Cricket-Australia recall Clarke for Sri Lanka ODIs

Jan 14 (Reuters) - Australia captain Michael Clarke is one of three big names to return to the squad for the third and fourth one-day internationals against Sri Lanka after a disappointing showing by stand-ins on Sunday.
Opening batsman David Warner and wicketkeeper Matthew Wade were the others to be recalled for the matches in Brisbane on Friday and Sydney on Sunday, with all-rounder Moises Henriques also given a chance to impress.
The 25-year-old Portuguese-born Henriques scored 18 runs and took one wicket in his two previous ODIs for Australia against India in 2009.
"Moises is a young man who has shown promise for some years with both the bat and the ball," Cricket Australia National Selector John Inverarity said in a statement.
"This will be an opportunity for him to impress as we look for a good seam bowling all-rounder."
Aaron Finch and Steve Smith, who struggled in the eight wicket loss to the tourists on Sunday that levelled the series at 1-1, were dropped from the 12-man squad with Usman Khawaja, Kane Richardson and Ben Cutting also making way.
Wicketkeeper Brad Haddin was also left out after suffering a hamstring injury in the Adelaide loss but Mitchell Starc and Mitchell Johnson have been named despite injury concerns.
Australia's rotation policy has been criticised by a number of former players but Inverarity defended the system.
"The three different formats and the amount of cricket and the amount of travel is very different from the past," Inverarity told reporters.
"The other key factor that's not often mentioned is the lack of proper conditioning periods. It's very difficult to find an extended timeslot when they can undergo appropriate conditioning."
Changes will also take place in the coaching set up for Friday's clash at the Gabba with Steve Rixon taking over the head coach role with Mickey Arthur returning home to South Africa to spend time with family before the Sydney match.
The fifth and final ODI will be played in Hobart on Jan. 23 before Sri Lanka wrap up their tour with two Twenty20 matches.

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Sharapova starts Australian Open with 6-0, 6-0 win

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Maria Sharapova finished her first match of the year in 55 minutes Monday, cruising to a 6-0, 6-0 win over Olga Puchkova to start proceedings on center court at the Australian Open without showing any signs of trouble with her sore right shoulder.
The No. 2-ranked Sharapova, who lost the final to Victoria Azarenka here last year before going on to win the French Open, faced only two break points in the match and she saved both of those in the first game.
Then she went on a 12-game roll that earned her a second "double bagel" inside a year.
Sharapova started her run to the French Open title with a 6-0, 6-0 win over Alexandra Caduntu at Roland Garros last year. But she said the score line wasn't really relevant.
"If you win 7-6 in the third, you've still won the match," she said.
Sharapova withdrew from the Brisbane International earlier this month with an injured right collarbone, saying she wanted to concentrate on being fit for the season's first major. She skipped the tournament last year, as well, before going on to reach the Australian Open final.
"After a couple of close games and a few break points, I certainly started to concentrate a bit better," she said. "I didn't want to concentrate on the fact I hadn't played a lot of matches. I just wanted to focus on what was ahead of me and really be aggressive.
"It was one of those matches where I didn't try to worry about her too much."
Sharapova has a potential third-round match against Venus Williams, who needed just an hour for her opening 6-1, 6-0 win over Galina Voskoboeva of Kazakhstan.
No. 4 Agnieszka Radwanska won the last nine straight games in her opening 7-5, 6-0 win over Australian wild-card entry Bojana Bobusic 7-5, 6-0 and 2011 U.S. Open champion Samantha Stosur beat Chang Kai-chen of Taiwan 7-6 (3), 6-3 to end a run of five losses on home soil.
Sixth-seeded Li Na, who lost the Australian Open final before winning the 2011 French Open, had a 6-1, 6-3 win over Sesil Karatantcheva of Kazakhstan, while No. 18 Julia Gorges of Germany and No. 27 Sorana Cirstea of Romania also advanced.
On the men's side, No. 10 Nicolas Almagro of Spain beat American qualifier Steve Johnson 7-5, 6-7 (4), 6-2, 6-7 (6), 6-2, No. 15 Stanislas Wawrinka beat German qualifier Cedrik-Marcel Stebe 6-2, 6-4, 6-3 and No. 16 Kei Nishikori of Japan had a 6-7 (5), 6-3, 6-1, 6-3 win over Romania's Victor Hanescu.
No. 32 Julien Benneteau of France ousted rising Bulgarian star Grigor Dimitrov 6-4, 6-2, 6-4.
Venus Williams played with power and determination and took command of the match early with a steady stream of winners and powerful serves.
She skipped last year's Australian Open due to illness and was warmly welcomed with applause as she entered the court. Venus Williams had the biggest jump of any of the top players in 2012, moving from outside the top 100 to finish the year at No. 24.
The announcer told the crowd as Williams, who has won seven major titles, was warming up on court: "She's back and fiery."
Williams said she was happy with the match statistics, particularly her serve, so early in the season.
"I don't think my opponent quite got the hang of ... you know, it's hard to play the first match in a major, first thing of the year, and that can be a lot of pressure,' Williams said. "I did my best to just close it out."
Her younger sister, Serena, was sitting in the crowd with coach Patrick Mouratoglou. Serena is the strong favorite to win the Australian Open, heading into the tournament with 35 wins in her past 36 matches including titles at Wimbledon, the Olympics and the U.S. Open.
No. 3-ranked Serena Williams is in the top half of the draw with defending champion Victoria Azarenka, and the pair won't start until Tuesday.
Novak Djokovic starts his bid to be the first man in the Open era to win three consecutive Australian titles later Monday with a first-round match against Paul-Henri Mathieu of France.
The top-ranked Djokovic shelved the conventional preparations for a while on the weekend, warming up for a shot at a third consecutive Australian title with a bit of weekend hit-and-giggle and a Gangnam Style dance with Serena Williams.
That was for kids' day, when thousands of people flocked to Rod Laver Arena to see 2012 Australian champions Djokovic and Azarenka hitting in a just-for-fun match with players including past champions Roger Federer and Williams and a cast of human-sized cartoon characters.
From Monday, it'll be all business. His five-set, 5-hour, 53-minute win over Rafael Nadal in the final last year has already been written into Australian Open folklore, and followed his titles at Melbourne Park in 2008 and 2011.
"This is my most successful Grand Slam. But this Grand Slam is also known for a lot of surprises, players who have been reaching the final stages who are not expected to. We'll see. The Australian Open always brings something interesting."

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Tennis-Australian Open order of play - day two

MELBOURNE, Jan 14 (Reuters) - Order of play on the main
showcourts at the Australian Open on Tuesday (play starts at
0000 GMT on all courts, prefix denotes seeding):
Rod Laver Arena
Robin Haase (Netherlands) v 3-Andy Murray (Britain)
1-Victoria Azarenka (Belarus) v Monica Niculescu (Romania)
Benoit Paire (France) v 2-Roger Federer (Switzerland)
From 0800
Bernard Tomic (Australia) v Leonardo Mayer (Argentina)
20-Yanina Wickmayer (Belgium) v Jarmila Gajdosova
(Australia)
- - - -
Hisense Arena
10-Caroline Wozniacki (Denmark) v Sabine Lisicki (Germany)
3-Serena Williams (U.S.) v Edina Gallovits-Hall (Romania)
7-Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (France) v Michael Llodra (France)
6-Juan Martin del Potro (Argentina) v Adrian Mannarino
(France)
- - - -
Margaret Court Arena
Carla Suarez Navarro (Spain) v 7-Sara Errani (Italy)
Francesca Schiavone (Italy) v 8-Petra Kvitova (Czech
Republic)
29-Sloane Stephens (U.S.) v Simona Halep (Romania)
Marinko Matosevic (Australia) v 12-Marin Cilic (Croatia)
From 0800
Gael Monfils (France) v 18-Alexander Dolgopolov (Ukraine)
- - - -
(Compiled by Nick Mulvenney; Editing by Patrick Johnston)

