euro zone countries like Greece, Spain and Portugal.
Cameron said it was important the Bank kept interest rates low to help companies expand and help the housing market, but dismissed a suggestion that the bank's incoming head Mark Carney had been hired to inject a dose of inflation into the economy.
"Right now Britain needs low interest rates because we need businesses to get out there and invest. It lets people get onto the housing ladder. So we want to maintain a situation where low interest rates are possible," he said.
Data on Friday suggested Britain's economy may have shrunk in late 2012, raising the chances of the country sinking back into its third recession since the 2008-09 financial crisis.
Last month rating agency Fitch said Britain's credibility had been damaged by government forecasts that it would not meet a key debt reduction target, and said it would review its triple-A rating later in 2013.

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Richardson: NKorea trip is private, humanitarian

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson says the State Department should not be nervous about a visit he's making to North Korea with Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt.
The State Department has advised against his making the trip. But Richardson says he doesn't work for the U.S. government.
Richardson said Friday he's concerned about an American citizen detained in North Korea, Kenneth Bae, and has spoken to Bae's son. The former U.N. ambassador and U.S. energy secretary points out he has helped negotiate the release of American service members and hostages in the past. Richardson says he's also concerned about what the U.S. believes is covert nuclear testing.
Richardson tells CBS "This Morning" it's a private, humanitarian mission and says the State Department shouldn't be so worried.

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Abbas sees Palestinian unity as Fatah rallies in Gaza

GAZA (Reuters) - President Mahmoud Abbas predicted the end of a five-year split between the two big Palestinian factions as his Fatah movement staged its first mass rally in Gaza with the blessing of Hamas Islamists who rule the enclave.
"Soon we will regain our unity," Abbas, whose authority has been limited to the Israeli-occupied West Bank since the 2007 civil war between the two factions, said in a televised address to hundreds of thousands of followers marching in Gaza on Friday, with yellow Fatah flags instead of the green of Hamas.
The hardline Hamas movement, which does not recognize Israel's right to exist, expelled secular Fatah from Gaza during the war. It gave permission for the rally after the deadlock in peace talks between Abbas's administration and Israel narrowed the two factions' ideological differences.
The Palestinian rivals have drawn closer since Israel's assault on Gaza assault in November, in which Hamas, though battered, claimed victory.
Egypt has long tried to broker Hamas-Fatah reconciliation, but past efforts have foundered over questions of power-sharing, control of weaponry, and to what extent Israel and other powers would accept a Palestinian administration including Hamas.
An Egyptian official told Reuters Cairo was preparing to invite the factions for new negotiations within two weeks.
Israel fears grassroots support for Hamas could eventually topple Abbas's Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank.
"Hamas could seize control of the PA any day," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday.
The demonstration marked 48 years since Fatah's founding as the spearhead of the Palestinians' fight against Israel. Its longtime leader Yasser Arafat signed an interim 1993 peace accord that won Palestinians a measure of self rule.
Hamas, which rejected the 1993 deal, fought and won a Palestinian parliamentary election in 2006. It formed an uneasy coalition with Fatah until their violent split a year later.
Though shunned by the West, Hamas feels bolstered by electoral gains for Islamist movements in neighboring Egypt and elsewhere in the region - a confidence reflected in the fact Friday's Fatah demonstration was allowed to take place.
"The success of the rally is a success for Fatah, and for Hamas too," said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri. "The positive atmosphere is a step on the way to regain national unity."
Fatah, meanwhile, has been riven by dissent about the credibility of Abbas's statesmanship, especially given Israel's continued settlement-building on West Bank land. The Israelis quit Gaza unilaterally in 2005 after 38 years of occupation.
"The message today is that Fatah cannot be wiped out," said Amal Hamad, a member of the group's ruling body, referring to the demonstration attended by several Abbas advisers. "Fatah lives, no one can exclude it and it seeks to end the division."
In his speech, Abbas promised to return to Gaza soon and said Palestinian unification would be "a step on the way to ending the (Israeli) occupation".

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Malala Yousafzai, Pakistani teen shot by Taliban, is released from UK hospital

A daily summary of global reports on security issues.

Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teen who was shot in the head by the Taliban in the fall for promoting girls’ education, was released from a British hospital yesterday.

Malala, who will spend the next few weeks with her family in the UKbefore returning to the hospital for more surgery, quickly became an international symbol of resistance to the Taliban’s efforts to deny women and girls education after the attack last October.

"Malala is a strong young woman and has worked hard with the people caring for her to make excellent progress in her recovery," said Dave Rosser, Queen Elizabeth Hospital's medical director.

15-year-old Malala was targeted in the close-range shooting – which took place on a school bus – because of a blog she wrote for the BBC in Urdu. Her blog, which was nominated for several awards, was written under a pen name, and was highly critical of the Taliban's ban on education for girls in the Swat valley.

According to The Christian Science Monitor, Malala blogged “about her views and about the atrocities of Islamic militias controlling the valley from 2007-2009.” The Taliban’s reign supposedly came to an end there after an Army operation in 2009, reports Agence France-Presse.

Recommended: How much do you know about Pakistan? Take this quiz.

In interviews with Pakistani journalist Owais Tohid, Malala described her blog and motivation:

"I wanted to scream, shout and tell the whole world what we were going through. But it was not possible. The Taliban would have killed me, my father, my whole family. I would have died without leaving any mark. So I chose to write with a different name. And it worked, as my valley has been freed….

"I want to change the political system so there is social justice and equality and change in the status of girls and women. I plan to set up my own academy for girls.…”

The Taliban have bombed more than 1,500 schools since 2008 in the Pakistani province where Malala comes from, according to a separate Monitor story. Under 80 percent of children between the ages of 6 and 16 are enrolled in school across Pakistan, and among those, less than half are girls. Malala’s writing documents the Taliban’s control of the Swat valley, as schools were burned and extreme rules were created and enforced.

"Saturday January 3, 2009: Today our headmistress announced that girls should stop wearing uniform because of Taliban. Come to schools in casual wear. In our class only three out of 27 attended the school. My three friends have quit school because of Taliban threats."

"January 5, 2009: Today our teacher told us not to wear colorful dress that might make Taliban angry."

"Tuesday March 2009: On our way to school, my friend asked me to cover my head properly, otherwise Taliban will punish us."

