Full Focus Our best photos from the last 24 hours. Slideshow Best photos of the year 2012 Download our Wider Image iPad app Follow Reuters Facebook Twitter RSS YouTube RECOMMENDED VIDEO Japan holds island drill (0:48) French hostage believed dead in rescue attempt (0:47) Iran shows new combat helicopter (0:44) Asia's endangered species: The expat (Global Connections) Small jet-makers flock to China (Global Connections) [?] READ Analysis: In spending wars, Obama strikes at Republican leverage 1:06am EST1Analysis: Move on assault weapons creates risks for Obama 12:05am EST2Pakistan Supreme Court orders arrest of prime minister 6:24am EST3France keeps up Mali air strikes, African troop plan advances| 3:29am EST4Jodie Foster comes out as gay at Golden Globes 14 Jan 20135 DISCUSSED 144 U.S. states flirt with major tax changes 125 Obama says refusal to lift debt ceiling would hurt economy 81 DNA pioneer James Watson takes aim at ‘cancer establishments’ SPONSORED LINKS Ads by Marchex China to offer up to $48,000 reward for food safety informers

Reuters

China will offer up to 300,000 yuan($48,200) as a cash reward to people who report on others who violate food safety laws, state media said on Tuesday, as the government tries again to crack down on a persistent problem.

"Actions taken to report violations of food and drug safety laws will be rewarded," state news agency Xinhua said. "The reward for each case, in principle, will not exceed 300,000 yuan."

>> Reuters has the complete report

Mobile devices surge at the expense of TVs, laptops

Agence France-Presse

LAS VEGAS - The global tech industry has become a tale of two sectors, with mobile devices surging at the expense of older electronics that are struggling, a forecast showed Sunday.

A survey presented ahead of the International Consumer Electronics Show, the biggest trade show of its kind, projects modest growth of four percent for the industry expected to generate 2013 sales of $1.1 trillion.

But half of the revenues will come from mobile connected devices -- smartphones, tablets and mobile computers, according to the forecast by the Consumer Electronics Association and GfK Research.

The industry has been buffeted by the huge shift to mobile, but also by sluggish global economic conditions, especially in recession-hit Western Europe.

>> full story here

Kuwait sentences second man to jail for insulting emir: lawyer

A Kuwaiti court sentenced a man to two years in prison on Monday for insulting the country's ruler on Twitter, his lawyer said, the second person to be jailed for the offence in as many days.

The U.S.-allied Gulf Arab state has clamped down in recent months on political activists who have been using social media websites to criticize the government and the ruling family.

Kuwait has seen a series of opposition-organized protests, including one on Sunday night, since the ruling emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, used emergency powers in October to change the voting system.

>>full story here

Cat caught sneaking saw, phone into Brazil prison

Reuters

A cat carrying a saw and a mobile phone was "detained" as it entered a prison gate in northeast Brazil, Brazilian media reported on Saturday.

Prison guards were surprised when they saw a white cat crossing the main gate of the prison, its body wrapped with tape. A closer look showed the feline also carried drills, an earphone, a memory card, batteries and a phone charger.

All 263 detainees in the prison of Arapiraca, a city of 215,000 people in the state of Alagoas, are considered suspect in the plot, which is being investigated by local police.

>>full story here

At least 26 dead in Mexico drug gang violence

Agence France-Presse
MEXICO CITY — At least 26 people were killed in Mexico in the past 24 hours in apparent drug-related crimes, including six men shot dead whose bodies bear signs of torture, authorities said Saturday.

Of the 26 deaths reported from Friday to Saturday, 16 of them took place in Chihuahua state, which shares a long border with the United States. Six others occurred in Sinaloa state, a stronghold of one of Mexico's ruthless drug gangs.

In Chihuahua, the bodies of six men were found late Friday in a ravine in the town of Balleza. Prosecutors said the men were tortured and then shot dead. Three of them had ties to Balleza's mayor.