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New Zealand show fight against South Africa

PORT ELIZABETH, South Africa (Reuters) - New Zealand fought bravely to move to 157 for four in their second innings, following on and still 247 runs behind South Africa, at the close of the third day's play in the second test on Sunday.
Unbeaten pair BJ Watling (41) and Dean Brownlie (44) provided stern resistance and the duo looked relatively untroubled as they added an unbroken fifth-wicket partnership of 73 off 27.2 overs to steer their team to the close of play.
Opener Martin Guptill contributed 48 before being bowled by seamer Rory Kleinveldt who went on to have Daniel Flynn (0) caught behind with his next delivery.
Kleinveldt ended the day with two for 31 while left-arm spinner Robin Peterson, who accounted for Brendon McCullum (11) and Kane Williamson (11), claimed two for 29.
The tourists showed far more determination with the bat than they had in their first innings when they subsided to 121 all out in reply to the top-ranked hosts's 525-8 declared.
Watling said that while the pitch was providing some variable bounce it was still good for batting which would aid New Zealand's seemingly impossible task of at least forcing South Africa to bat again.
"It is a little bit variable and there are a few balls staying quite low. It's still a reasonable track and we need to keep fighting away tomorrow morning and keep wearing them out," Watling told a news conference.
The morning session had belonged to speedster Dale Steyn, the world's top-ranked bowler, who claimed five for 17 off 13 overs to bundle New Zealand out 30 minutes before lunch, at that stage trailing South Africa by 404 runs.
Watling provided the one shining light for the tourists in their first dig as his battling 63 off 87 balls with 13 fours added some gloss to the innings.
ATTACK OR DEFEND?
Steyn, while expressing some sympathy for the situation that New Zealand find themselves in, said that the introduction of the second new ball soon after the start of play on day four could settle the test.
"It's a difficult situation when you have been asked to follow on and you are so many runs behind. How do you go about batting? Do you attack or do you defend? It is a tough one for them," he said.
"We are 13 overs away from the second new ball so if we can knock one over tomorrow with the older ball then get the new ball to talk a bit and get some swing then that would help," he added.
New Zealand began the day on a parlous 47 for six and the pair of Watling and Doug Bracewell (7) added 14 runs to the overnight total before the right-handed Bracewell prodded at a Steyn delivery to send an outside edge through to keeper De Villiers.
Steyn struck again one run later when he trapped the left-handed Neil Wagner (0) leg-before with an in-swinging delivery.
The 29-year-old Steyn was not done yet and in his next over he bowled Jeetan Patel (0) after the batsman backed away from a good length delivery.
Steyn enjoyed a wonderful morning as he claimed his 19th five-wicket haul in tests as he sent down a spell that produced figures of 5-3-3-3.
Watling and Trent Boult (17 not out) then provided some late resistance with a last-wicket stand that produced 59 runs, a New Zealand record 10th-wicket partnership against South Africa beating the 57 scored by Simon Doull and Richard de Groen scored in Johannesburg during the 1994/95 season.
The aggressive Watling was the last man out, caught at first slip off the bowling of paceman Morne Morkel.

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Australian wildfires spare observatory, uncover bush drug lab

CANBERRA (Reuters) - Raging wildfires destroyed at least another 28 homes and licked at Australia's leading optical space observatory on Monday, officials said, but spared giant telescopes that have mapped far-away galaxies and discovered new planets.
Less fortunate were a father and son who police arrested after a fire was lit deliberately to destroy illegal drug laboratories they were alleged to be running in dense bushland. Police were closing in on the drug labs when the fire was lit.
More than 140 fires are burning across vast areas in the north and west of New South Wales state (NSW), Australia's most populated state, and in the island state of Tasmania despite cooler weather giving firefighters some respite.
A searing heat-wave had fuelled the fires over the past week. Only one person, an elderly firefighter working alone in Tasmania, has died so far in the fires.
The biggest blaze, with a perimeter of 100 km (60 miles), destroyed around 40,000 hectares (100,000 acres) of bushland and 28 homes around the Warrambungle National Park in NSW.
That fire also forced the evacuation of the Siding Springs Observatory, which houses 15 major telescopes.
Cameras inside the mountain-top observatory showed large flames and thick smoke sweeping over it. There appeared to be little damage to telescopes and dishes but scientists have been unable to visit the site yet to assess any damage.
"We do not yet know what impact the extreme heat of the ash might have on the telescopes themselves," said Erik Lithander, acting vice chancellor of the Australian National University, which operates the observatory.
The fire damaged five buildings at the observatory, including accommodation for visiting astronomers, but Lithander said scientists were confident the telescopes would still work.
Siding Springs is home to the 4-metre (13 ft) Anglo-Australian Telescope, which has surveyed 200,000 galaxies and was instrumental in confirming the existence of dark energy.
That discovery led to Australian Brian Schmidt sharing the 2011 Nobel Prize for physics.
The observatory has also helped find more than 30 new planets over the past decade and is being used to map the southern sky.
In Sydney, police arrested two men late on Sunday over a fire that broke out in the Blue Mountains National Park west of the city last week. The fire destroyed more than 50 hectares of bushland in the Blue Mountains, a popular tourist destination.
Police said they had been aware of the illegal, outdoor drug labs but were forced to postpone a raid due to the extreme fire danger in the area last week.
"The two sites ... were only accessible by foot and required police to trek through tick, leech and snake-infested scrubland to reach them," NSW police said in a statement on Monday.
Police said a father and son had been charged with "the large commercial manufacture of a prohibited drug" and contaminating a water catchment area. The younger man was also charged with lighting the fire.

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Award-season hopefuls stop in Palm Springs; Gere, Affleck, Field, Cooper among honorees

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. - Award-season hopefuls made their first stop of the new year in the middle of the desert a couple of hours east of Hollywood at the annual Palm Springs International Film Festival gala.
A blast of Golden Globe nominees and Oscar hopefuls walked the press gauntlet Saturday night, including Naomi Watts ("The Impossible"), Helen Hunt and John Hawkes ("The Sessions"), Ben Affleck ("Argo") and "Arbitrage" star Richard Gere, who received the night's so-called Chairman's Award.
"Great," Gere noted with more than a touch of sarcasm. "That's better than the Governors Award?" he inquired with a chuckle. "What's the pecking order of these awards? I want to know. Am I getting the best award? I'm not going in unless I'm getting the best award!"
Though the 63-year-old Gere has never received an Oscar nomination, there were previous Academy Award winners aplenty at the Palm Springs gala. Among them, Sally Field, the night's honoree for career achievement, including her hard-won role of Mary Todd in director Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln."
"I still can't believe I got the role," Field replied, cracking a smile. "Did I get it."
Turning serious, Field told the black-tie audience she was proud to be part of the film and happy to still be working. "I'm very lucky. ... Next year it'll be 50 years that I've been in the business as a professional. It's been a wild ride," she said.
This upcoming week the awards season continues with the People's Choice show, two critics awards ceremonies and Thursday morning's Oscar nominations.
So how does the phrase "Oscar nominee Bradley Cooper" sound to the "Silver Linings Playbook" actor?
"That would be incredible," Cooper answered, explaining that he just may sleep through the pre-dawn nomination announcements. "Yeah, I'm sure I'll get up, but maybe I'll be asleep. I don't know."
And just three days after the Oscar nominations, it's the 70th annual Golden Globe Awards — a "much, much friendlier" show, exclaimed "Hitchcock" nominee Helen Mirren.
"And it has to do with those tables in still quite a small room," she added. "They haven't allowed it to get enormous. ... Everybody table jumps and chats. It's always slightly naughty. The hosts are always naughty. I can't wait to have Tina Fey and Amy Poehler doing it. That's going to be such fun."
___
Complete list of 2013 Palm Springs International Film Festival honorees:
__"Argo's" Ben Affleck, Alan Arkin and Bryan Cranston received the Ensemble Performance Award.
__Bradley Cooper, the actor Desert Palm Achievement Award for "Silver Linings Playbook."
__Naomi Watts, the actress Desert Palm Achievement Award for "The Impossible."
__Helen Hunt, Spotlight Award for "The Sessions."
__Helen Mirren, International Star Award for "Hitchcock."
__Mychael Danna, the Frederick Loewe Award for Film Composing for "Life of Pi."
__Richard Gere, Chairman's Award for "Arbitrage."
__Robert Zemeckis, Director of the Year Award for "Flight."
__Sally Field ("Lincoln"), Career Achievement Award.
__Tom Hooper, the Sonny Bono Visionary Award for "Les Miserables.