Malala’s ordeal has inspired people around the world to take action on supporting girls’ education, and her survival has made her a hero to many.

Reuters reports that more than 250,000 people have signed a petition calling for her to receive theNobel Peace Prize, while the United Nations released a plan named after the young woman to motivate girls around the world to enroll in school by the end of 2015. The UN also created a “Malala day” in November to support education for girls, reports the AFP. The Pakistani government even renamed her former school in her honor, reports the Telegraph. The angry reaction to that move, however, highlighted the ongoing fears surrounding the Taliban, as many students worried that any reference to Malala would create additional targets for Taliban violence.

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A current student told the Telegraph, "The militants didn't spare Malala, then how can they be expected to spare a college named after her…. The government should refrain from politicizing our education. We want to pursue our studies in peaceful environments and the new name of our college can bring it into spotlight and Taliban could hit it.”

According to a separate Telegraph report, Malala has said she would like to return home to Pakistanonce she has fully recovered. Officials say, however, that she will remain a target of the Taliban “as long as terrorism threatens the country.”

Malala’s release coincides with the appointment of her father, Ziauddin Yousafzai, as education attaché for the Pakistani consulate in Birmingham, reports Pakistani news outlet The News. “It is widely believed that it was Ziauddin’s own experience of campaigning for education and human rights that originally inspired Malala as her parents encouraged her by every means to be confident and vocal,” The News reports.

Malala was flown to England after an initial surgery removed the bullet – which “grazed” her brain upon entry – in Pakistan last fall. Her next procedure will take place in late January or early February and will focus on the reconstruction of her skull, reports Reuters.

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What does Google want with North Korea?

Google chairman Eric Schmidt plans to visit North Korea as early as next week in what analysts see as part of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s drive to give an appearance of closing the vast digital divide between his isolated country and the rest of the world.
Although Mr. Schmidt is not expected to reach any real deal with the North, his presence there seems to show a desire in North Korea to improve the technological capabilities of people almost totally shut off from the Internet. Schmidt, for his part, has often noted the power of the Internet – and Google – to lift people out of poverty and political oppression.
“In the last few years, Google has met with NGOs that do work with North Korea,” observes David Kang, director of the East Asian Studies Center at the University of Southern California. “This is not a sudden or impulsive visit.”
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Schmidt will be traveling with two figures who have been influential in recent years in developing contacts with North Korea. One of them, Bill Richardson, the former New Mexico governor who served as UN ambassador during the presidency of Bill Clinton, has advocated rapprochement with the North during several visits to Pyongyang.
Key in arranging Schmidt’s visit is assumed to be Richardson’s longtime adviser on North Korea, Tony Namkung, who has visited North Korea more than 40 times during the past 25 years.
Mr. Namkung, born to Korean parents in China and educated in the US, was instrumental in Mr. Clinton’s visit to North Korea in August 2009. That resulted in the release of the journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who had been held for 140 days after their arrest while filming along the North’s Tumen River border with China. He also advised the Associated Press on opening a bureau in Pyongyang.
Schmidt's mission raised the possibility that he might be the type of high-level visitor to whom North Korea might be willing to release another American now in prison in Pyongyang. Kenneth Bae, a human rights activist from Oregon, was charged with "hostile acts" after entering North Korea legally from China as leader of a tour group to the Rason economic zone in the northeast. A devout Christian, he was believed to have been carrying religious material -- strictly forbidden in the North.
There was no doubt, though, that the overall rationale for the visit would be political, diplomatic and economic -- with a view to relations with the US.
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“I don't know for sure,” says Nick Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute, “but it certainly looks as if Google is the ‘dangle’ for the Richardson/Namkung mission to Pyongyang.” Mr. Eberstadt, who has written extensively on North Korea, adds, “What Schmidt/Google stand to achieve is another question altogether, of course.”
Just what’s in the visit for Schmidt is especially puzzling considering that no North Korean can use Google's search engine unless working for a high-level government agency with a need for vital facts and figures.
In addition, Tom Coyner, a longtime business consultant in Seoul, raises another concern: "What could be the long-term implications for Internet freedom of information as central governments become stronger in denying individual rights – including to free access to information."
Victor Cha, who served as director of Asian affairs on the National Security Council during the presidency of George W. Bush, observes that Google withdrew operations from China to Hong Kong in 2010 as a result of Chinese Internet censorship. The problem, he says, “would likely be exponentially worse in North Korea.”
Mr. Cha, in questions and answers posted by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, where he serves as a senior adviser, said that “only about 4,000 North Koreans have access to the Web and under very tightly monitored conditions.”
Kim Jong-un, however, is believed to have played a key role in persuading his father, Kim Jong-il, to accept the inevitability of communication by mobile telephones several years ago. More than 1 million North Koreans now communicate on cellphones through a system set up by Orascom, the Egyptian telecommunications giant, that strictly blocks calls in and out of North Korea.
Thus David Straub, a former senior US diplomat in Seoul, believes that Schmidt may want to "look at what Orascom has done with cell phones in North Korea and thus that Google might be able to do something with the Internet there."
Kim Jong-un “clearly has a penchant for the modern accoutrements of life,” says Mr. Cha. “If Google is the first small step in piercing the information bubble in Pyongyang, it could be a very interesting development.”
Any attempt to formalize a deal between Schmidt and a North Korean state company, however, would run afoul of UN sanctions on doing business with the North. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland says “we don't think the timing of this is particularly helpful,” especially in view of North Korea’s latest launch of a long-range rocket last month, in violation of sanctions.
Still, the State Department can do nothing to block the trip. “They are private citizens,” she says. “They are making their own decision.

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France's Bardot threatens exile over elephants

PARIS (AP) — Sex symbol-turned-animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot is threatening to join actor Gerard Depardieu in Russian exile unless France halts the scheduled euthanasia of two sick circus elephants.
The 1960s screen diva says authorities have ignored her "numerous proposals" to save Baby and Nepal, a pair of 42-year-old elephants dying of tuberculosis at a Lyon zoo.
In a statement on her foundation's website Bardot says that if the elephants are killed she will request Russian citizenship "to flee this country that is now just a graveyard for animals."
This week France was shocked to learn Depardieu, an Academy Award-winner and pillar of French cinema, had received Russian citizenship after he was called "pathetic" by France's prime minister in a bust-up over the country's proposed 75 percent income tax for the superrich.

