Continue reading Panasonic introduces Lumix DMC-ZS20 and ZS15 compact superzoom cameras
Panasonic introduces Lumix DMC-ZS20 and ZS15 compact superzoom cameras originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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By JAYMES SONG
updated 1:00 a.m. ET Jan. 30, 2012
HONOLULU - While everyone was playing at half-speed and ready to extend their Hawaiian vacation, Brandon Marshall played as if it was his last game.
The Miami Dolphins wide receiver caught six passes for 176 yards and a Pro Bowl-record four touchdowns, and the AFC used a second-half surge to beat the NFC 59-41 on Sunday.
"You never know when you're going to be back," Marshall said, "and I wanted to go all out today because it could be my last Pro Bowl."
Marshall had a touchdown catch in each quarter, including an early 74-yarder and a 3-yarder in the fourth, in a game filled with highlight-reel grabs.
He was selected the game's MVP, and his name now will join the likes of Walter Payton and Jerry Rice on the MVP banners at Aloha Stadium.
"You know what? I wanted it," he said. "It's a Pro Bowl. Some guys are playing 100 (percent), some guys are playing 90, some guys aren't playing at all, but it means a lot to be up in the rafters with some of these guys."
The 59 points by the AFC set a Pro Bowl mark, and the 100 points scored by the teams combined was the second highest, a touchdown shy of the 107 scored in 2004.
But it was clear from the start it was Marshall's day. He hauled in a deflected, go-ahead 47-yard TD pass from Andy Dalton, while on his back, to give the AFC a 38-35 lead late in the third quarter. It was Marshall's third TD catch of the game, tying Jimmy Smith's Pro Bowl record set in 2004.
"It was the most unathletic highlight I ever had," he said. "Andy put it up there for me to make a play. I saw the ball, got nervous, fell, saw the ball, kicked it up and it just fell in my hands."
Marshall, making his third Pro Bowl appearance, then nabbed a 3-yard TD pass from Dalton that gave the AFC a 52-35 lead with 8:25 left and put the game away.
"People were saying throw to him. I saw the matchup I had and he's a great receiver, so I knew he could make the play," Dalton said.
Hawaii has been kind to Marshall, who also won MVP honors at Aloha Stadium in his final game at Central Florida in the 2005 Hawaii Bowl, where he caught 11 passes for 210 yards and three touchdowns.
Marshall noted he had six TDs this season, but four this game.
"It says a lot when you're playing with these type of quarterbacks," Marshall said. "They just put it in the right place and I just made the play. Hats off to those guys throwing me the ball."
The game featured 36 first-timers, including rookie quarterbacks Cam Newton of the Carolina Panthers and Dalton of the Cincinnati Bengals, who replaced Super Bowl quarterbacks Eli Manning and Tom Brady. Their selection made this Pro Bowl the first to feature two rookie signal callers.
Dalton and Newton played the entire second half.
While Dalton looked composed, Newton played horribly ? struggling to move the ball, stay in the pocket and find his targets, which drew some boos from the sun-splashed, sellout crowd of 48,423.
"No excuses," Newton said. "When you hang the ball up there, against these kind of players, that's what you get," Newton said. "It's the good and the bad of playing in a Pro Bowl. I learned a lot."
Newton finished 9 of 27 for 186 yards with two touchdowns and two interceptions. Dalton, meanwhile, was 7 of 9 for 99 yards and two TDs.
On his first series, Newton overthrew a wide-open Tony Gonzalez over the middle, with the ball sailing into Eric Weddle's hands. The San Diego Chargers safety popped up to his feet and returned it 63 yards to the NFC 23, leading to a 37-yard FG by Sebastian Janikowski, which gave the AFC its first lead of the game at 31-28.
Newton recovered on the next series, airing out a 55-yard go-ahead touchdown pass to Panthers teammate Steve Smith, making it 34-31. But he was intercepted again on the next series.
Weddle also intercepted another pass by Newton late in the game. After picking off the deep pass, he pitched it to teammate Derrick Johnson, who rumbled 60 yards for the AFC's final score.
"None of us want to go out and lose, so we picked it up and went out and made some plays," Weddle said. "Got the 'W,' that's the main thing."
With the Pro Bowlers unable to get out of third gear ? particularly on the offensive and defensive lines ? and hitting each other as though they were having a pillow fight, the Pro Bowl featured some good, bad and real ugly ? sometimes on the same play. For example, Aaron Rodgers caught a pass from himself. His throw was deflected at the line and he leaped to catch the ball and backpedaled for a 15-yard loss.
Rodgers was 13 of 17 for 141 yards and two TDs, giving him a quarterback rating of 139.6, higher than his NFL record 122.5 rating during the season. But he was watching late in the game as Newton struggled.
Rodgers said it's easier to play in the first quarter when the game isn't as intense.
"It's tough to be the last guy in, when it's the fourth quarter and money becomes an issue," he said. "Guys are playing a little bit harder. They come at you."
The NFC had three players with 100-yard yard receiving: Gonzalez (seven for 114), Larry Fitzgerald (6 for 111) and Smith (5 for 118).
The AFC and NFC traded score after score, and turnover after turnover in the first half.