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Regulators ease key bank rule to spur credit

BASEL, Switzerland/LONDON (Reuters) - Global regulators gave banks four more years and greater flexibility on Sunday to build up cash buffers so they can use some of their reserves to help struggling economies grow.
The pull-back from a draconian earlier draft of new global bank liquidity rule to help prevent another financial crisis went further than banks had expected by allowing them a broader range of eligible assets.
Banks had complained they could not meet the January 2015 deadline to comply with the new rule on minimum holdings of easily sellable assets from the Basel Committee of banking supervisors and also supply credit to businesses and consumers.
The committee's oversight body agreed on Sunday to phase in the rule from 2015 over four years, as reported by Reuters on Thursday, and widen the range of assets banks can put in the buffer to include shares and retail mortgage-backed securities (RMBS), as well as lower rated company bonds.
The new, less liquid assets can only be included at a hefty discount to their value, but the changes are a significant move from the draft version of the rule unveiled two years ago.
The Basel Committee, drawn from nearly 30 countries representing nearly all the world's markets, hopes they will stop banks from shrinking loan books to comply with the rule.
"For the first time in regulatory history, we have a truly global minimum standard for bank liquidity," the oversight body's chairman Mervyn King told a news conference in Basel, Switzerland.
"Importantly, introducing a phased timetable for the introduction of the liquidity coverage ratio ... will ensure that the new liquidity standard will in no way hinder the ability of the global banking system to finance a recovery," said King, who is also Bank of England governor.
Sunday's amendments, endorsed unanimously, came after two years of haggling among Basel Committee members.
They surprised relieved bankers with their scope and will help kick-start the mortgage backed securities market, languishing after being tarnished by the U.S. subprime crisis which set off the 2007-09 financial crisis.
"The inclusion of good quality RMBS in the liquidity buffer is a very welcome twelfth night present," said Simon Hills, executive director of the British Bankers' Association.
"It will make a real difference to issuance volumes by improving their marketability so that banks are better able to manage their balance sheets and provide funding to the real economy," Hills said.
MARKET PRESSURE
The rule requires banks to hold enough liquid assets like government and corporate bonds to cover net outflows for up to a month to avoid taxpayers having to bail them out.
Basel Committee chairman Stefan Ingves, who also heads Sweden's central bank, said Sunday's changes mean that the average buffer at the world's top 200 banks rises from 105 to 125 percent, meaning it is well above full compliance.
But many banks elsewhere are well below full compliance, especially in some euro zone countries, and they will have to find an estimated trillion euros of assets over coming years at a time when bank profitability is being hammered.
Furthermore, liquidity held by some banks is on loan from their central bank and will have to be returned at some point. A revived mortgage-backed securities would help wean lenders off central banks.
King said regulators want to be "crystal clear" that banks in countries undergoing stress like in the euro zone could draw down their buffers below minimum levels if the local supervisor agreed.
Jim Embersit, a former Federal Reserve official and Basel Committee member and now with Ernst & Young in Washington, said many banks would move to fully comply before 2019 given market pressures and the need to change business models.
"Firms will not be eager to jump to full 100 percent implementation quickly but would be expected to meet the required milestones on their own prior to the designated deadlines," Embersit said.
LESS STRESS
The Basel Committee also agreed to ease the "stress scenario" for calculating the amount of liquid assets banks must hold, meaning the buffer would be smaller.
Under the Basel regime, the rules would run alongside separate rules governing banks' capital, intended to ensure their longer-term stability.
Banks would start complying in 2015 when they are expected to hold at least 60 percent of the total buffer, building up to 100 percent by January 2019, when Basel's separate, tougher bank capital requirements also must be met in full.
The liquidity rule is meant to avoid a repeat of the scenario in which a short-term funding freeze brought down lenders like Britain's Northern Rock early on in the 2007-09 financial crisis.
It is part of the Basel III bank capital and liquidity accord agreed by world leaders in 2010 and being phased in over six years from this month, though there are delays in the United States and European Union.
Ingves said the Basel Committee is still committed to enacting a third plank of Basel III, the net stable funding ratio to limit dependence on short-term funding, by the end of 2018.
The Basel Committee will study how the introduction of the liquidity rule affects the impact of central banks injecting liquidity into the economy in a bid to spur growth.

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NBC says it is conscious of violence, but isn't the 'shoot-'em-up' network

PASADENA, Calif. - NBC says it is conscious about the amount of violence it airs in the wake of real-life tragedies, but it isn't really an issue because NBC isn't the "shoot-'em-up" network.
Network entertainment President Jennifer Salke said Sunday that NBC hasn't taken any specific steps to ask show creators to tone down violence. She said it would be different if NBC was perceived as a "shoot-'em-up" network with many crime procedurals, but she said it wasn't an issue.
NBC has in development a drama based on the life of Hannibal Lecter, one of fiction's most indelible serial killers, but hasn't scheduled it for the air.
Entertainment Chairman Robert Greenblatt said a tonic for people disturbed by violence is to watch an episode of "Parenthood.

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Egypt commission says Mubarak watched uprising