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In South Korea, Kim Jong-un's New Year speech generates surprise - and doubt

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un signaled his desire for improved relations with South Korea in a New Year’s Day address that South Korean officials see as an unsatisfying attempt to appear conciliatory.
A day after Kim Jong-un stressed the need for resolving North-South confrontation, South Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan responded Wednesday by calling for North Korea to make “wise and right decisions” by coordinating with “neighboring countries.”
Kim’s address was noteworthy for both the absence of the type of recriminations that characterize North Korean rhetoric and also because Kim Jong-un seized the occasion to speak publicly.
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The address, broadcast by North Korean state radio and television, was also noteworthy for another reason: Kim Jong-un’s father, Kim Jong-il, who died in December 2011, never delivered a New Year’s address. His grandfather, “Great Leader” Kim Il-sung, last addressed his nation on New Year’s day in 1994, about six months before his death.
The relative restraint of Kim Jong-un’s remarks – and the fact that he made them in person, not in a written statement in the official North Korean media – strikes analysts as a positive sign despite contrary indications of rising North-South confrontation.
“The language was tempered,” says Mark Fitzpatrick, director of the nonproliferation program at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. “It wasn’t over the top like so much North Korean propaganda.”
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Mr. Kim, in an address that also focused on the economy, called on South Korea’s “antireunification forces” to “abandon their hostile policy against their fellow countrymen” and pursue “national reconciliation, unity, and reunification.”
While those words are staples of North Korean rhetoric, they were bereft of mention of South Korea’s outgoing president, Lee Myung-bak, or the incoming president, Park Geun-hye, the daughter of the long-ruling dictator Park Chung-hee.
North Korea has repeatedly attacked Mr. Lee with vitriolic language, castigating both him and Ms. Park for suggesting the North give up its missile and nuclear programs as a prerequisite for resuming the massive shipments of food and fertilizer sent by the South during the decade of the Sunshine policy from 1998 to 2008.
Kim Jong-un suggested the need to go back to that era by mentioning the joint declarations signed by South Korean presidents during summits with Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang in June 2000 and October 2007. The late Kim Dae-jung pursued the Sunshine policy as president of South Korea from 1998 to 2003, and his successor, Roh Moo-hyun, carried on the policy from 2003 to 2008, at which point the conservative Lee reversed course after a landslide victory over a liberal foe.
Kim Jong-un’s address may hint that North Korea might be willing, in the interest of resumed aid, to concede to South Korean conditions – such as avoiding harsh personal rhetoric, much less threats to attack South Korea in the Yellow Sea, the scene of periodic bloodshed, or across the demilitarized zone that has divided the Koreas since the Korean War ended in an armistice in July 1953.
Nonetheless, South Korean officials did not seem immediately receptive. South Korea’s unification minister, Yoo Woo-ik, described Kim Jong-un’s remarks as “bland” – with “no ground-breaking proposals.”
Mr. Fitzpatrick, a former senior nonproliferation official at the US State Department, cautions against taking Kim Jong-un’s remarks as a sharp shift in North Korean policy. “I didn’t read it as an olive branch,” he says. “I read it as presidential” – a sign that Kim wants to project a statesmanlike image as he enters his second year in power.
Park Geun-hye, while interested in resuming dialogue with North Korea, has said she is willing to authorize “humanitarian” aid to North Korea. She is expected to calibrate humanitarian aid depending on the North’s responses.
Rhetoric on both sides is likely to intensify as South Korea takes a seat this month on the UN Security Council as a nonpermanent member for a two-year term. South Korea has called for strengthening sanctions against the North as punishment for firing a long-range missile last month that put a small satellite into orbit. The Security Council imposed sanctions after the North conducted an underground nuclear test in May 2009, but the North continued to receive food, fuel, and other aid from China.
Fitzpatrick believes increased sanctions may have a negative effect. “There might be a nuclear device tested again,” he warns, noting that North Korea appears to have completed most preparations for its third such test. The North conducted its first nuclear test in October 2006.
Still, he sees Kim Jong-un’s speech as indicating his desire to rein in the North’s military establishment. “Three times he talked about uniting around the Workers’ Party,” he says. “That’s in keeping with the need to rebalance power. The subtext is to obey the party.”

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Mandela's recovery "on track" at home: South African government

 Former South African President Nelson Mandela's recovery is 'on track' at his home in Johannesburg, the government said on Wednesday in its first statement since the anti-apartheid hero was released from hospital a week ago.
Mandela, 94, who has been in frail health for several years, spent nearly three weeks in a Pretoria hospital in December for treatment of a lung infection and surgery to remove gallstones, his longest stay for medical care since his release from prison in 1990.
"Madiba's recovery continues on track," presidency spokesman Mac Maharaj said referring to Mandela by his clan name.
"We are now in the phase where if we do not hear from his doctors, we assume he is all right," he said, without giving details on Mandela's condition.
Mandela has been receiving what the government calls "home-based high care" at his residence in an upscale Johannesburg neighborhood.
Mandela became South Africa's first black president after the first all-race elections in 1994, serving a five-year term.
He has been mostly absent from the political scene for the past several years due to poor health, while questions have been raised as to whether his ruling African National Congress (ANC) has lost the moral compass he left behind.
Under such leaders as Mandela, Walter Sisulu and Oliver Tambo, the ANC gained a stellar global reputation. Once the yoke of apartheid was thrown off, it began ruling South Africa in a blaze of goodwill from world leaders who viewed it as a beacon for a troubled continent and world.
Close to two decades later, this image has dimmed as critics inside and outside the country, and in the movement itself, accuse ANC leaders of indulging in the spoils of office, squandering mineral resources and engaging in power struggles.
Mandela's "Rainbow Nation" of reconciliation has come under strain under President Jacob Zuma, a Zulu traditionalist with a history of racially charged comments, including a statement in December where he reportedly said dog ownership was for whites and not part of African culture.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mandela has a history of lung problems dating back to when he contracted tuberculosis as a political prisoner. He spent 27 years in prison, including 18 years on the windswept Robben Island off Cape Town.
Mandela was also admitted to hospital in February because of abdominal pain but released the following day after a keyhole examination showed there was nothing seriously wrong with him.
He has spent most of his time since then in another home in Qunu, his ancestral village in the impoverished Eastern Cape province.
His poor health has prevented him from making public appearances in the past two years, although he has continued to receive high-profile visitors, including former U.S. President Bill Clinton.