Rodgers and Fitzgerald connected for a pair of scores on back-to-back plays to put the NFC up 14-0 early in the game.
After stopping the AFC on fourth down at midfield, Rodgers drove the NFC down the field and threw a 10-yard TD toss to Fitzgerald. Six seconds later, Rodgers aired a 44-yard rainbow in the end zone to Fitzgerald for another score after the NFC got the ball back with a surprise onside kick.
The reception was Fitzgerald's sixth career TD catch in the Pro Bowl, tying Gonzalez's record. He would break the record with the game's last touchdown, on a 36-yard pass from Newton.
The AFC came right back and tied it up on two deep TD passes on the right side by Ben Roethlisberger. He threw a 34-yarder to rookie A.J. Green, and then connected with Marshall on a 74-yarder.
But Drew Brees and the NFC kept the scoring going. Just like in the regular season, Brees and Saints teammate Jimmy Graham hooked up to give the NFC a 21-14 lead in the second quarter. On fourth-and-goal, Brees zipped a pass to Graham for a 6-yard score and would later find Greg Jennings for an 11-yard TD. Brees finished 10 of 14 for 146 yards and two touchdowns.
Antonio Gates pulled in a 27-yard TD from Chargers teammate Rivers as time expired in the half to tie it at 28.
Each AFC player earned a record $50,000 for the win, while the NFC players received $25,000.
? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/46185221/ns/sports-nfl/
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Continue reading Sony grows Cyber-shot family by three with DSC-WX50 and WX70, ultra-thin TX200V
Sony grows Cyber-shot family by three with DSC-WX50 and WX70, ultra-thin TX200V originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Jan 2012 23:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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MUMBAI, India (AP) ? India has joined China in saying it will not cut back on oil imports from Iran, despite stiff new U.S. and European sanctions designed to pressure Tehran over its nuclear program.
"It is not possible for India to take any decision to reduce the import from Iran drastically because, after all, the countries which can provide the requirement of the emerging economy, Iran is an important country among them," India's finance minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters Sunday in Chicago.
India and China together accounted for 34 percent of Iran's oil exports from January to September of 2011 ? slightly more than Europe, according to International Energy Agency data.
The move is likely to be seen as a political victory in Iran, but it's unclear how Chinese and Indian companies will actually be able to pay for Iranian oil without running afoul of the sanctions, analysts said.
"It's a blow," said David Hartwell, senior Middle East analyst at IHS Jane's, adding that Iran may have discounted prices to keep the Chinese and Indians on their side. "If you have two major countries like India and China saying they will not abide by the sanctions, that's going to keep a vital line open for the Iranians to continue to sidestep the sanctions and get foreign capital."
He said India and China could just be trying to buy time to diversify their oil supplies and may steer away from Iran, especially if Saudi Arabia ? India's largest source of oil imports ? were to ramp up production and offer an attractively priced alternative.
The European Union last week imposed an oil embargo against Iran and froze the assets of its central bank. In December, the U.S. said it would bar financial institutions from the U.S. market if they do business with Iran's central bank.
India and China are ravenous energy consumers and rely heavily on imported oil. Iranian oil accounts for 9 percent of India's oil consumption and 6 percent of China's, according to the latest data from the IEA.
Iran exports 2.5 million barrels of oil per day, about 3 percent of world supplies. About 500,000 barrels go to Europe and most of the rest goes to China, India, Japan and South Korea.
China has called for negotiations over Iran's nuclear program. South Korea has been noncommittal about the sanctions, and Japan is seeking an exemption, saying its Iranian oil imports have steadily declined and probably will continue to do so.
Kyodo News agency reported that senior Japanese and U.S. officials on Thursday will hold their second meeting on the sanctions this month.
"I believe it may not be easy to come to a conclusion on this matter in the upcoming discussions," Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba said.
Western sanctions could make it harder for India to pay for the oil it gets from Iran. Past sanctions have already delayed payments by Indian oil importers, who have had to scramble to find banks willing to handle transactions with Iran.
India's central bank governor D. Subbarao said last week that the current payment mechanism was "working fine," though India was also "exploring other options," which he declined to discuss.
Indian companies now reportedly route payments through Turkey's Turkiye Halk Bankasi AS, after EU pressure forced German-based Europaisch-Iranische Handelsbank AG to stop handling the payments last year.
IHS Jane's energy analyst Catherine Hunter said Turkey is unlikely to shut down that route immediately, noting that Turkish oil refiner Tupras also uses this payment mechanism.
"But this route remains susceptible to external pressure," she added by email. "India is now discussing rupee based payments and direct trade ? however that has a number of drawbacks for Iran given the trade imbalance and restrictions on use. China isn't publicly discussing options but I imagine other currency payments are also on the cards there."
The U.S. and its allies believe Iran is using oil revenues to develop nuclear weapons, but Tehran insists its nuclear program is purely for peaceful purposes.
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INDIANAPOLIS ? From pickpockets and prostitutes to dirty bombs and exploding manhole covers, authorities are bracing for whatever threat the first Super Bowl in downtown Indianapolis might bring.
Some ? nuclear terrorism, for instance ? are likely to remain just hypothetical. But others, like thieves and wayward manhole covers, are all too real.