>>full story here

Venezuela lawmakers elect Chavez ally as Assembly chief

Reuters
Venezuelan lawmakers re-elected a staunch ally of Hugo Chavez to head the National Assembly on Saturday, putting him in line to be caretaker president if the socialist leader does not recover from cancer surgery.

By choosing the incumbent, Diosdado Cabello, the "Chavista"-dominated legislature cemented the combative ex-soldier's position as the third most powerful figure in the government, after Chavez and Vice President Nicolas Maduro.

"As a patriot ... I swear to be supremely loyal in everything I do, to defend the fatherland, its institutions, and this beautiful revolution led by our Comandante Hugo Chavez," Cabello said as he took the oath, his hand on the constitution....>>Full story here

Famed Gulf War General Schwarzkopf dies

Reuters
Retired U.S. General Norman Schwarzkopf Jr, who headed coalition forces that drove Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's army out of Kuwait in Operation Desert Storm, has died, a U.S. official said on Thursday. He was 78.

The highly decorated four-star general died at 2:22 p.m. ET at his home in Tampa, Florida, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The cause of death was not immediately known.

>>full story here

Taiwan typhoon hero faces life in prison for corruption

Agence France-Presse

TAIPEI - A former Taiwan fire chief hailed as a hero for leading rescue efforts during a deadly typhoon has been indicted in a $690,000 corruption case and faces life in jail, prosecutors said Tuesday.

Huang Chi-min won widespread praise after he supervised rescue efforts for 14 days in a row when Typhoon Morakot hit the island three years ago, leaving more than 600 people dead.

But the man who headed the national fire agency until 2009 was arrested in August accused of favouring several unidentified firms in contracts.

On Tuesday, prosecutors said he had been charged with taking nearly Tw$20 million in bribes in the purchase of rescue and disaster relief equipment.

He is accused of taking the money from several companies to help them secure procurement contracts with the agency, the Taipei district prosecutors' office said in a statement.

"We seek life imprisonment since Huang shows no remorse for the serious crime he committed. His actions severely damaged the ethics of government officials," the office said in a statement.

Huang, who is in custody, denies the charges against him.

>>full story here

Indian PM calls for calm after gang rape sparks violent protests

Reuters

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh appealed for calm on Monday as he sought to tamp down growing public outrage over the gang rape of a young woman that led to clashes between police and protesters in the heart of the capital at the weekend.

Singh, who has faced fierce criticism for remaining largely silent about the rape, vowed action against what he called a "monstrous" crime.

The 23-year-old victim, who was attacked and then thrown from a moving bus in New Delhi, remains in hospital in critical condition.

"I appeal to all concerned citizens to maintain peace and calm. I assure you we will make all possible efforts to ensure security and safety of women in this country," Singh said in a televised address to the nation.

>>full story

Early signs show Egypt's new constitution passing

(Reuters) - Early indications showed Egyptians approved an Islamist-drafted constitution after Saturday's final round of voting in a referendum despite opposition criticism of the measure as divisive.

An official from the Muslim Brotherhood's political party, which backs Islamist President Mohamed Mursi, said that after nearly 4 million votes had been counted there was a majority of 74 percent in favor of the constitution.

Exit polls from the opposition National Salvation Front also showed the constitution passing, an official said.

>>full story

Connecticut Shooting: mostly 6-7 years old.

Photo courtesy of pakalertpress.com

Connecticut shooting on December 14, 2012 is probably the worst US massacre in 2012. The gunman killed 20 kids of which mostly ages 6-7 years old and six adults ages 27-56 according to the report released on Saturday. America have had many shooting incidents but this one is shocking—were most of the victims were kids.

A 20-year old Adam Lanza killed his own mother at their home and went to Sandy Hook Elementary School and immediately attacked the innocent victims with a series of fires. Nancy Lanza, mother of the murderer legally owned a gun store of which some guns are found at the crime scene.