CAIRO (AP) — Egypt's Hosni Mubarak watched the uprising against him unfold through a live TV feed to his palace, despite his later denial that he knew the extent of the protests and crackdown against them, a member of a fact-finding mission said Wednesday. The finding could lead to the retrial of the 84-year-old ousted president, already serving a life sentence.
In questioning for his trial for the deaths of some 900 protesters during the uprising, Mubarak said he was kept in the dark by top aides as to the gravity of the situation and fended off charges that he ordered or knew of the deadly force used against the protesters.
Mubarak was convicted in June of failing to prevent the deaths. But many Egyptians were angered that he was not convicted for ordering or having a direct role in the crackdown.
Ahmed Ragheb, a rights lawyer and a member of the commission, said state TV had designated a coded satellite TV station that fed live material from cameras installed in Tahrir and surrounding areas directly to Mubarak's Palace throughout the 18-days of the uprising.
"Mubarak knew of all the crimes that took place directly. The images were carried to him live, and he didn't even need security reports," Ragheb told The Associated Press. "This entails a legal responsibility" in the violence against the protesters, including the infamous Camel Battle, where men on horses and camel and other Mubarak supporters stormed the square trying to drive protesters out.
At least 11 people are said to be killed in that attack, and some 25 members of the ruling were tried in the case were set free.
The finding came in a 700-page report on protester deaths the past two years, submitted Wednesday to President Mohammed Morsi. Morsi had formed this commission soon after he came to office in June, having promised during his election campaign that he will order new retrials for former regime officials if new evidence were revealed.
The commission also found that security forces and the military used live ammunition in crackdowns on protesters during the 18-day uprising against Mubarak and during the 17 months of rule by the military that followed his Feb. 11, 2011 fall, Ragheb said. The military repeatedly denied it used live ammunition against protesters, despite several deaths caused by bullets and pellets.
Ragheb refused to give specifics, saying revealing the details could undermine the report and top of some of those newly named in it as responsible for deaths.
He told Al-Masry Al-Youm daily that the report recommends summoning hundreds implicated in the killings of protesters for questioning.
The commission's 16 members include judges, rights lawyers, representatives from the Interior Ministry and intelligence, in addition to family members of some of those killed in the protests. The report was based on evidence and testimony collected over five months.
Morsi on Wednesday asked the commission to hand its report to the general prosecutor to investigate its contents to determine what should be done, according to a statement by his office.
The fact that Mubarak was able to monitor events in Tahrir, if established, could lead to him being charged with premeditated murder, said Khaled Abu Bakr, a lawyer who represented some of the victims in the uprising.
"A retrial might add more jail time if new charges appeared, and it could also change the penalty from life sentence to the death penalty," Abu Bakr said.
The case against Mubarak and top aides was very limited in scope, focusing only on the uprising's first few days and two narrow corruption cases. Mubarak and his two sons were acquitted on corruption charges. His former interior minister, Habib el-Adly, was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for complicity in the crackdown, while six top security aides were acquitted.
Mubarak's life sentence failed to satisfy many who had called for him to be held responsible for ordering the killing, in addition to years of widespread corruption, police abuse and political wrongdoing under his regime.
The report of military use of live ammunition could be more controversial, since any attempt to try generals for protester deaths would spark a backlash from the powerful military.
The transition period managed by the generals who took over from Mubarak was turbulent. Protests against their management of the transition often included violent crackdowns in which at least 100 people died in clashes between protesters and soldiers. The military often blamed unknown assailants for shooting at protesters. Rights groups have held the military responsible for the violence before. But evidence of their use of live ammunition was rarely available.

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American journalist missing in Syria

BEIRUT (AP) — An American journalist has been missing in Syria since he was kidnapped more than one month ago, his family said Wednesday, less than two years after he was held by government forces in Libya while covering that country's civil war.
The family of James Foley, of Rochester, N.H., said he was kidnapped in northwest Syria by unknown gunmen on Thanksgiving day.
Foley, 39, has worked in a number of conflict zones around the Middle East, including Syria, Libya and Iraq. He was contributing videos to Agence France-Press while in Syria.
Foley's disappearance highlights the risks to reporters seeking to cover the civil war from inside Syria.
The Syrian government rarely gives visas to journalists and often limits the movements of those it allows in. This has prompted a number of reporters to sneak into the country with the rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad. Some have been killed or wounded while others have disappeared.
Foley and another journalist were working in the northern province of Idlib when they were kidnapped near the village of Taftanaz on November 22. He had entered Syria a short time earlier.
Media outlets refrained from reporting on Foley's kidnapping until his family released its statement. The other reporter's family has requested that that reporter's name not be made public.
Foley's family said they have not heard from him since.
"We want Jim to come safely home, or at least we need to speak with him to know he's OK," said his father, John Foley, in the online statement. "Jim is an objective journalist and we appeal for the release of Jim unharmed. To the people who have Jim, please contact us so we can work together toward his release."
The Chairman of Agence France-Press, Emmanuel Hoog, said in a statement that the news agency was doing all it could to get Foley released.
"James is a professional journalist who has remained totally neutral in this conflict," Hoog said. "His captors, whoever they may be, must release him immediately."
In April 2011, Foley and two other reporters were detained by government forces in Libya while covering that country's civil war. They were released six weeks later. South African photographer Anton Hammerl was shot during their capture and left to die in the desert.
"I'll regret that day for the rest of my life. I'll regret what happened to Anton," Foley told The Associated Press at the time. "I will constantly analyze that."
The U.N. said Wednesday that more than 60,000 people have been killed since the start of Syria's conflict in March 2011. This number represents a large jump from death tolls previously given by anti-regime activists.
The Committee to Protect Journalists said that Syria was the most dangerous country in the world for journalists in 2012, when 28 reporters were killed.
Those who lost their lives include award-winning French TV reporter Gilles Jacquier, photographer Remi Ochlik and Britain's Sunday Times correspondent Marie Colvin. Also, Anthony Shadid, a correspondent for The New York Times, died after an apparent asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.
Last month, NBC correspondent Richard Engel and his crew were detained by pro-regime gunmen near where Foley was kidnapped. After his release, Engels said they escaped unharmed during a firefight between their captors and anti-regime rebels.

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Algerian forces kill 2 Islamist insurgents

ALGIERS, Algeria (AP) — Algerian security forces killed two radical Islamist insurgents on Wednesday in the same locality east of the capital where seven were killed a day earlier.
The official APS news agency quoted an unidentified security source as saying army troops on a search operation killed the two guerrillas in Boulzazene in the Boumerdes region, 70 kilometers (45 miles) east of Algiers.
Algeria has been fighting a years-long battle with al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, which uses the Kabyle region, near Boumerdes, as its headquarters.
The Defense Ministry said in a rare statement Tuesday that seven insurgents had been killed and arms, ammunition and medicine recovered.
In recent years, AQIM is noted more for its reach into the Sahel region with kidnappings and its takeover of parts of northern Mali, which borders Algeria.
Algeria's government said Wednesday that contacts to free several Algerian diplomats who were taken hostage in April by another radical Islamist group in northern Mali are continuing. Foreign Ministry spokesman Amar Belani told the official APS news agency that contacts "with various channels" are taking place.
However, he wouldn't comment on a video apparently showing two of the diplomats asking President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to "answer the demands" of captors "so we can return safe and sound." The authenticity of the video, dated in November and released by the Mauritanian agency alakhbar.info, couldn't be confirmed.
Seven diplomats were taken from the Algerian Consulate in Gao, Mali, on April 5, by the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa, or MUJAO, one of two radical groups controlling the north. Three were freed in July. The reported execution of one in September hasn't been officially confirmed.

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UN says more than 60,000 dead in Syrian civil war