Though Indianapolis has ample experience hosting large sporting events ? the Indianapolis 500 attracts more than 200,000 fans each year, and the NCAA's men's Final Four basketball tournament has been held here six times since 1980_ the city's first Super Bowl poses some unique challenges.
Unlike the Final Four, which is compressed into a weekend, the Super Bowl offers crowd, travel and other logistical challenges over 10 days leading up to the Feb. 5 game. And unlike the 500, where events are largely concentrated at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway about seven miles from Lucas Oil Stadium, the NFL's showcase event will consume 44 blocks ? about a mile square ? in the heart of the city, closing off streets and forcing an anticipated 150,000 or more NFL fans to jockey with downtown workers for space much of the week.
"This is clearly bigger in terms of the amount of people who will be downtown over an extended period of time," city Public Safety Director Frank Straub said.
Under a security risk rating system used by the federal government, the Super Bowl ranks just below national security events involving the president and the Secret Service, said Indianapolis Chief of Homeland Security Gary Coons. The ratings are based on factors including international attention, media coverage, number of people the event attracts and visits by celebrities and foreign dignitaries, he said. The Indianapolis 500 ranks two levels below the Super Bowl.
The city has invested millions of dollars and worked with local, state and federal agencies to try to keep all those people safe. Up to 1,000 city police officers will be in the stadium and on the street, carrying smartphones and other electronic hand-held devices that will enable them to feed photos and video to a new state-of-the-art operations center on the city's east side or to cruisers driven by officers providing backup, Straub said. Hundreds of officers from other agencies, including the state police and the FBI, will be scanning the crowd for signs of pickpocketing, prostitution or other trouble.
One concern has been a series of explosions in Indianapolis Power & Light's underground network of utility cables. A dozen underground explosions have occurred since 2005, sending manhole covers flying.
Eight explosions have occurred since 2010. The latest, on Nov. 19, turned a manhole cover into a projectile that heavily damaged a parked car and raised concerns about the safety of Super Bowl visitors walking on streets and soaring above the Super Bowl village on four zip lines installed for the festivities.
Since December, IPL has spent about $180,000 to install 150 new locking manhole covers, primarily in the Super Bowl village and other areas expected to see high pre-game traffic.
IPL officials say the new Swiveloc manhole covers can be locked for security reasons during the Super Bowl. In case of an explosion, the covers lift a couple of inches off the ground ? enough to vent gas out without feeding in oxygen to make an explosion bigger ? before falling back into place.
An Atlanta consultant hired by the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission last summer to audit IPL's underground network of cables for a cause of the explosions says the new covers are merely a Band-Aid.
"We've argued it's better to prevent," said Dan O'Neill of O'Neill Management Consulting, which filed its report in December.
O'Neill's team couldn't pinpoint an exact cause for the explosions but said a flawed inspection process contributed, noting that IPL workers missed warning signs such as road salt corroding an old cable or leaks in nearby steam pipes. In a report filed Jan. 19 with Indiana utility regulators, the power company said it had overhauled its inspection process.
IPL will dispatch extra crews to the area around the stadium in case of power-related problems, such as a recent breaker fire that left 10,000 customers in homes south of downtown without power. Spokeswoman Crystal Livers-Powers said the company doesn't anticipate any power issues.
Straub, the public safety director, said he's confident the city is prepared and notes that Indianapolis hosts major events "pretty regularly."
Special teams from the Department of Energy will sweep Lucas Oil Stadium and the surrounding area for nuclear terror threats, and a new $18 million high-tech communications center that opened in time for the lead-up to the game will tie it all together.
"We're using more technology, and state of the art technology, than has been used in any Super Bowl before this one," Straub said.
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FILE - In this Jan. 22, 2011 file photo, a kimono-clad elderly woman walks across a street in Tokyo. Japan's rapid aging means the national population of 128 million will shrink by one-third by 2060 and seniors will account for 40 percent of people, placing a greater burden on the shrinking work force population to support the social security and tax systems. The population estimate released Monday, Jan. 30 by the Health and Welfare Ministry paints a grim future. (AP Photo/Junji Kurokawa, File)
FILE - In this Jan. 22, 2011 file photo, a kimono-clad elderly woman walks across a street in Tokyo. Japan's rapid aging means the national population of 128 million will shrink by one-third by 2060 and seniors will account for 40 percent of people, placing a greater burden on the shrinking work force population to support the social security and tax systems. The population estimate released Monday, Jan. 30 by the Health and Welfare Ministry paints a grim future. (AP Photo/Junji Kurokawa, File)
FILE - In this Jan. 1, 2012 file photo, worshippers pack the compound of Sensoji temple to pray in the hope of receiving a New Year's blessing in the Asakusa district in Tokyo. Japan's rapid aging means the national population of 128 million will shrink by one-third by 2060 and seniors will account for 40 percent of people, placing a greater burden on the shrinking work force population to support the social security and tax systems. The population estimate released Monday, Jan. 30 by the Health and Welfare Ministry paints a grim future. The sign reads, "Please advance in good order." (AP Photo/Hiro Komae, File)
TOKYO (AP) ? Japan's rapid aging means the national population of 128 million will shrink by one-third by 2060 and seniors will account for 40 percent of people, placing a greater burden on the shrinking work force population to support the social security and tax systems.