President Barrack Obama was moved by such incident; he was in tears while on national television and called for "meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this."

Police authorities are positive enough and they assured everyone that they all have great evidence to identify why the gunman have done such horrible thing.

Activists slam marriage of 12-year-old in Malaysia

AFP

Malaysian activists on Friday slammed the wedding of a 12-year-old to her 19-year-old boyfriend, renewing their calls for the government to outlaw child marriages.

Nur Fazira Saad and Fahmi Alias married last week in northern Kedah state after the girl's father agreed to the union and an Islamic court granted permission, The Star daily reported.

"It is better for them to get married rather than doing something improper," Saad Mustafa, the girl's father, was quoted as saying.

But Ratna Osman, executive director of activist group Sisters in Islam, described the young couple's marriage as "shocking".

"I don't understand why this is allowed in a country like Malaysia... We are talking about a developed country," she told AFP. "The concern is that this is a child being married off... No parents should be doing this."

Child marriages are not uncommon in the conservative Southeast Asian country, where 60 percent of the population of 29 million people are Muslim.

Two years ago, the marriage of a 14-year-old Muslim girl to a 23-year-old schoolteacher triggered similar calls for reform.

Girls below the age of 16 must obtain the permission of Islamic courts, which regulate civil matters for Muslims. But activists say such permission is too readily granted.

There was another outcry in October when two men, aged 19 and 22, were released on probation after courts convicted them of statutory rape.

In both cases the girls, aged 12 and 13, had not been forced, lawyers said.

But activists slammed the judges for freeing the men, saying the question of consent should not have arisen as the victims were below 16.

Earlier this week, a high court overturned the ruling in one of the cases, jailing the 22-year-old man for five and a half years.

Thanksgiving Day marked with parades, feasts in wake of Sandy

BY JONATHAN ALLEN, REUTERS

NEW YORK - Americans celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday with parades and sumptuous feasts, some sharing the bounty at East Coast emergency shelters to express gratitude for what they still had after Superstorm Sandy caused widespread damage throughout the region.

"We're trying to do it Pilgrim style," said Louis DeCarolis, 51, who was roasting a turkey in a fire pit marked by an American flag and dug into the front yard of his son's home in Rockaway Beach, Queens. The area lost power when it was flooded by the deadly storm, which hit the area last month.

Thousands of area residents are coping with the loss of homes, businesses and loved ones. At an emergency shelter in another coastal community, Belle Harbor, Queens, red cloths and red and pink roses graced tables groaning with trays of stuffing and pumpkin pies for people displaced by the historic storm that destroyed homes and businesses in New York and New Jersey.

In Texas, the crush of holiday road traffic was blamed for a massive, high-speed pileup of up to 150 vehicles on a fog-bound interstate near Beaumont that killed at least two people and injured up to 120, a sheriff's spokesman said.

New York City kicked off the holiday with cheering crowds lining streets for the 86th Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the largest public event so far in a city still recovering from the storm.

Under warm and clear skies, children climbed atop police vans and on their parent's shoulders to get a better view of an enormous inflatable Hello Kitty prowling between skyscrapers along with 15 other gigantic balloons, including a 60-foot-tall Kermit the Frog balloon and a huge Charlie Brown.

The parade, which typically draws 3.5 million spectators and 50 million television viewers, also featured 28 floats, 11 marching bands, thousands of cheerleaders and dancers as well as Santa Claus. Celebrity performers included Whoopi Goldberg, Carly Rae Jepsen and the Muppets.

Macy's provided seats for some 5,000 people affected by Sandy, which inundated lower Manhattan with seawater, damaged shorelines and destroyed homes in New Jersey and New York. The Oct. 29 storm killed 132 people in the United States and Canada.

Basting his turkey in the fire pit a block from the beach, DeCarolis said he planned to deliver it to a homebound neighbor and her disabled child who are still without power.