BEIRUT (AP) — The United Nations gave a grim new count Wednesday of the human cost of Syria's civil war, saying the death toll has exceeded 60,000 in 21 months — far higher than recent estimates by anti-regime activists.
The day's events illustrated the escalating violence that has made recent months the deadliest of the conflict: As rebels pressed a strategy of attacking airports and pushing the fight closer to President Bashar Assad's stronghold in Damascus, the government responded with deadly airstrikes on restive areas around the capital.
A missile from a fighter jet hit a gas station in the suburb of Mleiha, killing or wounding dozens of people who were trapped in burning piles of debris, activists said.
Gruesome online video showed incinerated victims — one still sitting astride a motorcycle — or bodies torn apart.
"He's burning! The guy is burning!" an off-camera voice screamed in one video over a flaming corpse.
It was unclear if the government had a military strategy for attacking the gas station. At least one of the wounded wore a military-style vest often used by rebel fighters. Human rights groups and anti-regime activists say Assad's forces often make little effort to avoid civilian casualties when bombing rebel areas.
Syria's conflict began in March 2011 with protests calling for political change but has evolved into a full-scale civil war.
As the rebels have grown more organized and effective, seizing territory in the north and establishing footholds around Damascus, the government has stepped up its use of airpower, launching daily airstrikes. The escalating violence has sent the death toll soaring.
The U.N.'s new count of more than 60,000 deaths since the start of the conflict is a third higher than recent estimates by anti-regime activists. One group, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, says more than 45,000 people have been killed. Other groups have given similar tolls.
"The number of casualties is much higher than we expected, and is truly shocking," U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said in a statement.
She criticized the government for inflaming the conflict by cracking down on peaceful protests and said rebel groups, too, have killed unjustifiably. Acts by both sides could be considered war crimes, she said.
She also faulted world powers for not finding a way to stop the violence.
"The failure of the international community, in particular the Security Council, to take concrete actions to stop the bloodletting shames us all," Pillay said. "Collectively, we have fiddled at the edges while Syria burns."
The U.S. and many European and Arab nations have demanded that Assad step down, while Russia, China and Iran have criticized calls for regime change.
The new death toll was compiled by independent experts commissioned by the U.N. human rights office who compared 147,349 killings reported by seven different sources, including the Syrian government.
After removing duplicates, they had a list of 59,648 individuals killed between the start of the uprising on March 15, 2011, and Nov. 30, 2012. In each case, the victim's first and last name and the date and location of death were known. Killings in December pushed the number past 60,000, she said.
The total death toll is likely to be even higher because incomplete reports were excluded, and some killing may not have been documented at all.
"There are many names not on the list for people who were quietly shot in the woods," Pillay's spokesman Rupert Colville told The Associated Press.
The data did not distinguish among soldiers, rebels or civilians.
It indicated that the pace of killing has accelerated. Monthly death tolls in summer 2011 were around 1,000. A year later, they had reached about 5,000 per month.
Most of the killings were in the province of Homs, followed by the Damascus suburbs, Idlib, Aleppo, Daraa and Hama. At least three-fourths of the victims were male.
Pillay warned that thousands more could die or be injured, and she said the danger could continue even after the war.
"We must not compound the existing disaster by failing to prepare for the inevitable — and very dangerous — instability that will occur when the conflict ends," she said.
The U.N. refugee agency said about 84,000 people fled Syria in December alone, bringing the total number of refugees to about a half-million. Many more are displaced inside Syria.
While no one expects the war to end soon, international sanctions and rebel advances are eroding Assad's power. Rebels recently have targeted two pillars of his strength: his control of the skies and his grip on Damascus.
Rebels in northern Syria attacked a government helicopter base near the village of Taftanaz in Idlib province, activists said. Videos posted online showed them blasting targets inside the airport with heavy machine guns mounted on trucks.
All videos appeared genuine and corresponded with other AP reporting on the events.
In recent weeks, rebels have attacked three other airports in north Syria. They clashed Wednesday with forces inside the Mannagh military airport near the Turkish border as well as near the Aleppo international airport and adjacent Nerab military airport, halting air traffic there for the second straight day.
The fall of those airports to the rebels would embarrass the regime but not fully stop the airstrikes by government jets, many of which come from bases farther south.
In another blow to the regime and to Syria's economy, a company based in the Philippines that handled shipping containers at Syria's largest port said it was canceling its contract, citing an "untenable, hostile and dangerous business environment."
The Manila-based International Container Terminal Services Inc. said the amount of port traffic had gone down, hurting business, while conditions in Syria grew more dangerous.
The company's departure will significantly limit cargo services at the Tartus port.
Also, Wednesday, the family of American journalist James Foley revealed that he has been missing in Syria for more than a month. Foley was providing video for Agence France-Press when he was abducted Nov. 22 by unknown gunmen, his family said in a statement.
"His captors, whoever they may be, must release him immediately," said AFP chairman Emmanuel Hoog.
Covering Syria has been a challenge for journalists. The government rarely gives visas to journalists, prompting some to sneak in with the rebels, often at great danger.

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Egypt panel implicates Mubarak, military in deaths

CAIRO (AP) — An Egyptian fact-finding mission determined that Hosni Mubarak watched the uprising against him unfold through a live TV feed at his palace, despite his later denial that he knew the extent of the protests and crackdown against them, a member of the mission said Wednesday.
The mission's findings increase pressure for a retrial of the 84-year old ousted president, who is already serving a life sentence for the deaths of 900 protesters. But its report could hold both political gains and dangers for his successor, Mohammed Morsi. A new prosecution of Mubarak would be popular, since many Egyptians were angered that he was convicted only for failing to stop the killing of protesters, rather than for ordering the crackdown.
But the report also implicates the military and security officials in protester deaths. Any move to prosecute them could spark a backlash from powerful generals and others who still hold positions under Morsi's government.
Rights activists said they would watch carefully how aggressively Morsi pursues the evidence, detailed by a fact-finding mission he commissioned.
"This report should be part of the democratic transformation of Egypt and restructuring of security agencies," Ahmed Ragheb, a member of the commission and a rights lawyer, told The Associated Press. "At the end of the day, there will be no national reconciliation without revealing the truth, and ensuring accountability."
Morsi, an Islamist from the Muslim Brotherhood, asked the commission to send the report to the chief prosecutor Talaat Abdullah to investigate new evidence, his office said Wednesday.
Morsi recently appointed Abdullah to replace a Mubarak holdover who many considered an obstacle to strongly prosecuting former regime officials. Some judges criticized the appointment as a political move to continue to wield leverage over the prosecutor post.
The case will be a test whether Abdullah will conduct a thorough process of holding officials responsible. Some rights activists were already disappointed that Morsi didn't empower the fact-finding commission itself to turn the investigations into prosecutions and avoid political influence.
The 700-page report on protester deaths the past two years was submitted Wednesday to Morsi by the commission, made up of judges, rights lawyers, and representatives from the Interior Ministry and the intelligence, as well as families of victims.
Morsi formed the commission soon after coming to office in June as Egypt's first freely elected president after campaign promises to order retrials of former regime figures if new evidence was revealed.
The trial of Mubarak and other figures from his regime left the public deeply unconvinced justice was done. The prosecution was limited in scope, focusing only on the first few days of the 18-day uprising and on two narrow corruption cases. Lawyers have since criticized the case as shoddy, based mainly on evidence collected by battered and widely hated police in the days following the uprising.
In the verdicts last summer, Mubarak and his two sons were acquitted on corruption charges. His former interior minister was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for complicity in the crackdown, while six top security aides were acquitted for lack of evidence.
Mubarak was convicted to a life sentence of failing to prevent the deaths of protesters during the uprising, which ended with his fall on Feb. 11, 2011. Many Egyptians believed he should have been held responsible for ordering the killings, in addition to widespread corruption, police abuse and political wrongdoing under his regime.
One key new finding by the commission was that Mubarak closely monitored the crackdown.
Ragheb said state TV had designated an encrypted satellite TV station that fed live material from cameras installed in and around Tahrir Square directly to Mubarak's palace throughout clashes between protesters and security forces.
"Mubarak knew of all the crimes that took place directly. The images were carried to him live, and he didn't even need security reports," said Ragheb. "This entails a legal responsibility" in the violence against the protesters, including the infamous Camel Battle, where men on horses and camel and other Mubarak supporters stormed Tahrir.
At least 11 people are said to have been killed in that attack, and some 25 former ruling party members tried in the case were acquitted.
In questioning for his trial, Mubarak said he was kept in the dark by top aides as to the gravity of the situation, and fended off charges that he ordered or knew of the deadly force.
Khaled Abu Bakr, another lawyer who represented some of the victims in the uprising, said a retrial could "add more jail time if new charges appeared, and it could also change the penalty from life sentence to the death penalty."
More politically explosive is the commission's look at the 17 months of military rule after Mubarak's fall, when activists protesting the generals' conduct of the transition clashed repeated with security forces in violence that killed at least 100 protesters.
The report clearly established that security officials and the military used live ammunition against protesters during the transition and the anti-Mubarak uprising, Ragheb said.
The military repeatedly denied firing live ammunition, despite several protesters killed by bullets and pellets and despite reports by rights groups holding the army responsible.
The report established that at least one of nearly 70 missing since the uprising was tortured and died in a military prison, said Ragheb. It also details abuse by military and security officers in the days following Mubarak's ouster, including the beating and abusing of women protesters and the conducting of "virginity tests" to intimidate and humiliate them.
Ragheb refused to give further specifics. The report was not made public. But he told Al-Masry Al-Youm daily thatit recommends summoning hundreds for questioning in protester killings.
Several rights activists raised concerns that findings implicating any military officials or security figures in the current Interior Ministry will be ignored.
"There is every reason for Morsi and the prosecutor general he appointed to act on the findings and make sure they are translated into prompt prosecution," said Hossam Bahgat, a human rights lawyer from the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.
"It will be a major embarrassment not to do anything," he said, adding that it would also be "clear evidence" of what many believe to be an agreement by Morsi to grant immunity to military leaders for any alleged crimes during their rule.
Morsi appointed the latest commission at a time when his relations with the generals were rough. Just before officially transferring rule to Morsi, the military had issued a decree stripping the presidency of most of its powers.
After barely a month in office, Morsi pushed out the top generals who ruled during the transition and reclaimed his powers. His move brought no protest from the military, which many took as a sign of a backroom deal.
Gamal Eid, a lawyer who has represented protester families, pointed out that prosecutors and the court ignored a previous fact-finding mission that established evidence that could have been more incriminating.
Heba Morayef, a researcher with Human Rights Watch in Egypt, said a "protect the revolution" law recently issued by Morsi providing for new investigations into protester killings made no mention of the commission, meaning its findings were not binding and could be ignored.
"It is a wasted opportunity," she said. "Without a clear implementing mechanism, you leave room for political compromise at the expense of accountability."