The population estimate released Monday by the Health and Welfare Ministry paints a grim future.
In year 2060, Japan will have 87 million people. The number of people 65 or older will nearly double to 40 percent, while the national work force of people between ages 15 and 65 will shrink to about half of the total population, according to the estimate, made by the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research.
The total fertility rate, or the expected number of children born per woman during lifetime, in 2060 is estimated at 1.35, down from 1.39 in 2010 ? well below more than 2 needed to keep the country's population from declining. But the average Japanese will continue to live longer. The average life expectancy for 2060 is projected at 90.93 for women, up from 86.39 in 2010, and 84.19 years for men, up from 79.64 years.
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda has pledged to push for social security and tax reforms this year. A bill he promised to submit by the end of March would raise the 5 percent sales tax in two stages to 8 percent in 2014 and 10 percent by 2015, although opposition lawmakers and the public pose challenges to its approval.
The institute says Japan has been the world's fastest aging country, and with its birthrate among the lowest, its population decline would be among the deepest globally in coming decades.
Experts say that Japan's population will keep losing 1 million every year in coming decades and the country urgently needs to overhaul its social security and tax system to reflect the demographic shift.
"Pension programs, employment and labor policy and social security system in this country is not designed to reflect such rapidly progressing population decline or aging," Noriko Tsuya, a demography expert at Keio University, said on public broadcaster NHK. "The government needs to urgently revise the system and implement new measures based on the estimate."
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New submitter Cinnamon Whirl writes "As a chemist, I work in a both lab and office enviroments, and need access to data in both, without causing undue clutter in either. My company has recently purchased two Win7 tablets for trial usage with electronic lab notebooks, propietry software, SAP, email etc. These are also useful for sharing in meetings, etc. As part of this project, I have been wondering whether we can use these tablets to detect other devices by proximity. Examples could include finding the nearest printer or monitor or, perhaps trickier, could two roaming devices find each other? Although lab technology is rarely cutting edge, I can see a day when all our sensors and probes will broadcast data (wireless thermocouples are already available), and positioning information will become much more important. What technologies exist to do this? How accurate can the detection be?"
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Girls are not as good at playing football as boys, and they do not have a clue about cars. Instead they know better how to dance and do not get into mischief as often as boys. Prejudices like these are cultivated from early childhood onwards by everyone. "Approximately at the age of three to four years children start to prefer children of the same sex, and later the same ethnic group or nationality," Prof. Dr. Andreas Beelmann of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Germany) states. This is part of an entirely normal personality development, the director of the Institute for Psychology explains. "It only gets problematic when the more positive evaluation of the own social group, which is adopted automatically in the course of identity formation, at some point reverts into bias and discrimination against others," Beelmann continues.
To prevent this, the Jena psychologist and his team have been working on a prevention programme for children. It is designed to reduce prejudice and to encourage tolerance for others. But when is the right time to start? Jena psychologists Dr. Tobias Raabe and Prof. Dr. Andreas Beelmann systematically summarise scientific studies on that topic and published the results of their research in the science journal Child Development (DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01668.x.).
According to this, the development of prejudice increases steadily at pre-school age and reaches its highest level between five and seven years of age. With increasing age this development is reversed and the prejudices decline. "This reflects normal cognitive development of children," Prof. Beelmann explains. "At first they adopt the social categories from their social environment, mainly the parents. Then they start to build up their own social identity according to social groups, before they finally learn to differentiate and individual evaluations of others will prevail over stereotypes." Therefore the psychologists reckon this age is the ideal time to start well-designed prevention programmes against prejudice. "Prevention starting at that age supports the normal course of development," Beelmann says. As the new study and the experience of the Jena psychologists with their prevention programme so far show, the prejudices are strongly diminished at primary school age, when children get in touch with members of so-called social out groups like, for instance children of a different nationality or skin colour. "This also works when they don't even get in touch with real people but learn it instead via books or told stories."
But at the same time the primary school age is a critical time for prejudices to consolidate. "If there is no or only a few contact to members of social out groups, there is no personal experience to be made and generalising negative evaluations stick longer." In this, scientists see an explanation for the particularly strong xenophobia in regions with a very low percentage of foreigners or migrants.
Moreover the Jena psychologists noticed that social ideas and prejudices are formed differently in children of social minorities. They do not have a negative attitude towards the majority to start with, more often it is even a positive one. The reason is the higher social status of the majority, which is being regarded as a role model. Only later, after having experienced discrimination, they develop prejudices, that then sticks with them much more persistently than with other children. "In this case prevention has to start earlier so it doesn't even get that far," Beelmann is convinced.
Generally, the psychologist of the Jena University stresses, the results of the new study don't imply that the children's and youths attitudes towards different social groups can't be changed at a later age. But this would then less depend on the individual development and very much more on the social environment like for instance changing social norms in our society. Tolerance on the other hand could be encouraged at any age. The psychologists' "prescription": As many diverse contacts to individuals belonging to different social groups as possible. "People who can identify with many groups will be less inclined to make sweeping generalisations in the evaluation of individuals belonging to different social groups or even to discriminate against them," Prof. Beelmann says.