"I'd rather give it to them. We have a lot to be thankful for - we didn't lose any loved ones," said DeCarolis, a building cleaner now homeless after his basement apartment was destroyed by the historic storm surge.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the city, in partnership with local community organizations and businesses, was providing 26,500 Thanksgiving meals for people hardest hit by the storm.

About 2,000 of those meals were being served under a white tent organized by the city outside St. Frances de Sales Parish in Belle Harbor, which was dishing out another 500 meals inside the church.

"I've seen lots of smiles, warm hearts," said volunteer Carmine Iovino, 61, a retired utility worker from Queens carving a turkey alongside Long Islanders Rita Amoreno, 70, a retired nurse serving her own pumpkin cake and Ursula Lindgren, 27, a caterer, ladling her homemade soup.

Laura and William Reichard, whose nearby home is still without heat and hot water, ate their feast from a styrofoam takeout tray in the tent and said small touches like flowers on the table meant a lot after a difficult month.

"It's beautiful. It lightens up everything," said Laura Reichard, who thanked the army of volunteers. "Day and night, they've just been so wonderful."

At another tent shelter about 30 blocks away, rock star Patti Smith played guitar as the crowd of about 200 people put aside their Thanksgiving dinners to sing along.

"Many of you know people, as I do, who have lost their homes, lost their cars, lost everything," Smith told the crowd. "But I can tell you that if you have each other, you have your friends, your kids are O.K., there is nothing better than that." — Reuters

Magnitude 5.5 earthquake hits Iran, USGS reports

LONDON, Nov. 7, 2012 (Reuters) — A shallow magnitude 5.5 earthquake hit northwest Iran on Wednesday morning, the U.S. Geological Survey reported.The quake was centered 32 miles north-northeast of Tabriz, at a depth of 6.2 miles, the USGS said.

(Writing by John Stonestreet ; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Obama re-elected

The first black American President of the United States of America was rewarded another term of ruling the most powerful country in the world today. President Barack Obama won over his Republican challenger Mitt Romney with 303 electoral votes against 206 for Romney.
Obama once again promised his supporters that he will do his best of while serving his term of presidency.
"We have picked ourselves up, we have fought our way back and we know in our hearts that for the United States of America the best is yet to come," he said in his speech.

Romney on the other hand said that now was not the time for  "partisan bickering and political posturing", and that Republicans and Democrats must "put people before politics". He also expressed his congratulations  to the re-elected president and "earnestly pray for him and this great nation".

Gay marriage plan hits opposition, delays in France

(Reuters-Tom Heneghan and Alexandria Sage) - Plans by France's Socialist government to legalize same-sex marriage are proving harder to enact than first thought after faith leaders and conservatives mobilized against it even as left-wing deputies try to expand it.

With a solid majority it won last spring, the government originally only planned short parliamentary hearings and a debate early next year before voting on one of President Francois Hollande's most divisive campaign promises and something he has framed as a trademark reform.

But as opposition has grown, it has put off issuing the draft text of the reform and scheduled longer parliamentary hearings. It has also put aside one demand, assisted procreation - or giving gay couples the right to have "test tube babies" - as too hot to handle for now.

"Parliament will take its time," Interior Minister Manuel Valls said on Saturday. "Nobody doubts (the reform) will become law, but all opinions - political, philosophical or religious - will be heard."

Inter-LGBT, a group pressing for full equality on all issues of sexual orientation, has accused Hollande of backtracking on his campaign promises. "The symbolism is strong but they're stopping halfway," said spokesman Nicolas Gougain.

"We thought we would get everything from a left-wing government," said a disappointed civil servant at a debate on gay parenting in the western city of Nantes. "There are still many fights to be fought."

SECULAR ARGUMENTS FROM FAITH LEADERS

Passing the law by mid-2013 as planned would make France the 12th country around the world to legalize same-sex marriage.