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Italy's Monti fires opening salvo of second-term campaign

 Italy's outgoing Prime Minister Mario Monti pledged to cut labor taxes to fuel growth on Wednesday as he shed his neutral technocrat stance and fired the opening salvo of his campaign for a second term.
The former European Commissioner was appointed in November 2011 to lead an unelected right-left government of experts to save Italy from financial crisis after Silvio Berlusconi quit amid a sex scandal and a crisis that threatened the euro.
Berlusconi's party withdrew its support for Monti in December, and Monti resigned on December 21, about two months earlier than had been planned.
On Friday Monti abandoned his mediator role he played to enter politics in his own right and lead a centrist alliance to fight the February 24-25 parliamentary vote.
The 69-year-old's bloc is now in a three-way race with the Democratic Party (PD) on the left and four-time prime minister Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PDL) on the right - his allies until 12 days ago.
A poll published on Wednesday said Monti's bloc would win 12 percent of the vote, while one published last week said it could gain up to 16 percent, depriving rivals of a clear win, but not enough to govern.
They show the PD and its coalition ally are on track to win the vote, at least in the lower house. Monti repeated on Wednesday that he wanted to form a broad coalition of pro-Europe, pro-reform parties after the election.
To Italians who have borne the brunt of austerity measures he introduced in late 2011 to save Italy from a Greek-style debt crisis, Monti promised to lower labor taxes and "redistribute" wealth from the richest to the poorest if he wins.
"We need to reduce taxes on the labor force, both on workers and companies, by cutting spending," he said in an hour-long interview with state radio.
Monti again ridiculed Berlusconi, saying he was personally "confounded" by his "illogical" swings from praising his government to attacking it.
"I hope voters are less confused than I am," he said. The 76-year-old Berlusconi has attacked Monti, saying he took orders from German Chancellor Angela Merkel, while at the same time offering him the leadership of the center-right.
"Monti is no longer credible," Berlusconi counter-attacked in an interview on SkyTG24. "He broke his word" by entering the election race after promising he would not when he took over as head of a technocrat government, Berlusconi said.
Berlusconi also said that he could cede the premiership to someone else should his bloc win the election, probably as a way of renewing an alliance with the Northern League party.
The Piepoli poll published on Wednesday put Bersani's center-left bloc at more than 40 percent, more than 10 percentage points ahead of the center-right. Without the League, Berlusconi's bloc trails by more than 16 percent.
For the first time, Monti also directly attacked the center-left, saying Pier Luigi Bersani's PD and its SEL ally were too close to labor union positions aimed at protecting jobs and not creating new ones.
BROAD COALITION
The center-left "wants to conserve - for noble reasons and in good faith I'm sure - a crystallized labor market, hyper-protective compared with other countries," Monti said.
Three days after Bersani pressed Monti to say what side of the political spectrum he was on, the former European commissioner responded that he was on the side of those who want to change the country.
"Now we need a new type of government - one that is in favor of reforms and not of conserving the status quo," Monti said. Last week Monti said he wanted to lead a coalition that went beyond the traditional left-right split.
Under the complex electoral law, Bersani's two-party coalition could win a comfortable majority in the lower house without taking a secure command of the Senate, possibly making an alliance with Monti's bloc crucial to creating a stable parliamentary majority.
Pier Ferdinando Casini, leader of Monti's ally the UDC party, said on Wednesday Bersani should not become prime minister if his bloc does not win an outright majority in both houses.
In an interview with newspaper Avvenire, Casini suggested Monti should be given the top job even if his bloc wins fewer votes than Bersani's, an opinion rejected by Bersani's PD.
Monti is the favorite of the markets, the business establishment and the Catholic church, and the PD has said it would continue down the Europe-minded path of Monti's government, though with adjustments to boost growth and jobs.
Monti has helped restore investor confidence in Italy. The key measure of this - the difference in interest rates on Italian 10-year government bonds and safer German Bunds - lay on Wednesday at around half the level it was when he took office.

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After 'peaceful' 2012, Kashmiris urge end to war-time measures

Government tallies in Kashmir find that 2012 was the most peaceful year since an armed rebellion began in the disputed region in 1989. Despite that, no measures have been taken to demilitarize the region or to revoke the draconian laws that provide impunity to paramilitary forces here.
A report released by the Jammu and Kashmir state last week put hard numbers on the widely-observed notion that armed separatism has steadily declined and is nearing extinction. “There have been 33 grenade attacks and IED explosions this year up to November end as compared to 41 last year. 95 people, including 23 civilians, 14 paramilitary forces’ personnel and 58 militants, were killed in 2012. It is much lesser as compared to the year 2011 in which 173 people were killed,” the report said.
The relative peace has brought a revival in tourism to Kashmir, but a political dialogue for resolving Kashmiri aspirations remains moribund. Many residents of the mostly-Muslim Kashmir Valley still express a desire for independence, and India remains wary of lifting its heavy military presence.
“The year 2012 was peaceful if we look at the general change in the atmosphere but despite that nothing happened on demilitarization. The reason for it is that we are still operating under the security paradigm and we have not sufficiently moved away to a political paradigm yet,” says Gul Wani, a political analyst and academic at Kashmir University.
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That security paradigm persists partly out of a sense that the peace here is so fragile that it could be upset by a single incident of violence.
Still, that shouldn't preclude some movement on the political front, Mr. Wani argues. “The security establishment will remain the determining factor but within that the political actors, whether mainstream or separatists, will also continue to ask for liberalizing the civilian space, demilitarization, revocation of some laws."
Kashmiris have been pushing for years for the revocation of two laws in particular; the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) and Public Safety Act (PSA). AFSPA grants broad immunity to Indian forces operating in Kashmir, and the PSA allows for detention without trial for a minimum of six months and maximum of one year.
Also at issue is the heavy presence of military forces and bunkers throughout the state, including roughly 600,000 troops (including paramilitary and police forces), according to the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, a prominent human rights organization.
“The militancy has died down to a trickle; a security review is required that could involve re-deployment of the troops,” agrees Radha Kumar, the director general of the Delhi Policy Group that works on track two diplomacy.
“There is a volatile situation but an uneasy calm. There has been steady decline in militancy. The dialogue is very important. We should look at this more positive way. We had recommended three things – stabilizing the situation on the ground, re-integration of divided areas and returning of former militants, and the peace process with the separatist groups,” says Ms. Kumar, a former member of a team of "interlocutors" appointed by the Indian government to start a dialogue with Kashmiris.
The state's chief minister, an ally of India's ruling coalition in New Delhi, has argued publicly for AFSPA's revocation. But last month the chief minister said that the Army has scuttled the proposal.
The National Conference Party, which currently rules the state, issued a statement on Dec. 28 after the Indian Army allegedly fired on protesters in Pulwama district saying that the Army cannot continue to use AFSPA to act with impunity, and that by such actions the Army was only making things difficult for the proponents of peace. The party also accused the Army of being responsible for the 2010 civil uprising in which 112 people were killed by paramilitary forces and police.
The Indian military cautions that it's too soon to assume the region will remain peaceful.
“One year being peaceful doesn’t mean the peace has returned, instead, there has to be durable peace,” says Lt. Col. J S Brar, Srinagar-based Defense spokesperson of India. He declined to comment on AFSPA saying that the “Army’s views on it are very well known that have been articulated by senior commanders and I will not comment on it.” The Army has argued that in most other states of India there is some legal protection for soldiers under a different law that is not fully applicable in Jammu and Kashmir.
There is also some push-back from human rights groups here about the extent of the peace. A report released today by the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society says that the year 2012 has passed just like previous years, and the state government has disgracefully claimed the year to be peaceful. Giving figures that contradict the home ministry, it says 148 people have lost their lives in 2012 because of violent incidents. It includes 35 civilians, 75 alleged militants, 36 armed forces personnel, 1 unknown person, and 1 retired police officer.