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Raabe T, Beelmann A.: Development of ethnic, racial, and national prejudice in childhood and adolescence: A multinational meta-analysis of age differences. Child Development. 2011; 82(6):1715-37. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01668.x.
Friedrich-Schiller-Universitaet Jena: http://www.uni-jena.de
Thanks to Friedrich-Schiller-Universitaet Jena for this article.
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PARIS ? British actress Kate Winslet is to receive an honorary award next month from organizers of the French equivalent of the Academy Awards.
The versatile 36-year-old now on French screens in Roman Polanski's clashing-couples film "Carnage" will receive the honorary Cesar at the ceremony on Feb. 24.
France's Academy of Cinematic Arts and Techniques presented nominations for the 37th Cesar Awards ceremony on Friday.
Child-protection drama "Polisse" led with 13 nominations, while silent, black-and-white film "The Artist" garnered 11.
France's National Cinematic Center has said French movie theaters sold 211 million tickets last year ? a 45-year high, and a 4-percent increase from 2010.
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NEWARK, N.J. ? The state's largest city must produce a list of documents related to a $100 million pledge to its public schools from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, a judge ruled Friday.
The ruling stemmed from of a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of a group representing Newark schoolchildren that is seeking more transparency about the donation. The Associated Press and other news outlets also have made such requests.
State Superior Court Judge Rachel Davidson's ruling requires the city to produce the list, believed to enumerate about 50 pages of emails pertaining to the donation, by Feb. 10. The city could seek to block the publishing of some of the emails on the list, according to ACLU New Jersey attorney Ed Barocas.
The city, in a response letter to an AP request for the documents in 2010, said that any conversations between Democratic Mayor Cory Booker and Zuckerberg were "not made in the course of the Mayor's official duties" and therefore were exempt from open-records laws.
Were Booker found to have been acting in his capacity as mayor, the letter continued, the city didn't have the records requested. But it added that if the records were found, their release was barred under executive privilege.
The ACLU, in its lawsuit, argued that privilege can be claimed only by the governor, not by a sitting mayor. It argued that the public has a right to know how the grant funds are to be used and who is making the decisions on their allocation.
"We don't want to make it seem that there was necessarily something nefarious going on," Barocas said Friday. "All we ask is for this to be transparent. The public should be aware what, if any, agreements were made prior to or as part of the grant of the money."
City attorney Anna Pereira declined to comment Friday, citing the ongoing litigation.
In court filings, the city has said that the Facebook grant is being administered not by the city but by two not-for-profits that it doesn't fund, operate or exercise any control over. The city's schools were placed under state control in 1995 after instances of waste and mismanagement, including the spending of taxpayer money by school board members on cars and restaurant meals.
Newark's public school system is the state's largest, with 75 schools and a student population of about 40,000, according to its website. The schools have been plagued for years by low test scores, poor graduation rates and crumbling buildings.
The $100 million pledge to the schools was announced in the fall of 2010 by Booker, Zuckerberg and Republican Gov. Chris Christie as they appeared together on Oprah Winfrey's syndicated talk show.
Zuckerberg described the gift as a "challenge grant" to Booker, who has sought to raise $100 million more to match what Zuckerberg promised to contribute over five years. Zuckerberg's social networking website, based in Palo Alto, Calif., is estimated to be worth more than $50 billion.
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KABUL, Afghanistan ? France's plans to withdraw its combat troops from Afghanistan a year early drew harsh words Saturday in the Afghan capital, with critics accusing French President Nicolas Sarkozy of putting domestic politics ahead of Afghans' safety.
A wider proposal by Sarkozy for NATO to hand over all security to Afghans by the end of next year also came under fire, with one Afghan lawmaker saying it would be "a big mistake" that would leave security forces unprepared to fight the Taliban insurgency and threaten a new descent into violence in the 10-year-old war.
Sarkozy's decision, which came a week after four French troops were shot dead by an Afghan army trainee suspected of being a Taliban infiltrator, raises new questions about the unity of the U.S.-led military coalition.
It also reopens the debate over whether setting a deadline for troop withdrawals will allow the Taliban to run out the clock and seize more territory once foreign forces are gone.
"Afghan forces are not self-sufficient yet. They still need more training, more equipment and they need to be stronger," said military analyst Abdul Hadi Khalid, Afghanistan's former interior minister.
Khalid said the decision by Sarkozy was clearly political. Sarkozy's conservative party faces a tough election this year, and the French public's already deep discontent with the Afghan war only intensified when unarmed French troops were gunned down by an Afghan trainee Jan. 20 at a joint base in the eastern province of Kapisa.
Sarkozy announced France's new timetable on Friday alongside Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who was in Paris for a previously planned visit. He also said Karzai had agreed with him to ask for all international forces to hand security over to the Afghan army and police in 2013, a plan he would present at a Feb. 2-3 meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels. He said he would call President Barack Obama about his plan on Saturday.
Afghan lawmaker Tahira Mujadedi said Afghan security forces will not be ready in time for any early NATO withdrawal, saying the current timetable already is rushing the training of national forces.
"That would be a big mistake by the Afghan government if they accept it," Mujadedi said of Sarkozy's plan. "In my view, they should extend 2014 by more years instead of cutting it short to 2013."