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Nicaragua volcano spews ash cloud, residents evacuated

 Nicaragua's tallest volcano has belched an ash cloud hundreds of meters (feet) into the sky in the latest bout of sporadic activity, prompting the evacuation of nearby residents, the government said on Wednesday.
The 5,725-foot (1,745-meter) San Cristobal volcano, which sits around 85 miles north of the capital Managua in the country's northwest, has been active in recent years, and went through a similar episode in September.
The latest activity began late on Tuesday.
Government spokeswoman Rosario Murillo called on residents who live within a 1.9-mile (3-km) radius of the volcano to leave the area. Around 300 families live near the volcano.
"We have some families who have self-evacuated. ... We ask (the people) to go to a safe place, it's just for a few days during this emergency," she said, adding it was a precautionary measure.
A billowing grayish cloud could be seen drifting sideways from the volcano's peak.
The volcano also stirred in mid-2008, when it expelled gas and rumbled with a series of small eruptions.

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South Africa: Mandela released from the hospital

Former South African President Nelson Mandela was released Wednesday from the hospital after being treated for a lung infection and having gallstones removed, a government spokesman said.
The 94-year-old anti-apartheid icon will continue to receive medical care at home.
Mandela had been in the hospital since Dec. 8. In recent days, officials have said he was improving and in good spirits, but doctors have taken extraordinary care with his health because of his age.
Mandela was released Wednesday evening and will receive "home-based high care" at his residence in the Johannesburg neighborhood of Houghton until he fully recovers, said presidential spokesman Mac Maharaj.
"We thank the public and the media for the good wishes and for according Madiba and the family the necessary privacy," said Maharaj in a statement, using Mandela's clan name, a term of affection. The statement requested that Mandela's privacy continue to be respected "in order to allow for the best possible conditions for full recovery."
David Phetoe, a resident of the Johannesburg township of Soweto, reacted with joy when he heard that Mandela was no longer in a hospital.
"It's not always the case, when people offer great expectations, that those expectations are fulfilled," he said. "In this case, we say in the same tone, in the Christmas mood and in the Christmas season, let him stick around for a while!"
Mandela is revered around the world as a symbol of sacrifice and reconciliation, his legacy forged in the fight against apartheid, the system of white minority rule that imprisoned him for 27 years.
The Nobel laureate served one five-year term as president after South Africa's first democratic elections in 1994. Although the country today struggles with poverty and inequality, Mandela is widely credited with helping to avert race-driven chaos as South Africa emerged from apartheid.
South African President Jacob Zuma was among those who joined Mandela's wife, Graca Machel, and other family members in wishing a Merry Christmas to Mandela at his hospital bedside in Pretoria, the South African capital.
"I think he is an icon of hope and we are very excited" that Mandela is out of the hospital, said Sipho Sibiko, a Soweto resident. "I personally know that he is one of the people that inspired me. He inspires a lot of people and we are excited that he has been released. We wish him many more joyous years and good health.

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Tensions hit French Embassy in C. African Republic

Angry protesters carrying clubs threw rocks at the French Embassy in Central African Republic on Wednesday, criticizing the former colonial power for failing to do more to stem a rapid rebel advance as fears grew that the insurgents aim to seize the capital.
The demonstrations began earlier in the day outside the U.S. Embassy before about 100 protesters then took to the French Embassy, carrying pieces of cardboard with messages that read: "No to war! No to France!"
"It's France who colonized us — they should support us until the end. Unfortunately, they have done nothing. In this case, we are merely asking purely and simply that they leave our country," shouted one young demonstrator in front of the French mission in Bangui.
The protesters then began stopping cars to verify whether any foreign nationals were inside.
"These people have taken down the French flag from its pole and removed it," said Serge Mucetti, the French ambassador to Central African Republic. "They have carried out stone-throwing in the area of the embassy and have broken windows. This kind of behavior is unacceptable."
Air France confirmed Wednesday that its once-a-week flight to Bangui turned back because of protests at the French Embassy. The decision was made independently by Air France, and the French government did not make the request, said an airline spokeswoman, who spoke on condition of anonymity because company policy did not authorize her to speak on the record.
The French foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the armed attacks, saying they "gravely undermine the peace agreements in place and the efforts of the international community to consolidate peace" in the country, U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said.
The U.N. chief appealed to all parties to refrain from any acts of violence against civilian and to respect human rights, he said.
The secretary-general welcomed the conclusions of the heads of state summit of the Economic Community of the Central African States in Ndjamena, Chad, on Dec. 21 and urged all parties to abide by the decisions "which provide a basis for a peaceful resolution of the dispute," Nesirky said.
But many fear that Bangui, a city of about 600,000 people, could be the scene of a battle between government forces and the rebels. The fighters already have seized at least 10 towns, meeting little resistance from soldiers.
Rebel Col. Djouma Narkoyo said Wednesday that his forces have continued taking towns in recent days because government forces are attacking their positions. But, he insisted via phone: "Our intention is not to take Bangui. We still remain open to dialogue."
Bangui residents were skeptical of the insurgents' intentions.
"We are afraid by what we see happening in our country right now," said Leon Modomale, a civil servant in the capital. "It's as if the rebels are going to arrive in Bangui any moment now because there are too many contradictions in their language."
The rebel advance began earlier this month, with a push by the Union for the Democratic Forces for Unity, known by its French acronym of UFDR. The group signed an April 13, 2007, peace accord, which paved the way for the fighters to join the regular army, but the group's leaders say the deal was never properly implemented.
Central African Republic is a desperately poor, landlocked country that has suffered numerous rebellions since independence from France. Despite the nation's wealth of gold, diamonds, timber and uranium, the government remains perpetually cash-strapped.
U.S. special forces troops have deployed to Central African Republic among other countries in the region in the hunt for Joseph Kony, the fugitive rebel leader of the notorious Lord's Resistance Army.