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Is Russia trying a dead whistle-blower because of a US law?

At the center of the stormiest US-Russia diplomatic crisis since the cold war stands the enigmatic figure of Sergei Magnitsky, for whom the US Senate has named a punitive new law that imposes harsh visa and economic sanctions against scores of Russian officials who are deemed to have committed serious human rights violations.
The tale of Mr. Magnitsky, a corporate lawyer who blew the whistle on a vast corruption scheme, was arrested by the same officials he had implicated, and was allegedly beaten to death in prison over three years ago, appears to validate all the worst suspicions held in the West about the nature of Vladimir Putin's Russia. The Magnitsky Act, signed into law by President Barack Obama last month, is a controversial new breed of legislation that aims to compensate for the perceived failures of Russia's justice system by meting out punishment to about 60 Russian officials deemed to have been involved in the wrongful prosecution and alleged murder of Magnitsky.
Do you know anything about Russia? A quiz.
The Kremlin's incandescent response makes it likely that the mutual acrimony will expand in weeks to come. Mr. Putin called the Magnitsky Act a "purely political, unfriendly act" that demanded a stern riposte. Last week he signed the retaliatory Dima Yakovlev Act, whose key provision is a ban on all adoptions of Russian children by US citizens.
But in an apparent effort to overturn the widely-held Western narrative, which sees Magnitsky as the victim of corrupt officials and a lawless state, Russian prosecutors have announced they will put the deceased Magnitsky on trial later this month, seeking to prove that he and his former boss, Bill Browder, head of the London-based Hermitage Capital, were the real criminals.
The pending trial has been fiercely opposed by Magnitsky's mother – who will be required to stand in for her dead son – and lawyers, who argue that a posthumous trial is against Russian law in all cases except when a family asks the court to "rehabilitate" a victim of an unjust verdict (a common legacy of the Stalin era).
"We did not ask for this, and we do not think the deputy prosecutor had any right to revive Sergei's case after it was closed upon his death," says Natalia Magnitskaya, Magnitsky's mother.
"We seriously doubt that the very same people who prosecuted Sergei hold out any prospect of rehabilitating him. So, our family doesn't want to take any part in these illegal actions," she adds.
Last week a Russian court acquitted Dmitry Kratov, a prison doctor who is the only official ever to have been charged in connection with Magnitsky's death. Mr. Kratov had been accused of failing to render timely medical assistance on the night Magnitsky died in handcuffs on the floor of a Moscow prison cell. A post-mortem report issued by the Russian Ministry of Health indicated that "the injuries on Magnitsky's body were most likely caused by multiple injuring impacts of a blunt object that might possibly be a rubber baton."
"This case was never properly investigated by authorities," says Lyubov Volkova, a member of the Public Oversight Commission, an independent watchdog mandated by Russian law to report on prison conditions. It was the first non-governmental group to look into the circumstances of Magnitsky's death.
"In Kratov's court case, both the judge and prosecutors acted as though they were his lawyers.... It seems that Kratov was just a scapegoat from the very beginning. That's not surprising, since deputy prosecutor Viktor Grin's name is on the US Magnitsky List, so obviously he wants to do everything possible to protect himself and make Magnitsky look guilty."
The narrative of Magnitsky's prosecution and death accepted by the US Senate, and several other Western legislatures that are considering variants of the Magnitsky law, is largely based on a 75-page report compiled by investigators working for Mr. Browder and also a 2011 investigation presented to then-President Dmitry Medvedev by the Kremlin's own in-house human rights commission. At the time, a somewhat shaken Mr. Medvedev appeared to agree that "at least some crimes" had been committed leading to Magnitsky's death.
According to that version, Hermitage's attorney Magnitsky went twice in 2008 to the Kremlin's State Investigative Committee to testify that corrupt police and tax officials had embezzled $230 million paid in taxes by Hermitage Fund companies, using corporate seals and charters seized in an earlier police raid on Hermitage's Moscow headquarters.
"My offices and our law firm's offices were raided by about 25 officers of Russia's Interior Ministry, who took all our official company documents," says Browder – once the biggest foreign investor in Russia – who had been barred from re-entering Russia about 18 months earlier on "national security" grounds.
"Those documents were then used in a complicated scheme to steal $230 million we had paid in taxes the previous year to the Russian government," he says. When Browder complained, he was charged by the same officers, in absentia, with underpaying his taxes in 2001.
After Magnitsky testified, Browder says, the same officers arrested him and placed him in the Butyrka prison, where he died a year later.
The investigations bankrolled by Browder have found that many of the police officers and other officials implicated by he and Magnitsky have since become inexplicably wealthy, and some have purchased expensive foreign properties. Aside from the doctor, Kratov, no Russian investigations have been opened into any of the 60 or so officials Browder alleges to have been involved in the corruption scam and the subsequent prosecution and untimely death of Magnitsky.
The Russian government's case, which will feature at Magnitsky's upcoming posthumous trial, appears to be summarized in a document handed out to US senators last summer by visiting Russian parliamentarians. It alleges that Browder, who had long championed minority shareholder rights in Russia, was guilty of acquiring more shares of the state natural gas monopoly Gazprom than he was legally entitled to, and that Hermitage companies had engaged in tax evasion and other wrongdoing. It also appears to claim that the $230 million tax theft was the work of Browder – who had been exiled to London more than a year earlier – operating in league with Magnitsky.
"The case against Magnitsky and me was entirely trumped up," says Browder.
"The clear aim of Putin and his government is to say 'Magnitsky died of natural causes, he was not killed, and his arrest was lawful because he was a criminal'. In order to create the right formal backdrop for that narrative they have exonerated all 60 people who played a role in the Magnitsky case. The most recent was Kratov last week," he says.
"Now their next step is to prosecute and convict Magnitsky [and me].... This obviously won't play well in any forum where people have looked at the evidence, but Putin is more concerned about what they can put on state television to justify their actions before the less informed Russian audience," he adds.