She said she sympathizes in the matter of the French soldiers' deaths, but argued that they present no logical reason for France to deviate from the U.S. timetable for NATO to hand over security by 2014.
"When military forces are present in a war zone, anything can happen," Mujadedi said. The French troops "are not here for a holiday."
France now has about 3,600 soldiers in the international force, which is mostly made up of American troops.
Afghan forces started taking the lead for security in certain areas of the country last year and the plan has been to add more areas, as Afghan police and soldiers were deemed ready to take over from foreign troops.
According to drawdown plans already announced by the U.S. and more than a dozen other nations, the foreign military footprint in Afghanistan will shrink by an estimated 40,000 troops at the close of this year. Washington is pulling out the most ? 33,000 by the end of the year. That's one-third of 101,000 U.S. troops that were in Afghanistan in June, the peak of the U.S. military presence in the war, Pentagon figures show.
Sarkozy also said France would hand over authority in the province of Kapisa, where the French troops were killed this month, by the end of March. Karzai's office confirmed that decision Saturday, saying it was made at the French president's request.
The NATO coalition has started to hand over security in several areas of Afghanistan, aiming to transfer about half of the country in the coming months. But Kapisa was not one of the provinces earmarked for handover, according to U.S. Navy Lt. James McCue, a coalition spokesman.
Mujadedi, a lawmaker who represents Kapisa, argued that Afghan forces in her province are not ready to go it alone in fighting the Taliban insurgency, which is especially strong in several of the province's districts. She warned that if NATO forces do pull back from Kapisa, it could also destabilize nearby Kabul.
"We have had so many attacks, ambushes and also suicide attacks in Kapisa," Mujadedi said. "Unfortunately, our national police and army, while present in Kapisa, are unable to provide good security for people."
France's early withdrawal announcement could step up pressure on other European governments like Britain, Italy and Germany, which also have important roles in Afghanistan.
Karzai, who praised the role of France and other NATO allies, didn't object at Friday's joint news conference when Sarkozy said the 2013 NATO withdrawal timetable was sought by both France and Afghanistan.
However, the Afghan leader appeared to suggest that it was a high-end target.
"We hope to finish the transition ... by the end of 2013 at the earliest ? or by the latest as has been agreed upon ? by the end of 2014," Karzai said.
Nick Witney, a senior policy fellow at the Paris-based European Council on Foreign Relations, said public support of the war in Europe started sliding fast after the coalition agreed to end the combat mission in 2014.
"It has become more and more difficult to justify every single casualty, since it's now clear that these are wasted lives," said Witney, a former head of the European Defense Agency.
"Most European policymakers realize that on a purely cost-benefit assessment, we would all leave Afghanistan tomorrow," Witney said.
___
Associated Press writer Slobodan Lekic in Brussels contributed to this report.
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KABUL, Afghanistan ? A suicide attacker detonated a car laden with powerful explosives Thursday in southern Afghanistan, killing four Afghan civilians and wounding 31 other people, including three British aid workers, officials said.
Britain's International Development ministry in London confirmed that three civilian members of the international aid team were among those injured in the blast. They were being treated for non-life threatening wounds, the ministry said.
The bomb exploded as a convoy from the British-led Provincial Reconstruction Team passed by in Lashkar Gah, capital of Helmand province, said Daud Ahmadi, a spokesman for the provincial governor.
More than two dozen Provincial Reconstruction Teams operate in Afghanistan. The joint international military-civilian units work on projects to boost support for the Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai.
No one claimed responsibility for the car bomb. Helmand has been one of the most volatile areas in the Taliban insurgency's pushback against a U.S.-led initiative to bring southern Afghanistan under greater control of the central Afghan government as NATO heads toward a 2014 pullout target.
The blast ripped through the convoy of three armored vehicles, knocking at least one over and charring others. The explosion also shredded nearby storefronts and damaged at least 17 civilian cars nearby, a provincial statement said.
Afghan National Army soldier Dad Mohammad witnessed the attack while on patrol in the town.
"A car passed our vehicle and parked down the road," he said. "When the foreigners' vehicle was passing this road, it was targeted and there was an explosion."
A spokesman for NATO declined to comment on the attack, referring all questions to the Afghan provincial government.
Karzai, who is on a trip meeting European leaders, condemned the attack. A statement from his office Thursday blamed "the enemy of the Afghan people" for the violence, which it called "un-Islamic and against humanity."
Elsewhere, officials said a rocket fired by Taliban insurgents killed a woman and her child in eastern Afghanistan.
Insurgents fired the mortar round during a battle Wednesday with Afghan army soldiers trying to clear militants from a stronghold in Kapisa province's Alasay district, said the provincial governor's chief of staff, Abdul Sabor Wafa.
In the south, an Afghan toddler was accidentally killed and the child's parents were wounded when Danish soldiers blew up a roadside bomb Monday in Helmand province, the Danish army said. The army said in a statement issued Wednesday that soldiers typically create a security zone around such a device before detonation, but shrapnel struck the three. The case is being investigated.
___
Associated Press reporter Mirwais Khan in Kandahar and David Stringer in London contributed to this report.
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LOS ANGELES, Jan 26 (TheWrap.com) - DirecTV and Sunbeam Entertainment have broken bread and ended the carriage dispute that caused customers in Boston and Miami to miss both the Packers-Giants NFL playoff game and the Golden Globes earlier this month.