Surveys by the Ifop polling group show support for gay marriage has slipped a bit from 65 percent in August to 61 percent now as the public debate has taken off.

Public support for full adoption rights for gay couples, the second part of the planned reform, has also slid from 53 per cent then to 48 percent now.

Sandra Adjedj, 36, a dress designer displaying her wares at a wedding salon in Paris, echoed the ambivalence about adoption rights. "I'm neither for nor against, but why not?" she said. "Most gay couples seem sweet, they like their children."

Leaders of the main religions have led the anti-reform drive using arguments based on the psychological and social damage they say it could cause rather than on religious doctrines.

The majority Roman Catholic Church organized nationwide prayers against gay marriage reform on August 15 and Paris cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois has discussed the issue in private talks with Hollande and Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault.

The Church has also distributed talking points to help Catholics around the country debate supporters of the reform.

Like the position papers by leaders of other faiths, the memo stresses respect for homosexuals but rejects their effort to redefine the traditional institution of marriage.

CONSERVATIVE OPPOSITION

Over 78,000 people have signed a petition sponsored by 41 conservative politicians and intellectuals as well as Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox Christian, evangelical and Muslim leaders.

Conservative mayors have called for a "conscience clause" to avoid presiding at same-sex marriages, which Paris has refused.

In an analysis published last week, Grand Rabbi Gilles Bernheim accused reform supporters of focusing on love and equality to win changes that he said could confuse children's sexual identities and undermine social stability.

Even the state's child benefits agency has criticized the plan to scrap the entries for "father" and "mother" in official records in favor of "parent 1" and "parent 2".

Yet the government is facing loud demands from within its own ranks to go even further and allow newer methods of procreation so that gay couples can have a biological link to their children.

Senior Socialists including National Assembly speaker Claude Bartelone, parliamentary leader Bruno Le Roux and Harlem Desir, the party's new first secretary, want to amend the draft bill to include a clause granting gay couples the right to assisted procreation so they can make "test tube babies."

Senator Esther Benbassa, from the allied Greens party, said she would push for legal recognition of children born to surrogate mothers outside France, where the practice is illegal.

"The government has offered only the minimum," said Socialist Senator Jean-Pierre Michel. "Separating the question of marriage from that of parenthood makes no sense."

(Additional reporting by Patrick Vignal and Julien Ponthus; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

As crops rot, millions go hungry in India

NEW DELHI, July 1, 2012 (Reuters) — Every day some 3,000 Indian children die from illnesses related to malnutrition, and yet countless heaps of rodent-infested wheat and rice are rotting in fields across the north of their own country.

It is an extraordinary paradox created by a rigid regime of subsidies for grain farmers, a woeful lack of storage facilities and an inefficient, corruption-plagued public distribution system that fails millions of impoverished people.

And it is an embarrassment for the government led by the Congress party, which returned to power in 2009 thanks in large part to pledges of welfare for the poor, who make up about 40 percent of the 1.2 billion population.

Quite why the authorities could not simply offload the mountains of grain for free to fill empty stomachs is puzzling, but the explanation lies in the complex regulations that govern procurement and distribution.

Gunman kills four in Phoenix suburb, kills self

(Reuters) - A gunman shot and killed four people including a toddler girl in a Phoenix suburb on Wednesday afternoon before apparently committing suicide, police said.

Gilbert Police Sergeant Bill Balafas said the gunman opened fire at or near a house in a neighborhood of single-family homes in the town of Gilbert. Police recovered two handguns and a shotgun from the scene.

The youngest victim, a girl of between one and two years old, was still alive at the scene, but later died in a hospital, Balafas said. The other dead were two men and two women. Police believe the shooter was among the dead.

Local resident Scott Kirkwood, 43, said neighbors were shocked by the shooting at the home, which he believed was occupied by a family.

"Everyone is shocked and concerned, nothing like this ever happens in this neighborhood, it's usually very quiet," he said.