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Children, many ill, would be victims of Russia ban on U.S. adoption

Family Christmas cards and smiling snapshots of children sent by their adoptive American parents fill Galina Sigayeva's office in Russia's second city St Petersburg.
Many of them were crippled by illness and in desperate need of medical care before her agency helped organise their adoption into U.S. families, she recalls.
Children's rights campaigners say children like these will suffer most if President Vladimir Putin approves a law barring American adoptions that has been rubber-stamped by Russian lawmakers. The act retaliates against a new U.S. law that will punish Russians accused of human rights violations.
Critics of the bill say Russian orphanages are woefully overcrowded and the fate of vulnerable children should not be used as a bargaining chip in a bilateral feud.
"These children are not even offered to foreigners until they get a certain number of (adoption) refusals from Russians," said Sigayeva, a neatly styled brunette who heads the New Hope Christian Services Adoption Agency.
"These are children with complicated diagnoses, really complicated. They are very ill children."
She smiled as she flipped through photos of children embraced by their adoptive parents, playing with family pets and enjoying presents and other trappings of holiday cheer.
"What surprises me is that here they all look so healthy, so fantastic, but you should see what they look like when they are taken from here," Sigayeva said.
"Some had to be carried to the border. We had a girl with hepatitis whom we helped from the emergency room."
Both sides in the heated debate surrounding the bill agree Russia's orphanage system is overwhelmed, riddled with corruption and most failing to place children in families.
More than 650,000 children are considered orphans in Russia - though some were rejected by their parents or taken from dysfunctional homes. Of that total, 110,000 lived in state institutions in 2011, according to the Ministry of Science and Education.
By contrast, in the United States - which has more than twice Russia's population - about 58,280 children were living in group homes and institutions last year, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Adoptions by Russian families remain modest, with some 7,400 adoptions in 2011 compared with 3,400 adoptions of Russian children by families abroad.
Russian politicians say it is an embarrassment that the country cannot care for its own, and supporters of the measure argue it will help stimulate reform and domestic adoptions.
"Foreign adoption is a result of the state and society's lack of attention to orphans ... It is, if you will, a result of our indifference," Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev told officials at a ruling party congress last week.
American families adopt more Russian children - 956 last year - than those of any other country. Of the children adopted by Americans in 2011, 9 percent - or 89 - were disabled, according to official Russian figures.
Opponents of the legislation, who include senior officials such as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, say politicking should not deprive orphans of this chance at better life.
"Russia is not able to provide for all its orphans," Boris Altshuler, director of the Moscow-based Rights of the Child advocacy group, said. "Although 1,000 is a small fraction - it was a help."
Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets has said the ban would violate international treaties on child rights, and the Kremlin's own human rights council called it unconstitutional.
"AMERICAN ROULETTE"
The ban responds to a U.S. law known as the Magnitsky Act, which punishes Russians suspected of being involved in the death in custody of anti-graft lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in 2009, and of other human rights violations, by barring them from entering the United States.
In a pointed echo of the Magnitsky Act, Russia's legislation is named the Dima Yakovlev law, after a Russian-born toddler who died of heat stroke after his American adoptive father left him locked in a sweltering car.
His death and that of 19 other Russian-born children in the hands of U.S. citizens in the last decade has helped drive support for the bill and for tougher adoption rules in a deal with the United States in June.
"It's American roulette," said Pavel Astakhov, Russia's Children's Rights Commissioner and a supporter of the ban.
"One handicapped girl from Russia got lucky. She was Jessica Long - a Paralympic champion. Another did not. She was Masha Allen ... who was raped by her paedophile adoptive father."
DISABLED CHILDREN
If Putin signs it into law, the ban will come into force on January 1, most immediately affecting the fate of children whose adoption is in the works.
The placement of 46 children with American families will be cancelled, Astakhov told the Interfax news agency on Wednesday.
"There is terrible irony in the fact that America's decision to speak out against human rights violations may cause the Russian government to deny many thousands of Russian orphans the possibility to grow up in loving, adoptive families," said Chuck Johnson, president of National Council For Adoption, a non-profit advocacy group based in Alexandria, Virginia.
Sigayeva, of the New Hope Christian Services Adoption Agency, said a six-month halt on American adoptions until a new bilateral deal entered force in November showed how it would aggravate problems in Russia's strained child-protection system.
"Hospitals were overwhelmed. There was no room in orphanages or hospitals for children whom their parents had rejected. So what's next then?" said Sigayeva, whose agency has helped place some 200 children in American families since 1992.
Advocates who work with disabled children say a reform proposal drafted by Astakhov ignores their plight. They say it calls for a reduction in the number of institutions caring for children with disabilities without explaining how they will find foster homes and medical care.
"No concrete measures are being suggested. Nothing exists but a lot of children's pain, which will only increase now," said Sergei Koloskov, a campaigner for children with Down's Syndrome.
"They are being left parentless in addition to being ill.

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New turmoil hits Egypt's tourism