"We are pleased to have reached an agreement to end the Sunbeam blackout, and regret that any of our customers were forced into the middle of a business dispute where they should never have been in the first place," DirecTV said in a statement Thursday. "We believe, like many, the public interest is best served by allowing customers to keep their local broadcast stations as we negotiate future agreements, rather than being denied access by broadcast stations and used as leverage in what should be a private business matter."
The statement added, "The Sunbeam-owned stations - WHDH and WLVI in Boston and WSVN in Miami - are now available for DIRECTV customers in those cities."
The disagreement between the two companies came to a head on January 13 when, unable to reach a deal with DirecTV, Sunbeam pulled its programming from the service. That left customers of Fox affiliate WSVN in Miami and viewers of CW affiliate WLVI and NBC affiliate WHDH, both in Boston, in the dark. In all, approximately 450,000 customers were affected.
Things got ugly on January 15, as both the Golden Globes and the playoff game prepared to air. Customers engaged in a mass Twitter protest throughout the Globes telecast. Meanwhile, Sunbeam rejected a request from DirecTV to air the football game despite the lack of a contract just prior to kickoff.
During the blackout, DirecTV issued a statement to its subscribers saying it was "working hard to bring back your local channel as quickly as possible" -- while adding that Sunbeam was trying to "extort a more than 300 percent fee increase to carry WSVN in Miami, and WHDH and WLVI in Boston."
DirecTV did not disclose the terms of the new agreement.
(Editing By Zorianna Kit)
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RALEIGH, N.C. ? North Carolina Gov. Beverly Perdue, facing a hard fight for a second term, will not seek re-election, a Democratic official said Thursday.
The first woman elected governor in North Carolina history, Perdue faced a potential rematch against former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory, a Republican whom she narrowly defeated in 2008 in the state's closest gubernatorial contest since 1972. Perdue's win was partly attributed to Barack Obama's surprise win in North Carolina.
Perdue was expected to make a formal announcement later Thursday, according to a Democratic official, who requested anonymity in order to discuss the governor's decision.
News of Perdue's decision came as North Carolina Democratic Rep. Brad Miller said he also would not seek re-election, avoiding a potential primary contest against fellow Democrat David Price after the Republican-controlled Legislature drew them into the same district.
North Carolina is considered an important state for Obama's re-election prospects and Democrats decided to hold the party convention in Charlotte in September.
Perdue has struggled with a state economy hit hard by the recession and an unemployment rate persistently above the national average. Polling conducted throughout her term has consistently shown her approval ratings hovering around 40 percent.
The first-term governor has clashed with the new Republican leadership in the General Assembly, which swept into power after the 2010 elections and gave GOP control of the Legislature for the first time since the 1870s. Perdue has traded jabs with Republican leaders on issues ranging from jobless benefits to a measure allowing death row inmates to use statistical evidence of racial bias to challenge their convictions. In a sign of the tension, she vetoed a record 16 bills last year.
A native of New Bern, N.C., Perdue worked as a teacher and director of geriatric services at a hospital in her home town before entering politics. She served in the Legislature and as lieutenant governor before being elected governor.
___
Associated Press writer Tom Breen in Raleigh, N.C., contributed to this report.
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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Tom Sherak is seen before the start of the Academy nominations for the 84th Annual Academy Awards on Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012 in Beverly Hills, Calif. The 84th Annual Academy Awards will take place on Sunday, Feb. 26 at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Tom Sherak is seen before the start of the Academy nominations for the 84th Annual Academy Awards on Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012 in Beverly Hills, Calif. The 84th Annual Academy Awards will take place on Sunday, Feb. 26 at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)
Producer Brian Grazer is seen after the nominations for the 84th Annual Academy Awards on Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012 in Beverly Hills, Calif. The 84th Annual Academy Awards will take place on Sunday, Feb. 26 at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)
Jennifer Lawrence and The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Tom Sherak announce the Adapted Screenplay nominations for the 84th Annual Academy Awards on Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012 in Beverly Hills, Calif. The 84th Annual Academy Awards will take place on Sunday, Feb. 26 at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)
LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Potential Oscar winners will now be a click away from winning a trophy.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced Wednesday that it has partnered with a company to develop an electronic voting system for next year's 85th annual Academy Awards.
The motion picture academy says it entered into an agreement with Everyone Counts Inc. to exclusively to work with longtime accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers to create the new system.
Oscar voting in the past has been compiled through paper ballots sent through the mail.
Ric Robertson, the Academy's chief operating officer, said in a statement that it's the first step the Academy is taking "toward developing a secure and convenient electronic voting system."
The 84th annual Academy Awards are set for Feb. 26.
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ANKARA (Reuters) ? Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan warned his Iraqi counterpart, Nuri al-Maliki, on Tuesday that Ankara would not remain silent if he pursued a sectarian conflict in his country.
A war of words between the two neighbors has added to heightened regional tension. Turkey fears Iraq is heading toward a full-scale sectarian war while Baghdad has accused Ankara of meddling.