"I heard sirens pulling up in my backyard, when I went to investigate there was like 30 cop cars, five ambulances, a fire truck, a SWAT team, the whole nine yards - it was just blanketing the neighborhood," he added.

Officers are currently interviewing a witness to the shooting, which investigators believe stemmed from a "domestic situation," Balafas said.

Two nearby schools were briefly placed on lockdown immediately following the incident, according to news reports.

As America's waistline expands, costs soar

(Reuters) - U.S. hospitals are ripping out wall-mounted toilets and replacing them with floor models to better support obese patients. The Federal Transit Administration wants buses to be tested for the impact of heavier riders on steering and braking. Cars are burning nearly a billion gallons of gasoline more a year than if passengers weighed what they did in 1960.

The nation's rising rate of obesity has been well-chronicled. But businesses, governments and individuals are only now coming to grips with the costs of those extra pounds, many of which are even greater than believed only a few years ago: The additional medical spending due to obesity is double previous estimates and exceeds even those of smoking, a new study shows.

Many of those costs have dollar signs in front of them, such as the higher health insurance premiums everyone pays to cover those extra medical costs. Other changes, often cost-neutral, are coming to the built environment in the form of wider seats in public places from sports stadiums to bus stops.

The startling economic costs of obesity, often borne by the non-obese, could become the epidemic's second-hand smoke. Only when scientists discovered that nonsmokers were developing lung cancer and other diseases from breathing smoke-filled air did policymakers get serious about fighting the habit, in particular by establishing nonsmoking zones. The costs that smoking added to Medicaid also spurred action. Now, as economists put a price tag on sky-high body mass indexes (BMIs), policymakers as well as the private sector are mobilizing to find solutions to the obesity epidemic.

"As committee chairmen, Cabinet secretaries, the head of Medicare and health officials see these really high costs, they are more interested in knowing, 'what policy knob can I turn to stop this hemorrhage?'" said Michael O'Grady of the National Opinion Research Center, co-author of a new report for the Campaign to End Obesity, which brings together representatives from business, academia and the public health community to work with policymakers on the issue.

The U.S. health care reform law of 2010 allows employers to charge obese workers 30 percent to 50 percent more for health insurance if they decline to participate in a qualified wellness program. The law also includes carrots and celery sticks, so to speak, to persuade Medicare and Medicaid enrollees to see a primary care physician about losing weight, and funds community demonstration programs for weight loss.

US double-murder suspect found dead in hideout

Agence France-Presse

SAN FRANCISCO – US law enforcement blew the roof off a mountain hideout in Washington state on Saturday and inside found the body of a man suspected of killing his wife and teenage daughter, officials said.

Peter Keller, who had been missing since Sunday when the bullet-ridden bodies of Lynnettee Rocha Keller, 41, and their 19-year-old daughter Kaylene Keller were discovered at the family home, apparently died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

“They believe the person has been dead for some time. There’s a great deal of blood and a pistol nearby,” King County Sheriff Steven Strachan said of the scene in the Cascade foothills 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Seattle.

Evidence led investigators to the the mountain bunker late Friday and a SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) team fired tear gas into the structure and stood guard at the site overnight.

But on Saturday, they used explosives to blow off the bunker’s roof, leading them to Keller’s body.

The bunker had been fortified by logs and dirt and was believed to stretch back at least 20 feet (six meters) into the mountainside.

Keller, 41, was named a suspect Wednesday in the murder of his wife and daughter, whose bodies were found after neighbors called the authorities when they noticed the home had been set on fire.

Investigators have yet to establish a motive for the killings, said Sergeant Cindi West, a spokeswoman for the King County Sheriff’s Office, adding that a search for evidence was under way at the mountainside bunker.

ABC News reported that Keller, a reputed survival skills enthusiast, had spent eight years planning and building the bunker, pictures of which police said he intended to destroy in the fire at the family home.