At Egypt's Pyramids, the desperation of vendors to sell can be a little frightening for some tourists.
Young men descend on any car with foreigners in it blocks before it reaches the more than 4,500 year-old Wonder of the World. They bang on car doors and hoods, some waving the sticks and whips they use for driving camels, demanding the tourists come to their shop or ride their camel or just give money.
In the southern city of Aswan, tour operator Ashraf Ibrahim was recently taking a group to a historic mosque when a mob of angry horse carriage drivers trapped them inside, trying to force them to take rides. The drivers told Ibrahim to steer business their way in the future or else they'd burn his tourist buses, he said.
Egypt's touts have always been aggressive — but they're more desperate than ever after nearly two years of devastation in the tourism industry, a pillar of the economy.
December, traditionally the start of Egypt's peak season, has brought new pain. Many foreigners stayed away because of the televised scenes of protests and clashes on the streets of Cairo in the battle over a controversial constitution.
Arrivals this month were down 40 percent from November, according to airport officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information.
Tourism workers have little hope that things will get better now that the constitution came into effect this week after a nationwide referendum. The power struggle between Islamist President Mohammed Morsi and the opposition threatens to erupt at any time into more unrest in the streets.
More long term, many in the industry worry ruling Islamists will start making changes like banning alcohol or swimsuits on beaches that they fear will drive tourists away.
"Nobody can plan anything because one day you find that everything might be OK and another that everything is lost. You can't even take a right decision or plan for the next month," said Magda Fawzi, head of Sabena Management.
She's thinking of shutting down her company, which runs two hotels in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh and four luxury cruise boats on the Nile between the ancient cities of Luxor and Aswan. In one hotel, only 10 of 300 rooms are booked, and only one of her ships is operating, she said. She has already downsized from 850 employees before the revolution to 500.
"I don't think there will be any stability with this kind of constitution. People will not accept it," she said.
Tourism, one of Egypt's biggest foreign currency earners, was gutted by the turmoil of last year's 18-day uprising that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak.
Scared off by the upheaval, the number of tourists fell to 9.8 million in 2011 from 14.7 million the year before, and revenues plunged 30 percent to $8.8 billion.
This year, the industry struggled back. By the end of September, 8.1 million tourists had come, injecting $10 billion into the economy. The number for the full year is likely to surpass 2011 but is still considerably down from 2010.
For the public, it has meant a drying up of income, given that tourism provided direct or indirect employment to one in eight Egyptians in 2010, according to government figures.
Poverty swelled at the country's fastest rate in Luxor province, highly dependent on visitors to its monumental temples and the tombs of King Tutankamun and other pharaohs. In 2011, 39 percent of its population lived on less than $1 a day, compared to 18 percent in 2009, according to government figures.
For the government, the fall in tourism and foreign investment since the revolution has worsened a debt crisis and forced talks with the International Monetary Fund over a $4.8 billion loan.
Morsi has promised to expand tourism, but hotel owners and tour operators say he has yet to make clear any plans.
Their biggest fear is new violence causing shocks like December's. Ibrahim, of the Eagle Travels tourism company, said that because of this month's protests, two German operators he works with cancelled tours. They weren't even heading to Cairo, but to the Red Sea, Luxor and Aswan, far from the unrest.
But some in the industry fear that, with the constitution's provisions strengthening implementation of Shariah, Islamists will ban alcohol or restrict dress on Egypt's beaches, which rival antiquities sites as draws for tourism. Officials from the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsi hails, are vague about any plans.
Ultraconservative Salafis, who are key allies of Morsi, have been more direct.
Nader Bakkar, spokesman for the Salafi Nour Party, told a conference of tour guides in Aswan earlier this month that tourists should not be allowed to buy alcohol but could bring it with them and drink it in their rooms. Tourists should also be encouraged to wear conservative dress, he said.
"We welcome all tourists but we tell them ... there are traditions and beliefs in the country, so respect them," he said. "Most tourists will have no problem if you tell them" to bring their own alcohol.
One Salafi sheik earlier this year said the Pyramids and Sphinx should be demolished as anti-Islamic — like Afghanistan's then-Taliban rulers destroyed monumental Buddha statues in 2001. Bakkar dismissed the comments as the opinion of one cleric.
But tour guide Gladys Haddad sees the Salafis' attitude as a threat, saying the constitution should have said more to protect Egypt's pharaonic heritage. "We are talking about a civilization that they do not acknowledge. They see it as idolatrous."
"Why would a tourist come to a resort if he can't drink?" said Fawzi, of Sabena Management. "People are coming for tours and monuments, and to relax on the boats. If they feel that restriction, why should they come?"
Nahla Mofied of Escapade Travels said the Islamists might restrict what tourists can "wear and do" but, given its importance to the economy, "they may not destroy tourism fully."
Complicating attempts to draw tourists back is the lawlessness gripping Egypt the past two years. With police supervision low, tourist touts increasingly assault guides and even tourists to demand business. In September, 150 tour guides held a protest against attacks by vendors.
"We have struggled with this problem since before the revolution, but now the situation is completely out of control," Ibrahim said.
At the Giza Pyramids, police seem indifferent to the touts. Camel-riding police even join in, pushing tourists to take rides.
Gomaa al-Gabri, an antiquities employee, was infuriated at the sight, shouting, "You sons of dogs" and a slew of other insults at a policeman trying to get money off a tourist.
"They're trying to take away my income," said the father of 11. "In Mubarak's time we wouldn't dare talk to them like this. Now I can hit him with a shoe on his head and he can't speak."
For some tourists at the Pyramids, the chaos is part of the experience.

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Kenya Red Cross: 30 people killed in clashes

At least 30 people were killed when farmers raided a village of herders in southeastern Kenya early Friday in renewed fighting between two communities with a history of violent animosity, the Kenya Red Cross said.
Five children and five women were among the dead, the Red Cross said. Forty-five houses were set on fire during the attack, Red Cross spokeswoman Nelly Muluka said.
Anthony Kamitu, who is leading police operations to prevent attacks in the region, said that the Pokomo tribe of farmers raided a village of the semi-nomadic Orma herding community at dawn in the Tana River Delta. He said the raiders were armed with spears and AK-47 rifles.
At least 110 people were killed in clashes between the Pokomo and Orma in August and September.
The tit-for-tat cycle of killings may be related to a redrawing of political boundaries and next year's general elections, the U.N. Humanitarian coordinator for Kenya, Aeneas C. Chuma, said late August. However, on the surface the violence seems driven by competition for water, pasture and other resources, he said.
Political tensions and tribal animosities have increased due to competition among potential candidates in the March election.
Violence after Kenya's last general election, in late 2007, killed more than 1,000 people. Officials are working to avoid a repeat during March's presidential election, but episodes of violence around the country are raising fears that pockets of the country will see violence during the voting period.
The Tana River area is about 430 miles (690 kilometers) from the capital, Nairobi.
The utilization of the waters of the Tana River has been at the middle of a conflict pitting the Pokomo against the Orma, according to research by the Institute of Security Studies in 2004, following clashes in the Tana River area in 2000 to 2002. The Pokomo claim the land along the river and the Orma claim the waters of the river, said the research by Taya Weiss, titled "Guns in the Borderlands Reducing the Demand for Small Arms." At least 108 people died in the 2000-2002 clashes, according to the parliamentary record.
The longstanding conflict between the two tribes had previously resulted in relatively low casualties but the increased availability of guns has caused the casualties to escalate and more property to be destroyed, said the report.
It said a catalyst to the conflict was the collapse of three irrigation schemes at Bura, Hola, and Tana Delta, which influenced residents' lifestyles in terms of employment and sources of income.
"The collapse of these schemes forced the nomadic pastoralists to move during the wet season, while the farmers remained along the river. During the dry season the pastoralists move back to the river in search of water and pasture," it said.
The Tana River area has the characteristics of any other conflict prone area in Kenya: underdevelopment, poor infrastructure, poor communication and social amenities, and social marginalization, according to the report.
"Communities are arming themselves because of the need to defend against perceived attacks," said the report. "They feel that the government security machinery has not been able to effectively respond to violence. Isolation has led to increased demand for guns.

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Burning pipeline fire sign of Nigeria's woes

 The gasoline pipeline burns unstopped near a village close to Nigeria's sprawling megacity of Lagos, shooting flames into the air as leaking fuel muddies the ground. All around it, the ground is littered with plastic jerry-cans, used by those who hacked into the line to steal the fuel within.
The pipeline explosion here in Ije Ododo shows the ongoing problems oil-rich Nigeria faces. While the nation's politicians and businessmen have long profited from the country's production of roughly 2 million barrels of oil a day, many Nigerians remain desperately poor and take dangerous risks to try and earn a living.
Meanwhile, nothing ever seems to change, locals say.
"That sort of thing always happens every year," resident Samuel Otor said with a shrug.
This pipeline explosion happened Monday in Ije Ododo, in a swampy mangrove forest in the western fringe of the sprawling city of Lagos. Officials say the explosion happened when locals tapped into the pipeline to steal the refined gasoline moving through it. A spark from the scavengers likely set the line ablaze. It's unclear how many people were injured by the initial blast.
On Thursday, the flames still burned as fire-fighters sprayed water around the site, trying to stop the fire from spreading. The ground turned to a foul-smelling mud, with puddles of fuel and dirt looking red.
The line belonged to the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. It is the second-such pipeline rupture in the recent months around Lagos. In September, the company said suspected thieves shot dead three of its workers in southeast Ogun state after rupturing a gasoline pipeline to steal fuel. Another pipeline rupture in Nigeria's southeastern Abia state killed about 20 people.
Pipeline ruptures remain common in Nigeria, where militants and criminals routinely tap into lines to steal crude oil and refined gasoline. Fires can easily and accidentally be sparked by those attempting to gather the fuel.
While the government criticizes theft from the lines, it often remains the only quick way to make money in a nation where most earn the equivalent of a $1 day. The International Energy Agency recently estimated that widespread thefts of crude oil in Nigeria cost the country $7 billion a year.
Despite efforts to crack down on oil and gasoline thieves, locally called bunkerers, the practice continues unstopped, just like the flames in this small village.

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