"Esteemed Maliki should know this - if you start a period of conflict in Iraq within a sectarian struggle, it will be impossible for us to remain silent," Erdogan told his AK Party parliamentary group in the Turkish capital.
Maliki's office responded with a statement again criticizing Turkey's "interference" in Iraq's affairs.
"This is not acceptable in the dealings between officials of different states and especially from heads of state," Maliki's office said. "Mr Erdogan has to be more careful in handling the usual protocols in international relations."
Fears of renewed sectarian conflict in Iraq have increased since U.S. troops withdrew in December and Maliki's Shi'ite-led government sought the arrest of a Sunni vice president on accusations he ran death squads.
Maliki's government denies it has a sectarian agenda, but the arrest warrant threatens to wreck a fragile ruling coalition that led to Sunni and Kurdish groups joining Maliki's cabinet.
DIPLOMATIC ROLE
Iraq summoned the Turkish ambassador in Baghdad last week to complain about comments by some Turkish officials it said amounted to meddling in its internal affairs.
While Iraq did not specify what Turkish remarks they were angry about, the complaint appeared to stem from comments this month by Erdogan, who said a Sunni-Shi'ite conflict in Iraq, if unleashed, could engulf the entire Islamic world.
Mainly Sunni but officially secular Turkey has sought to play a bigger diplomatic role in the Middle East, backed up by its growing might as the world's 16th biggest economy.
But while Ankara insists it maintains its official "zero problems with the neighbors" foreign policy, its support for Syrian demonstrators has drawn it into tensions with Iran, one of the main backers of the Damascus government.
Analysts say Turkey has heavily courted Sunni and Kurdish political blocs in Iraq in recent years while Iraq's Shi'ite parties remain closer to Shi'ite Iran.
In an interview with al-Hurra television this month, Maliki said: "Turkey is unfortunately playing a role which may lead to disaster and civil war in the region."
Tuesday, Erdogan described Maliki's comments about Turkey meddling in Iraq's affairs as "unfortunate" and "ugly."
"That Turkey is backing or is against a particular ethnic group or sect, whether in Syria or Iraq or in any other country in the region, is out of the question," Erdogan said.
"We see every problem in our region from a position of peace, stability and loyalty."
At least two rockets were fired at the Turkish embassy in Baghdad last week, Iraqi and Turkish sources said, prompting condemnation from Ankara which said it expected Iraq to take steps to provide security for Turkey's diplomatic missions.
Iraq is now Turkey's second biggest export market after Germany, with trade volume between the two reaching nearly $12 billion in 2011, Turkey's economy minister said during a visit to northern Iraq last week.
More than half of that trade is with Kurdistan, which puts the region in Turkey's top-10 trading partners.
(Writing by Jonathon Burch; Editing by Alison Williams and Robert Woodward)
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WASHINGTON ? A Republican bill that would strip President Barack Obama of his authority to decide on a Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline raises "serious" legal questions, the State Department said Wednesday in objecting to the bill.
Assistant Secretary of State Kerri-Ann Jones told Congress that the bill "imposes narrow time constraints and creates automatic mandates that prevent an informed decision" on the $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., would transfer authority over the 1,700-mile pipeline to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Obama blocked the $7 billion pipeline last week, saying officials did not have enough time to review an alternate route that avoided environmentally sensitive areas of Nebraska.
The plan by Calgary-based TransCanada Corp. would carry tar sands oil from western Canada across Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma en route to refineries on the Texas Gulf Coast.
Jones said Obama's Jan. 18 decision to reject the pipeline was not based on the merits of the project, but on the fact that officials did not have enough time to review the project before a deadline imposed by Congress.
"We fought in World War II in less time than it has taken to decide on this project," shot back Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas. "In all due respect, it is an insult to the American people to say you need more time."
TransCanada first applied to build the pipeline in 2008, under the Bush administration.
Obama had delayed a decision on the pipeline in November, saying his administration needed time to review an alternate route that avoided environmentally sensitive areas of Nebraska ? a route that still has not been proposed. But in an unrelated tax deal he cut with congressional Republicans, Obama had been boxed into making a decision by Feb. 21.
The deal required that the project would go forward unless Obama declared by that date that it was not in the national interest. The president did just that last week.
Project supporters say U.S. rejection of the pipeline will not stop one from being built. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said Canada is serious about building a pipeline to its West Coast, where oil could be shipped to China and other Asian markets.
TransCanada has said it will submit a new application once an alternative route for the pipeline is established. Company chief Russ Girling said a proposed route could be made public in a few weeks.
TransCanada says the pipeline could create as many as 20,000 jobs, a figure opponents say is inflated. A State Department report last summer said the pipeline would create up to 6,000 jobs during construction
The pipeline is a dicey proposition for Obama, who enjoyed strong support from both organized labor and environmentalists in his 2008 campaign for the White House.
Environmental advocates have made it clear that approval of the pipeline would dampen their enthusiasm for Obama in November. Some liberal donors even threatened to cut off funds to Obama's re-election campaign to protest the project, which opponents say would transport "dirty oil" that requires huge amounts of energy to extract and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming.
By rejecting the pipeline, Obama also risks losing support from organized labor, a key part of the Democratic base, for thwarting thousands of jobs.
__
Matthew Daly can be followed on Twitter: (at)MatthewDalyWDC
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