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Syrian rebels set sights on Damascus airport

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad set their sights Friday on the capital's international airport in a bid to cut off the regime's supplies, clashing with government troops nearby and again forcing the closure of the airport road. A fighter who is part of the push against Damascus International Airport declared it a legitimate target, claiming that the regime has stationed troops and elite forces there as well as military planes that transport ammunition. Losing control of the airport would be a major blow to the regime, which has recently lost two air bases near the capital. It was unclear just how close to the airport, a few kilometers (miles) south of the capital, the battles reached. Fighting has intensified in the past week in the southern districts of the Syrian capital and its suburbs. "The rebels have made major military gains, and have been fighting closer to the regime's nerve center, which is the airport, for days, systematically chipping away at the political and military power off the Assad regime," said Fawaz A. Gerges, head of the Middle East Center at the London School of Economics. The clashes around Damascus, a city of 1.7 million, have already forced the suspension of commercial flights over the past week, although airport officials insist the facility remains open and was functioning normally on Friday. Rebels said they were targeting the airport in an effort to cut military supplies to the government. "This would send a very strong political message to the regime. It will be a moral victory, to say the least," said the fighter, who gave only his first name, Nour, for security reasons. "The battle to cut off the regime supplies from the airport has started." Another rebel, speaking on condition of anonymity for the same reason, said the airport is now considered a "military zone." "We urge civilians to stay away," said the rebel, a member of the Damascus area military command involved in Friday's fighting. Iran and Russia are widely believed to be supplying the Assad regime with weapons through the airport. Tehran has not given details of its direct military aid to Assad's regime but has acknowledged that Revolutionary Guard envoys have been advisers in the past. Moscow has rejected Western sanctions against Assad's regime and said it would honor earlier signed weapons contracts with Syria for the delivery of anti-shipping and air defense missiles. The Kremlin insists that the Russian arms sales don't violate any international agreements. At talks in Belfast, Northern Ireland, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday that the United States and Russia are committed to trying again to get Assad's regime and the rebel opposition to talk about a political transition, setting aside a year and a half of U.S.-Russian disagreements that have paralyzed the international community. Clinton stressed, however, that the U.S. would insist once again that Assad's departure be a key part of that transition, a position not shared by the Russians. On Friday, Syrian government forces were firing rockets and mortars at suburbs south of Damascus amid heavy clashes with rebels, according to activists. Most of the fighting was taking place in the towns of Aqraba and Beit Saham near the airport. An airport official said the highway leading to the facility was closed Friday because of the fighting. The official said, however, that the airport was functioning as normal and that people were reaching it through side roads. The official declined to be identified because he was not authorized to give official statements. Meanwhile, video posted online by activists showed rebels with a helicopter they claim to have captured from the Syrian army in an air base outside of Damascus. "Your days are few, run away because we are coming to you, Bashar," one of the rebels is heard saying on the video that was posted Friday. The activist video appeared genuine and in line with Associated Press reporting. The fresh violence around the capital, including near the airport, comes amid growing international concerns about the use of chemical weapons in the civil war. Syria has not confirmed it has non-conventional weapons, and insists it would never use such arms against its own people. U.S. officials say intelligence suggests the government does have the weapons and has moved some of its stockpiles in recent days. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon renewed a call for Syria not to use chemical weapons, saying Friday the move would amount to an "outrageous crime" against humanity. Speaking to reporters after visiting Syrian refugee camps in Jordan and Turkey, he also called for an end to the violence. "The slaughter in Syria must stop," Ban said. "The military path is a dead end. It only fills the streets with more blood."

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Egypt delays early voting on new constitution

CAIRO (AP) — Egypt postponed early voting on a contentious draft constitution, and aides to President Mohammed Morsi floated the possibility of canceling the whole referendum in the first signs Friday that the Islamic leader is finally yielding to days of protests and deadly street clashes. Tens of thousands marched on the presidential palace after pushing past barbed wire fences installed by the army and calling for Morsi to step down. Thousands also camped out in Tahrir Square, birthplace of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak in 2011. A spokesman for Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood urged the group's supporters to practice "self-restraint" after hundreds gathered in front of a mosque near the presidential palace. He appealed for them not to march to the palace and to avoid confrontation. The announcement by the election committee head Ismail Hamdi to delay early voting on the charter came as a surprise, and it was difficult to predict whether it will lead to a breakthrough in the political crisis. The president's aides said the move would ease some pressure and would provide room for negotiations with the opposition. But Morsi's opponents have rejected talks, saying he must first cancel the referendum and meet other demands. Late Friday, an opposition umbrella group called for an open-ended sit-in in front of the presidential palace. The crisis began Nov. 22, when Morsi issued a decree that gave him absolute powers and immunity from judicial oversight. It deepened when he called for a Dec. 15 national referendum on the draft constitution hurriedly produced by the Islamist-led constituent assembly. The draft was infused with articles that liberals fear would pave the way for Islamizing Egypt. Legal Affairs Minister Mohammed Mahsoub said the administration was weighing several proposals — including calling off the referendum and returning it to the constituent assembly for changes. Another possibility was disbanding the constituent assembly and forming a new one, either by direct vote or an agreement among the political forces. "We have a big chance tomorrow," Mahsoub told the Qatari-based Al-Jazeera network, referring to what he said was a meeting between Morsi and political forces. "There are no deadlines or referendums outside the country. Tomorrow or day after, we might reach a good agreement." Vice President Mahmoud Mekki also told the broadcaster that he had contacted leading democracy advocate Mohamed ElBaradei to join Morsi in a dialogue. ElBaradei leads the newly formed National Salvation Front, a group of liberals and youths who opposed Morsi's decrees and led the protests in Cairo. In a televised speech, ElBaradei made clear the opposition's demands: cancellation of the declaration that Morsi used to give himself immunity from judicial oversight and postponement of the referendum. "The people are angry because they feel their rights have been raped," ElBaradei said on the ONTV network. "If he takes these decisions, he will be opening the door for dialogue. I hope he is listening." The opposition National Salvation Front rejected talks with Morsi, urging an ongoing sit-in at the palace and warned of assaults on the protesters and more violence. "We reject the fake dialogue which Morsi has called for. No talks after bloodshed and before holding those responsible accountable," the front said in a statement. Some protesters expressed optimism after they heard that the early voting for Egyptians abroad, which was due to begin Saturday, had been put off until Dec. 5. "This looks like the beginning of a retraction," said Dr. Mohsen Ibrahim, a 56-year-old demonstrator. "This means Morsi may postpone the referendum. It looks like the pressure is working out." But he warned that "if Morsi doesn't see the numbers of people protesting, then he will be repeating the same mistake of Mubarak." Since the Arab Spring uprising that toppled Mubarak, Egypt has been split between Islamists and mostly secular and liberal protesters. Each side depicts the conflict as an all-out fight for Egypt's future and identity. The opposition accuses Morsi and his Islamist allies of turning increasingly dictatorial to force their agenda on the country, monopolize power and turn Egypt to a religious state. The Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists say the opposition is trying to use the streets to overturn their victories in elections over the past year and stifle popular demands to implement Islamic Shariah law. The tone was one of a battle cry as thousands of Islamists held funeral prayers at Al-Azhar Mosque — the country's premier Islamic institution — for Morsi supporters killed in Wednesday's clashes. A series of speakers portrayed the opposition as tools of the Mubarak regime, or as decadent and un-Islamic. "Egypt is Islamic, it will not be secular, it will not be liberal," the crowd chanted in a funeral procession filling streets around the mosque. During the funeral, thousands chanted, "With blood and soul, we redeem Islam," pumping their fists. Mourners yelled that opposition leaders were "murderers." One hard-line cleric denounced anti-Morsi protesters as "traitors." Another said Egypt would not be allowed to become "a den of hash smokers." "We march on this path in sacrifice for the nation and our martyrs," a leading Brotherhood figure, Mohammed el-Beltagy, told the crowd. "We will keep going even if we all become martyrs. We will avenge them or die like them. "Bread! Freedom! Islamic law!" the crowd chanted, twisting the revolutionary slogan of "Bread! Freedom! Social justice!" used against Mubarak. At the same time, the anti-Morsi demonstrators streamed in from different parts of Cairo to the presidential palace in an upscale neighborhood for a fourth straight day. Many were furious over the president's speech Thursday night in which he accused "hired thugs" of attacking protesters. Most witnesses said Wednesday's clashes began with supporters of the president attacking a tent camp set up by the anti-Morsi crowd. Video clips emerged showing badly bruised faces of female activists and a man putting his hand over the mouth of one of them, prominent activist Shahanda Mekalad, to try to silence her as she chanted, "We are the Egyptian people." Other protesters were shown stripped naked and beaten up by Morsi supporters. The violence has fed into the mistrust between the two sides. Pressure on Morsi also came from his inner circle after he was hit by a string of resignations by some top aides protesting the violence. Criticism is also growing from journalists, including those working for state-run news organizations, over what they say are attempts by Islamists to control the media. Judges are on strike for two weeks and said they are not going to oversee the vote as stipulated by law, something that would erode the credibility of the process. Salafis rallied Friday in front of Egypt's Media City south of Cairo, protesting coverage by privately owned networks. Led by lawyer-turned-cleric Hazem Salah Abu-Ismail, with his trademark long, gray beard, the Salafis raised black flags and signs reading "hypocritical media," and brought bedspreads for a prolonged sit-in. Anti-riot police were deployed. Violence also was reported in cities across Egypt either between members of the Muslim Brotherhood and police on one side and anti-Morsi protesters on the other side in the Mediterranean coastal city of Alexandria and Nile Delta city of Zagazig. The sides pelted each other with stones outside the headquarters of the Brotherhood office in Nile Delta city of Kom Hamada, in the province of Beheira. In the Delta industrial city of Mahallah, protesters stopped trains and announced a sit in until the cancellation of Morsi's decrees and the referendum. In the southern city of Assiut, hundreds of protesters chanted, "No Brotherhood, no Salafis, Egypt is a civic state." Mohammed Abdel Ellah, one of the protests' coordinators, said the secular groups are organizing street campaigns to get the public to vote "no" if a referendum is held. But Muslim preachers in Assiut mosques called on worshippers to support Morsi. One cleric in the nearby village of Qussiya denounced the opposition as "those with wicked hearts" and "enemies of God's rule." "The enemies of the president are enemies of God, Shariah and legitimacy" another preacher said, adding that it is prohibited to protest against the ruler.

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Egyptian opposition to shun Mursi's national dialogue

CAIRO (Reuters) - Prime Minister Mohamed Mursi was expected to press ahead on Saturday with talks on ways to end Egypt's worst crisis since he took office even though the country's main opposition leaders have vowed to stay away. Cairo and other cities have been rocked by violent protests since November 22, when Mursi promulgated a decree awarding himself sweeping powers that put him above the law. The upheaval in the most populous Arab nation, following the fall of Hosni Mubarak last year, worries the West, in particular the United States, which has given it billions of dollars in military and other aid since Egypt made peace with Israel in 1979. Mursi's deputy raised the possibility that a referendum set for December 15 on a new constitution opposed by liberals might be delayed. But the concession only goes part-way towards meeting the demands of the opposition, who also want Mursi to scrap the decree awarding himself wide powers. On Friday, large crowds of protesters surged around the presidential palace, breaking through barbed wire barricades and climbing on tanks guarding the seat of Egypt's first freely elected president, who took office in June. As the night wore on, tens of thousands of opposition supporters were still at the palace, waving flags and urging Mursi to "Leave, leave". "AS LONG AS IT TAKES" "We will stay here for as long as it takes and will continue to organize protests elsewhere until President Mursi cancels his constitutional decree and postpones the referendum," said Ahmed Essam, 28, a computer engineer and a member of the liberal Dostour party. Vice President Mahmoud Mekky issued a statement saying the president was prepared to postpone the referendum if that could be done without legal challenge. Mursi's planned dialogue meeting was expected to go ahead on Saturday in the absence of most opposition factions. "Everything will be on the table," a presidential source said. Mursi could be joined by some senior judiciary figures and politicians such as Ayman Nour, one of the candidates in Mubarak's only multi-candidate presidential race, in 2005, in which he was unsurprisingly trounced. The opposition has demanded that Mursi rescind the decree giving himself wide powers and delay the vote set for December 15 on a constitution drafted by an Islamist-led assembly which they say fails to meet the aspirations of all Egyptians. EXPAT VOTE DELAYED The state news agency reported that the election committee had postponed the start of voting for Egyptians abroad until Wednesday, instead of Saturday as planned. It did not say whether this would affect the timing of voting within Egypt. Ahmed Said, leader of the liberal Free Egyptians Party, told Reuters that delaying expatriate voting was intended to seem like a concession but would not change the opposition's stance. The opposition organized marches converging on the palace which Republican Guard units had ringed with tanks and barbed wire on Thursday after violence between supporters and opponents of Mursi killed seven people and wounded 350. Islamists, who had obeyed a military order for demonstrators to leave the palace environs, held funerals on Friday at Cairo's al-Azhar mosque for six Mursi partisans who were among the dead. "With our blood and souls, we sacrifice to Islam," they chanted. A group led by leftist opposition leader Hamdeen Sabahy has called for an open-ended protest at the palace. Some pro-Mursi demonstrators gathered in a mosque not far from the palace, but said they would not march towards the palace to avoid a repeat of the violence that took place on Wednesday night. In a speech late on Thursday, Mursi had refused to retract his decree or cancel the referendum on the constitution, but offered talks on the way forward after the referendum. The National Salvation Front, the main opposition coalition, said it would not join the dialogue. The Front's coordinator, Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel peace laureate, dismissed the offer as "arm-twisting and imposition of a fait accompli". ElBaradei said that if Mursi were to scrap the decree with which he awarded himself extra powers and postpone the referendum "he will unite the national forces". Murad Ali, spokesman for the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, said opposition reactions were sad: "What exit to this crisis do they have other than dialogue?" he asked.

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Venezuela's Chavez returns from Cuba after treatment

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez made a theatrical return home on Friday after medical treatment in Cuba, walking and joking in a first public appearance for three weeks that quashed rumors he may have been at death's door. "So, where's the party?" an ebullient and robust-looking Chavez said after flying in before dawn to the surprise and delight of supporters. "I'm happy and enthused to be back again," he told beaming ministers after walking unaided down the steps from his plane at the international airport outside Caracas. The 58-year-old socialist leader has had three cancer operations in Cuba since mid-2011 and returned to Havana ten days ago to receive "hyperbaric oxygenation" - a treatment normally used to alleviate bone decay from radiation therapy. Speculation had been rife that he may have suffered a recurrence of the disease, and one local journalist had said he was confined to a wheelchair. Earlier this year, Chavez declared himself "completely cured" and went on to win re-election comfortably in October. Amid a barrage of rumors fed by the opposition, officials had maintained that his latest visit to Cuba was just a scheduled follow-up to the radiation therapy he underwent in the first half of 2012. Supporters celebrated the return of a man who has dominated the South American OPEC nation since he first won election in 1998. He wore a blue and white tracksuit and flew with relatives and aides including Vice President Nicolas Maduro. "YEEESSSS!!!!," tweeted Eva Golinger, an American-Venezuelan lawyer close to the Chavez government. "Chavez is back and has shown up all the rumor-mongers, necrophiliacs, gossips and ill-thinkers ... Welcome comandante." Chavez looked relatively well, moving with ease and chatting for 15 minutes on the runway, although he remains puffy-faced as he has been since the radiation treatment. QUESTIONS LINGER, BONDS FALL Chavez's return gives him a week to campaign for Venezuela's December 16 state elections, where his ruling Socialist Party is hoping to use the momentum of the presidential victory to win back some opposition-held governorships. The opposition, however, is hoping that discontent with grassroots issues like crime, power-cuts and cronyism will enable it to at least hold the seven states it controls out of Venezuela's 23. Speculation over Chavez's health is unlikely to end, given the scant details given by the government. Doctors say hyperbaric oxygenation is a treatment normally given in different sessions over several months, meaning he could return to Cuba again soon. They also say nobody can declare themselves cured of cancer until a couple of years have passed without recurrence. The president had dearly wanted to attend a Mercosur summit in Brazil on Friday, to celebrate Venezuela joining the regional trade bloc this year, so his absence from that maintained a question mark over just how well he is. News of Chavez's trip to Cuba had prompted a Venezuelan bond rally given Wall Street and Western investors' preference for a more business-friendly government in Caracas. But in early trading on Friday, following news of his return, Venezuela's global bonds fell 1.81 pct in price, according to returns tallied by the J.P. Morgan Emerging Markets Bond Index Plus (EMBI+). Bonds had risen 6.2 percent so far this month to Thursday. Opponents criticize Chavez for secrecy over his health and preferring Cuban doctors to Venezuelans. "His whole absence has been a black hole of misinformation," opposition legislator Tomas Guanipa told local media. "Any president should give account to his people, it is an obligation to give health details. When you are transparent and responsible, and recognize you are there to serve the people not boss them, the logical thing is to say what is going on." Chavez has chosen to be treated in Havana due to his friendship with Cuba's past and present leaders Fidel and Raul Castro, plus the discretion he is guaranteed thanks to the Communist government's strict controls on information. Cuba's Communist Party newspaper published photos showing Raul Castro bidding farewell to Chavez at Havana airport. Chavez said he had met Fidel Castro during his stay.

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